This is the way to enjoy BCUK!

With a few rainy working days behind me, im sat here enjoying BCUK in style ;) Outside on the balcony with my firebasket going nicely, ice cold Mangers, wireless laptop for BCUK, listening to some sweet harmonica blues and a lovely big beech tree at the end of the garden, it dosent get much better! Well I suppose it could; I could be somewhere deep

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I'm not looking forward to the seemingly endless concrete motorway, the smell of the city, urban traffic jams, endless streams of people on the street and the over-heated hotel where you can only open the window wide enough to pass through your credit card.

I am looking forward to seeing the old folks and an evening meal at a nearby cosmopolitan sea-front restaurant hopefully taking in

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More grinding today, shaping the knife more and taking the crap off the sides. I've still got a couple of ml to take off the sides to get it to my desired thickness and the file/teeth marks will probably come off with that work.

I've got the bevel-edge to put on, drill the holes through the handle and then shape some Oak wood down for my handle.

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Today I’ve taken Thorin, Rowan and my nephew and niece Harry and Cerys fly fishing, although it’s not actually me, I’ve been more the lift to the big lake.  There’s a few different schools around here that have fly fishing classes, my kids go each week and learn about fly tieing, casting etc and then each holiday they’re out for the day with the fly fishing teacher, I’ve just come along to help out and I’m sitting

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Well with a bunch of old files that myself and a friend collected we went to work and started playing around with them. I started playing around with the smallest yet chuckiest file with a small blade in mind, only to find after spending a good time on it I find that my friend intended it to be his tool of use! So I was back to the drawing board, lol.

Anyway

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My first chance to mention the Moot and how great it was to see old friends and make new ones. There were some great skill sharing going on which added a huge amount to what people got out of the event.

I can’t say that the weather was kind to us as it started raining on Sat and was still raining on Monday when we left, I suppose it’s fair to say that it could have been worse, some of the trees that came down in

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I've been thinking and asking some questions about putting up my own web-page. We've had some visitors over the past few days, amongst whom was a young ladknowledgeable in these matters but I'm still not convinced I know enough to take the next step. Seems like you have to pay different people for either .com or co.uk adresses then pay someone else to keep the words on the screen. Something like Blogspot was mentioned, but again I'm happier hitting things with heavy impliments

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...and it was lovely.

 This is the view over the old bronze age hill fort

The sky was a fantastic colour - even thistles looked great against it

Saw this oil beetle and though "wow what a colour

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Just back from the moot and fingers thawing out at last. A fantastic few days with lots of new skills learnt (thanks Jason for the bow drill lesson - Bob for the cordage session). Great talks from Stuart and a wonderful Viking story from Wayland.

 The final night was pretty rough for those of us that didn't retreat to the barn. Had to move Mark from the edge of

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A warm glow is the result of my first moot.

I've learnt to: use a knife, build a shelter, survive in the jungle, make felt, cook bannock, start fire, make a coconut cup, knot nets, identify foreign survival kits, carve wood, enjoy viking tales, make willow whistles, identify evergreens, treat minor wounds, make nettle cord, coo like an owl, make a cheery cherry pouch and that spruce tea is lushcious.

No man is an island, thanx for the love.

deb