A short stroll today - kind of falling in between a proper walk and the short
sprints, however what tipped it over the edge was the events on the walk
itself.
Steph was around as she had some work with Toby over at the Leonardslee
Christmas lightshow, and wanted a short walk before work, so I though we could
go up the canal and back around via the lane - a common dog walk.
We knew it was going to be "different" when we got to the Adder field and found
the stream had broken its banks and the field was underwater. We waded through
and up to the canal which showed the depth to be about 5cm under the top of the
wellies.
At the canal we followed it up to the lock at Furzen Wood and continued on to
Gennets wood lock. The original idea was to turn along the Sussex Border Path
here, however one look across the field showed that the flooding here was worse
than back at the Adder field.
A quick though and I came up with an alternative to walk up towards Sydney Wood
and then take the path across to Sydney Farm where I thought the flooding would
be spread over a larger area and hence shallower.
Beyond the farm the path dropped down to a bridge hidden in a hedge - it looked
flooded but still passable. We dropped down and crossed the first barrier and
onto the flooded bridge deck under water. The deck felt solid until about half
way across where a plank was floating. Bertie stepped over the plank and
suddenly he was swimming - the deck had vanished. Luckily the stream was not
flowing too strongly and he swam across to the far side and climbed out. Steph
and I followed by straddling the bridge using the lower handrails for foot
holds.
We were now on an island between two streams - the next bridge looked much the
same except the deck was above water. After this second one we would be over the
flooding and on higher ground.
Over the firs t stile to get onto the second bridge, following Bertie who jogged
over to the second stile on the far side. I stopped to take a photo of the final
obstacle, when the next thing I knew was performing a self arrest on a crevasse
rescue. The bridge deck had collapsed below my feet and I fell into the water
below, only to stop when I held myself at waist level. The photo I was taking
actually only showed my surprise and Bertie's tail during the fall.
Now completely soaked from the waist and with Wellies full of water I had to
pull myself out the hole and continue to the end of the bridge and through the
next puddle to the final stile. I had actually been dangling feet first in the
water and was lucky the wellies stayed on my feet as the water swirled around
me.
I emptied the wellies out and we sploshed on climbing up to the Sussex border
path and now were back on the original route. The walk back down the Lane and
into the village was a strange kind of waddle - soaked and slopping around in
the boots.
Back home via the Ride and I could finally get out of my wet clothes (although
the trousers had started to dry, but my feet we still swimming).
