Chris and I met just below the White House and cycled along the reservoirs to the point where you can see Gaddings reservoir. It was bitterly cold despite all the gear and I had a bad case of white finger which always makes me panic slightly. This was our first bike outing together this year so we kept it short and flat. On the return stretch we were going into the wind and we both felt quite weak with using muscles we’d forgotten existed. By the time we got back I had not only white toe but white foot even though I couldn’t see it, I couldn’t actually feel it either. We tried the White House for a warming cup of hot chocolate or even a snack but to no avail as they were just closing so we whizzed down to the best named Moorcock which I’m sure is some harmless wee birdie from these parts but allows me to indulge in teenage humour. This pub was open and we got hot tomato soup (bit odd) for me and spicy burger for Chris all washed down with a pint of Peroni for her and half of Landlord for me. Then it was suddenly time to go and pick up Carol from the renal unit and to be ribbed by the nurses for boozing whilst she was being a “poor invalid”. Poor invalid, my foot, stuffing herself full of biscuits, sleeping and reading, life of Reilly!!
Sun 17th March
I’ve bitten the bullet and have just returned nice and hot from my first ever jog. This has been a mental leap for me to do, partly I felt it would be bad for my knees, partly I thought I would look a berk, and partly I wasn’t sure I could do it.
I did 28 minutes which got me to our nearest reservoir and back, this was a total of 2 miles. I ran one minute and walked the next so as not to kill myself on the first outing. Now I know what’s possible in half an hour I can build it up. It did take a long time for me to get hot but it was pretty cold out today. I even picked up some litter. Runkeeper tells me I’ve burnt 223 calories. It will take a while for me to be able to run a mile in 12 minutes which is my goal but at least I now know that it’s possible. Hooray.
Please visit Map and Compass and learn how to interpret a map with me and my navigation partner, Cath.
This is the first time I’ve attended this event. I arrived on Friday evening in Castleton Hollowford Centre after a long and tedious journey because the M62 had shut, so instead of 1 and a half hours it took 2 and a half for what as the crow flies is really not far from here.
I shared a room with Hazel and Liz. I got the top bunk which didn’t have the lovely steps up I’d seen in the photos of the centre but the usual very hard to climb in bare feet ladder.
I spent the evening with Hazel and some other people including Jim who reminded me very strongly of my dear Dave, so much so that I had to keep telling myself he wasn’t Dave but enough to bring up all the memories of the times we had and make me feel sad (Dave died in 1996).
Back in room 5, we democratically negotiated turning down the heating. I never have any heating on at all in the night but do understand that some like it hot! We also set our alarms for 3 different times, Hazel’s not on a round number. I am rather taken with this idea, having always rigidly stuck to the hour or quarters, with an occasional foray to a 20 or 35 minute so may even experiment!
Saturday 2nd March
We didn’t really need the alarms and got up and going for breakfast of poached egg, hash brown, beans and toms and toast. We received an intro to the centre and the conference and then set off in our groups.
I’d chosen to do “Lumps and Bumps” which was about how to teach navigation skills. 6 of us went off with Phil Dowthwaite who was great, he is a Mountain Guide which is about as far as you can go in the awards. The day worked as a refresher with some good tips for keeping it simple when training others. I liked this approach as it’s quite easy to make navigation very complicated and it doesn’t need to be. I’m planning to do some navigation training this year with Cath so this day was very timely. We had quite a short walk but it was great to be out in the sun and almost warm when we had our lunch (tuna roll, apple).
We got back to the centre quite early so I attempted to have a shower however it was a miserable experience with the water barely lukewarm despite mega efforts to run it hot.
There was a short gathering before dinner which now I can’t remember what was covered, then dinner was a choice of curries with rice and chips and a poppadom. I opted for spinach and chick pea which was tasty. Followed by apple crumble and cream.
A visit to the bar and then in to the main conference room for a lecture by John Beatty who is a photographer and who has had a long history in the outdoors taking photos. The photos and the stories were great, but he should have stopped at the point where we had the interval. The seating in the room was incredibly uncomfortable for 2 hours which didn’t help. It was the complete opposite of when I saw Ranulph Ffiennes last year, he just came on, did an hour racing through his slides and went off very promptly.
The bar was still open so we helped to drain it. The Farmer’s Blonde, a good local brew and renamed by me as Farmer’s Daughter had finished so Jim and I moved onto whisky. I felt this would help with sleeping in the bunk.
Hazel went off to the room and I followed shortly after. When I got there Liz was already in bed, and Hazel was just going in the bathroom. She went in plunging me into darkness. So I went into the corridor with my rucksack and rootled about for my torch. I was on the verge of helpless laughing at this point but managed to restrain myself.
Went straight to sleep and actually had a decent sleep.
Oh, it’s a line of trees on the skyline!Big farm pussyThe navigation workshop group
Sunday 3rd March
Breakfast was much the same but with waffles instead of hash browns.
Mal Creasey gave us an update on things the MTA is planning which includes modules on Hill Skills. WGLs and MLs would go for a couple of days training which will then allow us to deliver Hill Skills or Mountain Skills, or both, depending on which awards we hold. This is something I definitely want to do.
Then we got into groups for our workshops. I’d chosen “Environment for Mountain Leaders”. This was run by Jim Longley from Nature’s Work. There were a lot of us (15 incuding Jim) which didn’t really work for me as I had to make sure I kept close to Jim to hear what he was saying and every now and then I would forget and have to trot along to where he was. He knows his stuff and dropped in some teaching aids which I know my pal Cath would like, including an environmental version of what she and I call “People Bingo”, plus we sat and drew pictures of geological events, I was terrible at this. We stopped for lunch (egg roll, crisps, apple), then we were given cards with clues for tree identification. These were all great ideas and have spurred me on to think about doing some of these, I think trees would be a good one for me to do. I’m going to splash out and buy a laminator now that I’ve found I can get one for £20. Along the way, Jim treated us to sloe gin and rose hip syrup which he makes himself and he has links to various recipes from foraged foods on his Facebook page.
We looked quite a bit at geology and I felt I had to think quite a bit which was great. We saw some fungi and looked at sedges and rushes. It’s a real treat to be with someone who knows so much. Much colder than the day before and we walked a little further but a great day out.
Back at the centre for more food (sandwiches, nibbles and cake) and goodbyes. It took me 1 hour and 20 minutes to get home.
Old landslip from the 90s. The land is still in motion.Sandstone changing to limestoneJew’s Ear fungusPeveril CastleShowing where rock has recently fallen off
Footnote
The Peak District is much more badly littered than both Snowdonia and the Lake District and littered much more on the hills which is really depressing. If it was cleaner I probably would walk there more often. Mostly on the Lakeland hills, once you’re away from the car parks, there’s nothing much. I felt really depressed last weekend too when we were in Wales as it was just dreadful everywhere although fine once you’re off the main roads.
Please visit Map and Compass and learn how to interpret a map with me and my navigation partner, Cath.
We both got up very early and I delivered Carol to Huddersfield hospital for dialysis at 7.30 am. C had swapped with another patient so as to get the early slot. I went back home and packed the car up and did lots of last minute jobs before returning to collect C at 11.20. We set off and arrived in Llanfechain at 2 pm.
Unloaded the car and then out for a swift trot round the lanes from the cottage, very cold and snow threatening. Back at Pentre we saw Nicky who had sad tale of her dogs, one now ok elsewhere and one savaged to death by a neighbouring collie. She now has a pug puppy which is quite sweet. It snowed in a light dusting way.
Nicky had rung us on Friday eve to say the heating wasn’t working but we still opted to go as we’re not free at the same time together for a long time. The heating was fixed thank goodness, with snow about.
Quick relax then out to Seeds in Llanfyllin. I had smoked salmon, then rib eye beef with mushrooms in port sauce with green beans, red cabbage, carrots and potato, then lemon posset with black currant on top. Mainly I had the posset because I didn’t know what it would be like. All very nice indeed. C had chicken in sauce followed by white chocolate cheesecake with passion fruit. We discussed whether white chocolate actually is chocolate at all.
All washed down with Spitfire beer from Shepheard Neame in Kent. Well stuffed.
Sun 24th February
Lazy start to day. The snow had mostly gone by the time we set out. Stopped in Llanfyllin for supplies then up on ridge looking to Clawdd Mawr. More snow and much colder up there. So cold that we quickly changed plans of climbing the hill for a short wintry circuit of about a mile and a half. Had lunch in the car and then took the little roads to Pontrobert and back to Llanfechain.
I cooked us a pasta and minced beef concoction which was good, then we watched War Horse some of which is supposed to be Devon but it looked like Kentmere in the Lakes to me. Not one of the horses received a credit which was really annoying.
Mon 25th February
Today we got up lazily and drove to Llanidloes where we looked in the Great Oak bookshop and had a coffee (Carol) and a hot choc (me) to warm up in the whole food cafe. I bought some broccoli in the organic veg shop and then we went to Spar for milk.
We left the town to park up and walked in a south westerly direction away from the town. We got onto a ridge which took us along hidden tracks and through beech woods and past the most messy farm I’ve ever seen. Really horrible and quite discomfiting. A lot of the ground was muddy and some was frozen and our boots got heavy with mud and manure.
We arrived at another farm which was a lot tidier but with loads more mud and 2 barking dogs to come and run at us. They did have an old farmer to call them in. I got goosed by one of them. Back to the road and the car. Past a place marked on the map as Ppg Ho. I know Welsh is hard but this takes the biscuit.
I’ve got a thing about stands of trees on the skyline.
We had a lovely time and this was very significant as it was the first of our trips away now that Carol is on dialysis and shows us we can get to Wales very quickly and stay in lovely cottage and have a short break away. Although nearly as much packing as for a whole week!
Please visit Map and Compass and learn how to interpret a map with me and my navigation partner, Cath.
My first bike ride of the year and since the terrible flu. It’s 8 weeks since that started and I’m only now feeling about back to normal but massively unfit.
Another lovely day so just to get into the swing of it, a very short ride for about 40 minutes or so covering about 8km. There is a stone circle marked on the map near us and we’ve been talking about it checking it out for a while. You can see it from a distance from Ringstone reservoir but to get to it you take a longer track round. However it’s in a cultivated field which had just been sown so it wasn’t possible to go up to it and although the circle is a noticeable shape, it seems what stones are there are very small or flat.
Very glad I managed to get the motivation to go out. It was bitterly cold today so I wore a t shirt, a merino baselayer, a micro fleece and an insulated jacket. On my feet I tested out cycling shoes with neoprene overshoes, these worked very well to keep my feet warm but took forever to get on and made me so hot I had to take my jacket and helmet off during the procedure. On my hands I wore my new Christmas present from Chris cycling gloves which feel hot when you put them on indoors and which did the job brilliantly. At last warm hands on the bike!
Please visit Map and Compass and learn how to interpret a map with me and my navigation partner, Cath.
Just a short nearly 6 mile walk around the hills above Hollingworth Lake with Babs. Lovely day for it. We wandered about on paths that Babs knew and it was nice not to have to navigate. We went under the motorway and did some of the route Chris and I have done on bikes. I was feeling very tired and out of condition so it was good to be out in the air and shoot the breeze with Babs.
