The temperature is down to minus 16 degrees centigrade and looks like staying there for the foreseeable future. My English shoes are proving not to be up it, sliding all over the ice and giving me cold toes after a fifteen minute walk. On the way back from a couple of beers with a neighbour, I bought a pair of walking boots. Not bad for about forty pounds, these Chinese shoes come with fur lining inside and a tin of wax to preserve the stitching. And I walk without slipping about.