Baltic weather for AGA as our point-to-point series visits the south-east, but Charing turn up the heat!

Did you notice my new word in the title? It's 'baltic', and it follows swiftly on the heels of the words 'raw' and 'bleak' which I used after our visit to Overton two weeks ago. No matter, we still had a tremendous day and our first visit to the south-east area was a resounding success!

We were greeted by a smattering of snow as we drove onto the course, and then we spotted the familiar white hair of Beazo in the distance ... who once again helped Derek to put the signs up while I took the photos. Definitely something wrong there!

"AGA - A warm welcome home" proclaimed the sign by the open ditch, it would be a few hours before we would be warm, although the welcome on course was very warm - something we have come to expect.

No AGA tent this week, just our trusty van and lots of flags, but we did manage to brand the last fence and the open ditch before we turned our attention to the two pony races on the card - and a chance to watch the stars of the future. Everyone was wrapped up warm, even the dogs, and for the third time this season the potential for a best selling AGA branded dog coat was discussed!

The moment was soon approaching when I would get that dreaded message on the screen of my camera "battery exhausted", thank heavens for the new generation of smart phones! Although it has to be said that it's incredibly bad planning by the AGA man to go pointing without packing some spare batteries!

Frankie Hickman leads the girls out, she is followed by Caroline Dennis and Cynthia Haydon.

Cynthia has a cheeky smile for the camera.

Hannah Grissell and Lisa Baker were also sporting cheeky smiles.

Rose Grissell was last out.

West Cork Flash was a bit lively, while Bohemian Rock looked very serene as he observed it all going on around him.

Six went to post and six completed, but only one of them earned 10 AGA iTotal Lady Riders' Championship points, and that was Hannah Grissell, courtesy of a 3 length win on Rear Gunner, trained by her sister Rose!

Hannah was the eigth lady rider to bag 10 points this season in our ninth race, and even though we are not quite a third of the way through our qualifiers we look set for another exciting Championship!

The superb Coalbrookdale pot was again very popular, indeed the winning owners, Mr Cockerell and Mr Cowing asked if they could order another another one in blue ... along with two new AGA cookers!

Nicola Jane Swinney, Chief Sub-editor and Point-to-Point/Showing Editor from the Horse & Hound, enjoyed being in our pic so much that she asked if we would take another one ... this time with the AGA logo in view. The AGA man also made a mental note to iron the table cloth before it is next seen in public!

After explaining the significance of the 10 points - you could win a brand new AGA worth ten grand, the AGA man decided to wave the lid in the air and see how many people laughed .. thankfully everyone saw the funny side!

It was that time again ... time for the Beazo interview, and doesn't he look cold, despite the fact that he was wearing two jackets! While Hannah was concentrating on her interview, her sister Rose watched the Club Members Conditions race, along with Derek 'the man with the van' Martin (who probably backed the winner - he usually does!).

The interview was going really well until somebody decided to stand next to our winning rider and grin, although it didn't put Hannah or Beazo off, but it did get edited out of the final cut! And that was it, another great day at a point-to-point meeting for AGA was drawing to a close, but there was still enough time to pay one last visit to the sponsors tent before we headed for the M25. Well done to all at Charing, we liked your course a lot and I hope we can come back soon, but preferably when it's a bit warmer - such as in the photo below taken by Beazo on a previous visit.