A Christmas Cruise

Hello everyone and Happy New Year!  Hanley, Endon and I have been busy bears already this year but, before I tell you about our first 2019 adventures, I want to share some Christmas memories with you.

We bears had a wonderful time, because we spent most of the holidays on Polar and Grizzly's narrowboat, Uplander II ('Uppie').  We love being on the boat, because it is small and cosy.  Polar brought some Christmas decorations and we wore our best sock jumpers, so everything looked very festive.

We went aboard on Christmas Eve.  We were glad we had wrapped up warm, because the boat was quite cold at first.  Once Polar had lit the fire, it soon warmed up and the sun came out too, which made everything look much more cheerful.

We watched the scenery from one of the windows, as Polar had made us a hammock from one of her scarves. It was lovely and snug, because we could pull it over our back paws and up to our tummies to keep us warm.  We were very lucky bears and saw two kingfishers on our journey.

After a sunny afternoon cruising quietly up the Macclesfield Canal, Polar and Grizzly moored at Congleton Wharf.  We hadn't been here before and thought it looked very nice and a good place to stop for the night.  

Unfortunately, the local ducks were very noisy, either pecking at the side of the boat to eat the algae off it, or quacking at each other late into the night, then some geese joined them who were even noisier.  We gave them hard stares out of the window, but they took no notice at all!

We had mini mincemeat tarts for Christmas Eve tea, then settled down and tried to sleep in a bed Polar made for us from the hammock scarf and some cushions.  Despite the noise from the ducks and geese, we eventually fell asleep and, when we woke up, it was Christmas Day!

'Presents for everyone!' cried Hanley Bear as soon as it was light, pulling them all out of their bag.  'I wonder what we've got?'

We all worked together to open two thin but quite heavy little parcels we had been sent by our Twitter friend Gecko.

She had sent us two lovely vintage books about things we love learning about - canals and railways - and they are a perfect size and weight for small bears to read.  We have added them to what Gecko calls our 'Libeary' of special small books.

Polar and Grizzly said we were going to have a few hours boating before we had Christmas dinner.  We watched from our hammock as we went under some of the very pretty 'turnover' bridges that the Macclesfield Canal is famous for, across an aqueduct beside the Dane Valley viaduct (no trains on Christmas Day!) and all through the countryside to the locks at Bosley.

Polar and Grizzly had to work the boat up through the bottom lock to turn it round, then bring it back down again, as we were going back towards Kidsgrove in the morning.  There was a very high hill near where we moored called 'The Cloud', which we couldn't see very well because it was hidden by low clouds!  

Polar gave us small bear dinners of turkey and vegetables before she and Grizzly tucked in to theirs, then we enjoyed a quiet evening reading our books and listening to a special concert on the radio about Paddington Bear, which was the perfect end to this small bear's Christmas.  

But we still had more boating adventures to come!

A Tudor Christmas

Today is the shortest day of the year, when many wild bears will be hibernating.  We small bears feel very much like doing the same!  However, I have a blog to write for you, about a visit we made to Little Moreton Hall last weekend.

Our human guardians, Polar and Grizzly, like to take us out for fresh air and regular walks during the winter but, when it has been very rainy, lots of our favourite footpaths are too muddy for small furry feet.  

'I know where we can take you,' Polar said.  'There's a Tudor house nearby, which is always decorated for Yuletide and will be fun for you to visit.  We take most of our friends there, but we haven't yet taken you three yet.'

We put our Christmas jumpers and hats on and scrambled into our bear bag.  Soon, we were at Little Moreton Hall.  It is a fantastic-looking house, with walls and floors running at all sorts of funny angles because it is so old.  Polar carried us up to the top of a little hill - made by humans - for a better view.

'The upstairs rooms aren't open at this time of year,' she said.  'We'll have to come again in the spring or summer, so you can run about in the Long Gallery.  I think you'll enjoy what they do downstairs, though.'

On the way in, some nice ladies were giving all the grown-up human visitors spiced apple brandy and little ginger biscuits.  Grizzly let us try a little sip of his drink and Polar shared her biscuit between us, which made us all warm inside.  

In the courtyard, we made friends with the jester, who was doing silly things to make the human cubs laugh.  He told us that there would be music in the Great Hall shortly and that there was a feast laid out on the table.  We all cheered.

'It's time for your run first, bears,' Polar said.  You can explore the Knot Garden.  People aren't allowed to walk on it but I don't think anyone will mind if small bears run around on the gravel.'

We ran about playing hide-and-seek among the hedges for a little while, before Polar called us back to get in the bear bag.  

'There will be lots of people in the Great Hall to hear the musicians,' she explained.  'You'll need to stay in the bag to avoid being accidentally trodden on.'

Polar was right.  We were squashed right at the back of the hall.  The musicians were a group called Piva, who play instruments like the ones the Tudors had and sing and play music from over five hundred years ago.  We liked it a lot.  Some of it was very pretty but there were also sing-along songs about drinking beer which made us laugh and had us bobbing up and down in the bear bag.

After singing songs about feasting and smelling the food on the table, we small bears felt very hungry.  Polar and Grizzly told us that the food was only for display and not to eat, but when the bear bag swung us close enough, we stretched out our paws and sneaked little pieces of fruit and nuts.

In another room there was a big octagonal table covered in sweet things to eat, but the lady sitting at the table was watching too closely for us to nibble anything.

Endon liked the look of the Tudor Rose sweets, which were made with honey.

'We'll have a nice tea, with home-made bread and mince pies, when we get home, little bears,' Polar promised.

'Can we make ginger biscuits and spiced apple brandy too?' asked Hanley.

'I don't know if more brandy would be good for small bears,' Polar replied.  'I could make you some warm apple juice with honey and spices, if you like?'

We thought that sounded like the perfect Yuletide Tea!

 

Standing Stones

We have been so busy getting ready for Christmas that I have forgotten I have one of our adventures still to write about.  This happened last month, when we were travelling around the south and west of England with our human guardians.

We had another nice visit to Polar and Grizzly's friends in Evesham before setting off for Hampshire.  Polar worked out a route through the Cotswolds and across the Wiltshire Downs avoiding the busy main roads, which meant we could enjoy looking at some lovely countryside and pretty small towns. 

When we stopped for elevenses, a small bear's most important meal of the day, Polar lifted us in our bear bag out of the car and carried us with her along a footpath beside a cricket pitch towards a small village called Avebury, where she said there was a café. We hoped we would have hot chocolate and cake, as it was a bright but cold day.  As Polar reached the end of the path and stepped out onto a lane, we were very surprised to see a row of huge stones in a field beside the village.

'Whatever are those for?' I asked Polar and Grizzly.

'We don't really know,' said Grizzly.  'Archaeologists, who study ancient civilisations, think the stones might have been put here to help people keep track of the seasons, so they knew when to sow their crops.'

'Aren't humans funny,' said Endon.  'Wild bears know when to hibernate, when to hunt and when to have cubs without standing up big stones to help them.'

'That's because bears are brilliant!' Hanley cheered.  'But I think the stones are part of a castle - they are standing at the top of a big ditch, like a moat.'

'There is a theory that this might have been a sort of hill fort,' Polar told him.  'Although it's also possible it was a site for festivals or religious ceremonies.  We're going to have a walk right round it so you can see all the different stone shapes.'

'Can we have elevenses first?' I asked.

Fortunately that was the plan.  The café was in an outbuilding of a manor house, next to a big barn.  I stayed with Polar and Grizzly, drinking hot chocolate, but Hanley and Endon went to explore outside.  

Hanley climbed the Christmas tree to look at the decorations, while Endon scurried into the dovecote and climbed up the little alcoves where the birds used to nest.

'There was Christmas music playing inside,' Endon told us, when he came back.  'And cosy blankets for people to put over their knees if they were cold.  I almost snuggled up for a nap.'

Polar helped us all back into the bear bag, ready for a walk around the whole site.  There were big stones everywhere, forming a big outer circle and a smaller one on the inside, but with the main village street running through the middle of the big circle and on one side of the smaller one.  

The other bears got me to pose as if I was trying to push one of the biggest stones over, then told me to sit on it to give a sense of scale to Polar's photograph.

You can just see me in these pictures.  I look even smaller than usual!

Polar was delighted that it was such a clear day as she got lots of very good photographs, most of them without small bears in, although Hanley decided he wanted to climb one of the stones too.

Endon said he thought the stones were rather spooky and he would rather stay in the bear bag, even though he usually likes to climb things.

'People who lived in the Middle Ages thought the same, Endon,' Polar told him.  'Most of the stones were pushed over or buried, or broken up to build houses or walls.  They were only stood up again in the 1930s.  There are lots of other strange structures around here, including the famous stone circle at Stonehenge.  We will go past Silbury Hill when we drive back to the main road.  That was built by ancient people too, but nobody today really knows why it was built.'

Polar pointed out the funny conical hill as Grizzly drove us along.  The ancient humans had obviously worked very hard to make something so big.  We decided we needed to add more books about history to our small bear library so we could become archaeologist bears and understand why.

'That's very weird,' said Hanley.  'Wouldn't it be fun to climb up and roll down!'

But nobody is allowed to climb it, not even small bears - although we might be allowed, if we were proper archaeologists, so we will have to study hard.