River Frome at Thrupp, near Stroud

Sunny weather prompted me to call my friend J and suggest a walk. She wanted to meet at Waitrose, on my side of town, and from there we took a stroll along the canal, over the river Frome, which was in spate, and across the open farmland of Rodborough Fields to the suburb of Rodborough. I wanted to go uphill gently rather than all at once, so we strolled around Rodborough and its red brick villas until we came to the limestone cottages and grander houses of Butterow Lane. As we came to the junction, where Dark Lane slopes upwards to to the high, open common land, I had a sudden urge to visit the ice cream factory, which is probably the only such factory in the middle of the countryside. It's open 364 days a year, and Google Maps said it was 27 minutes' walk, so we slogged up and when we got to the common, the snow/ice on the grass was still crunchy and the skies bright. I felt I had tipped over into a holiday in another country. Maybe one with Alps.

At Winstone's I had a double: honey and ginger ice cream with a scoop of coffee ice cream. J went for seasonal flavours: Christmas pudding and chocolate orange in a hundreds and thousands-studded cone. She made it last about an hour! The coffee ice cream has reverted to its original flavour (it went through a period of being called coffee and cream, which was lacking strength and distinction).

We walked down the side of the common to a road which may or may not have been Bagpath Lane, curving around the combes of the common. The views over Stroud, Thrupp and Brimscombe are remarkable. The houses straggle along the road which goes up and down, eventually becoming Montserrat (why?) which then turns into Butterow, named after the archery butts which were once part of life in this hamlet, when archery practice was still compulsory on Sundays. The road called Butterow is well below Butterow Lane, where we walked earlier, and both are part of the same hamlet located on the opposite side of the Golden Valley from Bowbridge, where I live.

From Butterow we descended via a footpath to the canal with its hump-backed bridges, and there I noticed that the nearby river Frome had burst its banks. A mist was forming over the water, the sun was setting, and I was transported to the swamplands of a steamier continent, though I failed to spot any alligators, hard as I tried.

One last little stretch of straight canal to Bowbridge, and from there we walked along the wiggly bit, re-landscaped in 2013, which is hilly because the canal had to be re-routed and the path went over a former landfill dump, now concreted, pinioned and landscaped. Strange but true. The canal goes along the flat valley bottom, but the path crosses the hill. Thus we found ourselves back at Waitrose, several hours after we started out.

I got some shopping done, and was just engaging in what was turning out to be a deeply Calvinistic conversation about the impending lockdown (I had not heard that we are about to be placed in tier 4 from midnight) when I was rescued by another friend, whom I had not recognised in his mask. I hadn't seen him for about a year, so we decided to have coffee, before realising there was nowhere to go in tier 3! In the end he gave J a lift partway home (we kept our masks on) and then he came back to mine and we crashed through the side passage in the dark to the back garden and the cabin. We had coffee in there with the door open and masks on when not drinking. I cannot bear to imagine that life will always be like this. He even refused Christmas cake because he says he's pre-diabetic. We did manage a giggle or two, though. We always do. He's looking after his teenage grandson several days a week now. When I met R, he was younger than I am now,so, he must be one of my first friends in Stroud. Him and J both.

Then I went in and watched the dreary old government press conference. I have to say I'm somewhat alarmed about the prospect of going back to nursery next week, Hogmanay or no Hogmanay.

I couldn't have wished for a better day: sunshine, tramping, hours spent out of doors, in the company of friends. All that, and ice cream too! My cone runneth over.