It’s that time of the year once more, when we flee all the aggravation of summer in the big city and set up camp at our summer house by the Baltic, where our only hard wired connection to the grid is a 15 mm diameter water pipe.

I’ve come prepared – just over a kilo of tea went into my suitcase when I packed early yesterday morning…

• a 200 gram brick of Nannuo sheng Pu-erh
• a 200 gram brick of Menghai 7562 shou Pu-erh
• 250 grams of green gunpowder
• about 200 grams of Tie Guan Yin
• about 200 grams of loose leaf shou Pu-erh

Given the fact that we have to be back at home-base for the start of August, that wee cargo should see me through, no matter how hard and frequently I indulge.

Early each morning, when even the seagulls and cormorants are still asleep, I’ll drag my trusty Trangia alcohol stove up the cliff, fire her up, and brew a pot of the green. For 20 minutes or so, the entirety of my world will shrink down to the sun, the sea, and tea.

Around lunch I’ll give a few grams of oolong leaf a walk through the gaiwan, and then as the day draws to a close I’ll retreat to the candle-lit sanctuary of the veranda and have a session with whichever Pu-erh takes my fancy as we wait for the moon to rise over the pines on the headland.

Steep, sleep, repeat, until you run out of July. Bliss.