Snow Day 4 - Walk to Mankinholes

It stopped snowing this morning after 2 and a half days of non-stop blizzard conditions. The wind is still blowing the snow off the fields and drifts though so it still feels like it's snowing even though it isn't!

The road through Mankinholes is closed due to a small amount of snow

 As I couldn't get through the village due to the digger clearing the road, I went down the Pennine Bridleway, which although it had drifts seemed passable

 until I got to the section just before the Top Brink when I was confronted by a wall of snow 3 feet above the level of the walls!

 I thought I'd have to go over the wall to the right, through the field and rejoin the bridleway past the drift, but then I thought why not just walk over the top of it, so I did - it's the first time I've been in snow up to my waist :)

 

Strange to say the Little Owls weren't to be seen, nor were any birds apart from corvids until I got down to a lower altitude and New Mill Dam held 3 Goosander and 2 Mallard. The Goosander were doing well feeding away despite the anti-fish-predator wires strung across the water.

None of the water bodies were frozen over at all even though temperatures have been at or below freezing over the last few days, so I'm guessing the wind blowing so hard has kept the water surface moving and has prevented it freezing over.