This has been the coldest week for at least a decade, the temperatures dropping to minus 7 on many nights. Yet, it has provided so many wonderful sights: full moons on clear, starry nights; ice forming along the waterline of Derwentwater; stunning blue skies during the daytime. But, most impressively of all, the trees have been covered in heavy frosts bringing a magical feel both to the hotel wood and gardens, and the Borrowdale Valley more generally. The blue tits, woodpecker and robins are enjoying the feed left out for them but they have struggled to find any gaps in the ice covering the hotel pond.