The notebook has this one down for the eleventh of January and the first line is the frost. Hard frost overnight, towpath like glass — that's written down, and I remember it an' all, because I went along that stretch holding the wall like an old man, which I suppose I'm nearer to now than I were then. Right trainer, white gone grey, laces still in and frozen stiff. It were by the third lock gate.
I tried a photograph and it didn't come out, which were the way of things in them days more often than not. I'll have had the flask, though the notebook doesn't say — I weren't recording flask conditions till 2015. A cold start to what turned out a settled year.
Written up August 2026, from the notebook.