Crossing Regent Street tonight (long story – delayed tubes) I found myself next to a blind man.

‘Excuse me,’ he said.

Me: ‘Can I help you?’

Him: ‘Will you tell me when it’s safe to cross.’

‘Of course,’ I said, looping my arm through his. He tapped about with his stick for a bit and then stepped into the road.

‘Hold on,’ I said. ‘It’s still red.’

‘I know it’s red,’ he said. ‘But there’s surely nothing coming.’

And he dragged me across the road in front of a bus.

We both made it to the other side.

Our exploration of the Essex Way continued this weekend as we strode out in Great Leighs.

Now it’s years since I’ve been through Great Leighs. Through, rather than to, you note. Before the fast road opened it was the best way from Chelmsford to Braintree, and in all honesty I’d probably been spending more time looking at the traffic ahead than I had the surroundings.

What a shame. Turns out Great Leighs is very nice. We parked up at the village hall and struck out across the fields, through some woods and a wood yard, along the backs of some cute smallholdings populated by chickens, bantams and guinea pigs and down to the river, which we followed for three or four miles.

We should have followed it further, unfortunately, but got ourselves mixed up (we were eating Creme Eggs at the time and it’s easy to be distracted) and turned right one road too soon, putting ourselves on a long loop up through the centre of our route.

In fairness that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing as we were starting to flag, and it means we can do the other half another time. We did find this dinky spring by the side of the road close to Great Leighs church, on Cole Lane. You can see where it is on Google Maps by following this link.

So we went into Halfords for an air freshener. Somehow we came out with a tent.

Yes, if you’re counting, this is my third tent. But what a lovely tent is is. Its wide, it’s long, it’s tall. Tall enough to stand up in without bashing your head on a lantern hanging from the roof support. And not just any lantern, either: a free lantern. To go with the free torch, the free sleeping bags – all four of them – and the two free double airbeds (I’ve always been a bit anti-airbeds when it comes to tents, but I have to admit that they felt very nice).

Oh, and the free compressor to blow them up, too.

It all packs into a nice big kit bag you can throw in the back of the car and was a bit of a bargain. Less than half price, all told. When you add up the cost of the air beds and the sleeping bags alone they come to £19 less than the tent. Add in the compressor, the torch, the lantern and the kit-bag and they’re paying you to take it off their hands.

Even at full price it would have been a good deal.

Cannot wait to get out and use it – likely towards the end of May when the weather is warm and the mozzie netting will come in handy.

Which of course means I have my old six-man tent to sell as you really don’t need two-, four- and six-man tents in your collection, do you.

Anyone want to buy it?

Yesterday wasn’t actually mum’s birthday. It was a few days ago. And yesterday wasn’t really like the queen’s official and actual birthdays – it was just a far better day for us all to get together and celebrate.

Sal and Dan were over for the weekend, with Will in tow, obviously. Viv came down on the train. Therese and Peter drove over; Kim and Mikey drive down, and everyone converged on Galleywood. Even the sun put in an appearance, and we all started the day sitting in the garden on chairs that haven’t seen the light of day since last summer. They’re already talking of a barbecue summer, so I’m hoping that was the start of it… but then they said that last year, too, didn’t they. Look where that got us.

Sun aside, it felt very much like Christmas, chiefly on account of eating far too much. There was lots of chat and laughter and some game-playing, and Rich and I headed out for a walk mid-afternoon, around the more rural parts of the village. It’s surprising how many people have chickens. We counted four houses into whose gardens we could see, so I guess we could safely double that when you consider how many we couldn’t.

We were the last to leave in the end, taking the traditional platefuls of food with us, which will see us through a few eats for the rest of the week.

Much fun.

A bit of a sinking feeling, fortunately averted.

Rich’s mum came over for mothers’ day weekend, with Ean and Vikki and we’d booked ourselves into the Saracen’s Head for lunch.

A bit of a spur of the moment booking after the other places we tried were either full or had gone ‘family friendly’ and installed ball pools. Still, it looked nice and the menu was good.

Then we had to change our booking, and that’s when I found the reviews. Terrible, terrible reviews. And even worse, an episode of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares in the kitchen there when it was called D-Place. Lots of Ramsay swearing and then, apparently, it went bust.

According to the News of the World:

In Chelmsford, Essex, D-Place went bust just two weeks after the cameras left. Owner Israel Pons said: “The menu Ramsay came up with was extremely poor. We dropped 50 per cent in sales. He wasn’t the saviour everyone seemed to think he would be.”

This, I kept quiet about. It was far too late for us to go anywhere else.

I’m so glad I did. The service may have been a little slow, but food was excellent, and Ean even declared the pate the best he had ever tasted.

If I could remember where I’d read the reviews I’d head back and add my own, refuting them.

Out of five? A good four.

It’s a long, long time since I’ve been to Cressing. I went years ago, when I was a student and had no money on a day off college and turned around when I got to the barns and saw that you had to pay to get in.

Anyhow, today we headed back there. The sun was out for pretty much the first time since October and it felt like the first weekend of spring, so we dug out the walks book and opened on a random page. This is where it took us.

The walk, which started in White Notley, followed a short stretch of the Essex Way, an 80-odd mile footpath that stretches from Epping to Harwich through surprisingly unspoiled countryside.

White Notley itself is little more than a small town, with the dinkiest train station (one platform, one track, no car park) sat at the start of the walk. We quickly broke away from the road, past old farm buildings and across ploughed fields.

Eventually we found ourselves at the famed Templar barns, now coming up for 900 years old and in remarkable condition. If you’d told me they were replicas, build five years ago I could quite have believed you.

We didn’t go in. We got diverted by the tea shop and sat reading about what was inside them, but as soon as we discovered it was waxwork people and ‘display boards’ (yawn) we skipped the cultural bit and headed off across the fields again.

All in all, though, an excellent walk of four and a bit miles out in the middle of nowhere. Let’s hope this heralds the start of a good summer of walking. We could do with it after the winter we’ve just had.

We’ve got some new chickens. Our little flock of three was always supposed to be a starting point, from which we’d eventually expand to 10 or so over time. Well, today was the first step in that expansion.

We’ve had Barbara, Gerry and Margo for a year and a half now, so it was a bit of a shock for them when Gabrielle, chicken and chicken appeared in the coop overnight. They should have been chicken, chicken and chicken as we were determined not to give them names, but one of them has a dodgy eye, and so she immediately became Gabrielle.

Whether it’s this that makes her such a softie, I don’t know, but she is very happy being picked up and held. I even put her on my lap and she just sat there without me hanging on to her.

Anyhow, as recommended we dropped them into the coop tonight when the other chickens were in bed so they’ll all wake up together tomorrow morning.

I’ll track their progress over on my other blog, Blagger. Check it out to see how they’re getting on.