Sunday 22 April 2012

Sulby Reservoir 2 - Practice Walk

Paul, Russ, Tim, Andrew and Richard braved the hail and thunder storms this after noon and did the 'smiley face' walk that goes past Sulby Reservoir.

Smiley Face Walk

Russ took a lot of picture and will post here after he shakes the water out of his camera.

Monday 9 April 2012

3 practice walks on Stiperstones and Long Mynd - Easter 2012

Well I've just returned from a long Easter weekend in Shropshire shared with Dawn, Graham and Debbie. We took the caravan and motorhome to a site we've been to before called the Lilac House in Pennerley which is at the foot of the Stiperstones National Nature Reserve. Considering that it was reasonable weather when we left Leicestershire, you can imagine our surprise when we arrived on site to a foot of snow!! Thank goodness for Land Rover - otherwise I wouldn't have got the van onto the field. Graham arrived a few hours later and had to put the snow chains on the bus to get it on the field.

We had a great weekend starting with a decent walk - not sure of the mileage, but it took us 7 hours - over the Stiperstones and beyond. It was incredibly hard work - the first 2 hours spent wading through snow sometimes up to waist height (I kid you not) often up to our knees. Although strength sapping, it was great fun. 7 hours later we returned to the vans completely soaked and knackered!

The following day me, Graham and Debbie walked just over 20 miles up over the Stiperstones and eventually up onto the Long Mynd - a huge walk and equally huge challenge - still battling deep snow in places, biting cold and thick cloud and occasional driving rain up on the Mynd. Nevertheless, it was a great day and we returned to Dawn and the vans as knackered as the day before and I took comfort in a home made chicken curry and a couple of bottles of good French red!

The next day saw Dawn and I return to the top of the Mynd via Carding Mill Valley - absolutely stunning!

So, a great weekend with more miles walking than I can remember - I've added a few photos which I hope give you a flavour of the weekend and the walking in particular. These are ones I took with the Ipod, so not sure how good the quality is? I've taken about 200 with the Lumix and am happy to share. If you want to see all the photos or hear more about the walk just give me a shout.

Russ




















09-04-2012 Practice Walk


Friday 6 April 2012

Easter Practice Walk Number 1

Paul, Andrew, Simon and Hazel went for a walk this morning.
Easter Walk Number One

Monday 2 April 2012

Kinder Scout Pics - Day 2


















Kinder Scout - Day 2 (11.5 Miles)

Good Morning all,

Day two started with a crisp morning frost, sun shining and clear blue skies above. Jacob had discovered a blister the night before, so a compeed plaster was applied and he continued to proceed with the days walk ahead.

After hot showers for all, we packed our backpacks and headed down to the cafe for some breakfast.

The day was looking glorious, so we set off on our way back to Hayfield at about 10:20am all walking the first few hundred metres quite gingerly. Graham had mentioned the night before that we would be climbing up another brook, scrambling over rocks, which would be great fun. Being April 1st Russ suggested that Graham may have been playing an April's fool, and there would be another route to take...........this was not the case.

The start of the climb was up a rocky path to the side of the brook (Grinds Brook)constantly getting higher until we met the water and rocks that we had to climb. Ahead lied more and more rocks, and a pretty much vertical climb at the end, behind was Edale and the mind blowing views that were getting more and more dramatic the further we climbed. Having a few stops on the way up gave us a chance to take some photos of what we had done.
This climb was a bit different though and it WAS great fun, all went up this one with smiles on our faces and at the top a sense of accomplishment was visible to see :-)

So we were again at the top of Kinder Scout and proceeded to head towards Edale Cross and Jacobs Ladder (situated on the Pennine Way) where we would continue on a a route called Brown Knoll. This part of the walk took us past some quite interesting rocks that had been severely shaped from the ever changing weather over the last few million years.

When we hit Brown Knoll the wind picked up, but the sun was still shining and you could see for miles and miles around, inc Stockport in the far distance. Walking along we could see what lied ahead, which was a couple more accents, but advised that these were gentle compared to what we had climbed. Russ & I stopped for a bite to eat out of the strong winds, whilst Graham, Debi, Jacob and Lilly carried on to the bottom of the next accent. We met them again at the bottom of Mount Famine where they were also taking on some sustenance for the last part of the walk.
We stuck to the ridge along the top instead of taking the "tourist route" to Hayfield. This made it all the more worth while because again the views were spectacular and very dramatic with the small amount of clouds creating shadows across the valley. When we got to the bottom at Hayfield after an adventurous route down through the woods, we heard a familiar voice on the road above.......It was Dawn greeting us standing outside the Sportsman Pub which signified the end of our weekend. Dawn said she would have walked down the steps which we had to walk up first to get to the finish point, but Russ found that hard to believe :-)

The whole weekend was fantastic, stunning scenery, terrific company and more than we could ask for with the weather.



Andrew

Sunday 1 April 2012

Kinder Scout Pics - Day 1


Unfortunately not in time taken order, but here are some of the many photos that were taken over the course of day 1.