So I pulled out my new toy / gadget / rattle [don't ask] and plugged it in. The Garmin GPSmap 62s maps popped up on my laptop screen and I started planning the route by clicking points on the map. Didn't know where I wanted to go; just out on a few hours walk before it became too dark [in the pouring rain]. Before long I'd sorted myself a 4.9km route with a 308m ascent/descent all plotted on the screen... I downloaded it to the hand held device and popped it in its little sealed rubber bag and I was off... Geeky or what. Grabbed my compass and hand maps on the way out the door though! Just in case...
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| 1hr 15min to summit of 308m, total walk time 2hr 31m.
I was clearly a bit slower on the way back down...
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The walk only really started to become tough when I left Grasmere Village; surprising that since there are hills all around. As I walked up the final piece of tarmaced road, past houses of value that I'm sure would seem like telephone numbers, all I could hear was the angry and urgent sound of some very fast running water; well that and the incessant rain playing a drum solo on my jacket hood.
The road ended abruptly and probably with some relief, any steeper and the tarmac would have slid down the hill long ago.
If there was ever a sign that it had been raining... this this was it.
On top of a number of rocks someone had carefully stacked a number of stones in little piles. Amazingly, and despite the gushing water, they stood there looking like alien protrusions from the rocks. Surely someone must have glued these in place... how were they resisting the buffeting river?
Perhaps there's a Jedi student around here and his test is to see how long he can hold the rock here before they topple. He's doing pretty wall so far!!
It soon became obvious that I wasn't alone up here. I began to meet and number of sheep as I trudged further from civilization; total count 20 or so. Small flocks? or were the sensible sheep taking refuge elsewhere? Of course they could all see me coming from a mile away, and most likely more in the bright red jacket. It very quickly became obvious that I was not built for this sort of walking, aside from the fact that my Asthma was saying a cheery hello, I'd not been born with enough legs; well that an the fact that my feet were the wrong shape; my trusty and not so old Berghaus walking boots were making a cartoon scenes of wheeling legs and arms as I tried to walk up the polished stone track; it felt a bit like the 'it's a knock-out game-show' of my television youth as some wackily dressed person tried to walk up a slope while the TV producers were urging the guys with the water hoses to increase the water pressure and put him back at the bottom.
I wasn't going to be beaten; I kept going determined to complete my first walk hill walk of the week; and see my first 'honey pot' photography sight. As I walked I remembered to turn around and look behind me at the wonderful scenery unfolding; some of these visions were making it truly worthwhile.
Here we're looking back to Helm Crag after having accented approximately 200ft above the Hotel site. Time for a little rest of crisps and coffee.
After nearly an hour and a quarter of walking I was nearing my goal; Alcock Tarn. My heart was pounding and I was all a little bit sweaty... not through excitement mind you... I was knackered! [am I allowed to say that]. While visions of an untimely demise flashed briefly across my consciousness I remained focused on reaching my target; albeit with an increasing number of stops to quieten my heart, which by this time must have been alerting any sheep who couldn't actually see my red jacket.
Eventually I reached my target, Alcock Tarn. To say I was somewhat disappointed would be one great almighty understatement... I walked all this was for this grubby little marshy bit at the top of a hill. Cheated. Oh well, I thought... I've had a lovely walk, probably nearly died of heart failure due to the exertion, but I was sure that the experience had done me good... plenty of other fantastic places to see for the rest of the week... not to worry I told myself and trudged in the thankfulness that I was now on my way down hill again; no more spiteful near vertical [hah! they just felt like it] slopes to climb.
Then suddenly I walked through a gate and saw this!!!
The sheep must have thought I was crazy; I was chuckling [nay laughing - is that normal?] away to myself. Alcock Tarn was beautiful and well worth the near coronary to reach. I sat down on a friendly looking rock and looked out over the lake as the wind continued to try shake me from my perch.
From the reeds in front of me there came a few chirps, and then a family of ducks waddled over to me, clearly heading for my freshly opened packet of ready salted crisps. I'm quite sure that their diet shouldn't include ready salted crisps, even the Walkers crisps I was eating, but they seemed to know their appetite vocally enough and so I gladly shared the packet. Ignoring the massive hit their metabolism would have with the sudden rush of salt, I'd figured they'd enough water to wash them down with :)
The journey down initially took me through the middle of a fern forest; only waste height mind you but I was still in trepidation that the situation would suddenly turn into some Hollywood scene where I missed my footing and ended up slipping down a gully on my back; although in this case with nice large rock to meet me at the bottom rather than a conveniently placed splash pool... perhaps I should make a complaint to the Director.
Finally making my way back to the correct track I reached the edge of the hill; yes a near vertical drop that would have been difficult on the way up in dry weather, let alone terrifying when on the way down, when tired, in torrential rain, and on my own. Pausing briefly I got on with task in hand and gently made my way down on my hands and feet in a reverse crab action; bottom down. I'm not sure this was the right way to approach the escarpment in hand, but at normally 6ft 2in tall I wanted to be as close to the ground as possible; just in case there was suddenly an extra strong pull of gravity and I went a tumbling. I was also mindful of approximately £4K of camera on my back that I wanted even closer to the ground.
I guess I was fretting unnecessarily as I made it down without too much incident; must speak to the patent office about my reverse crawling action... it would certainly have been fun to see that on video.
After this I was relieved that the journey down was a lot more straight forward; I'm not sure that I could have withstood too many more shocks or incidents. The final event that caught me unawares was the sudden appearance of a chap and his huge German Shepherd dog; I was so engrossed in map reading [okay, twiddling with my Garmin rattle] that it wasn't until they were only a few feet away that I noticed them... the sudden awareness of them certainly made me jump; the two of them must have thought I was totally mad! It was clearly unreasonable that I shouldn't have expected people to be ascending the hill at this time of day and in this weather. We chatted for few moments and it transpired that he was only on a pee-walk [for the dog]... lucky dog to have an owner that's willng go out on a wet evening, up a steep hill in the blackness, just so he could have a pee [the dog that is].
Two more views that caught my breath; the view over Lake Grasmere, and a lovely little pond that appeared from nowhere along the track; I'll let you work out which is which.
More later.... off for evening meal now... strangely I'm hungry!!
All photographs in this entry were taken with an HTC Desire mobile phone!!
Perhaps there's a Jedi student around here and his test is to see how long he can hold the rock here before they topple. He's doing pretty wall so far!!
It soon became obvious that I wasn't alone up here. I began to meet and number of sheep as I trudged further from civilization; total count 20 or so. Small flocks? or were the sensible sheep taking refuge elsewhere? Of course they could all see me coming from a mile away, and most likely more in the bright red jacket. It very quickly became obvious that I was not built for this sort of walking, aside from the fact that my Asthma was saying a cheery hello, I'd not been born with enough legs; well that an the fact that my feet were the wrong shape; my trusty and not so old Berghaus walking boots were making a cartoon scenes of wheeling legs and arms as I tried to walk up the polished stone track; it felt a bit like the 'it's a knock-out game-show' of my television youth as some wackily dressed person tried to walk up a slope while the TV producers were urging the guys with the water hoses to increase the water pressure and put him back at the bottom.
I wasn't going to be beaten; I kept going determined to complete my first walk hill walk of the week; and see my first 'honey pot' photography sight. As I walked I remembered to turn around and look behind me at the wonderful scenery unfolding; some of these visions were making it truly worthwhile.Here we're looking back to Helm Crag after having accented approximately 200ft above the Hotel site. Time for a little rest of crisps and coffee.
After nearly an hour and a quarter of walking I was nearing my goal; Alcock Tarn. My heart was pounding and I was all a little bit sweaty... not through excitement mind you... I was knackered! [am I allowed to say that]. While visions of an untimely demise flashed briefly across my consciousness I remained focused on reaching my target; albeit with an increasing number of stops to quieten my heart, which by this time must have been alerting any sheep who couldn't actually see my red jacket.
Eventually I reached my target, Alcock Tarn. To say I was somewhat disappointed would be one great almighty understatement... I walked all this was for this grubby little marshy bit at the top of a hill. Cheated. Oh well, I thought... I've had a lovely walk, probably nearly died of heart failure due to the exertion, but I was sure that the experience had done me good... plenty of other fantastic places to see for the rest of the week... not to worry I told myself and trudged in the thankfulness that I was now on my way down hill again; no more spiteful near vertical [hah! they just felt like it] slopes to climb.
The sheep must have thought I was crazy; I was chuckling [nay laughing - is that normal?] away to myself. Alcock Tarn was beautiful and well worth the near coronary to reach. I sat down on a friendly looking rock and looked out over the lake as the wind continued to try shake me from my perch.
From the reeds in front of me there came a few chirps, and then a family of ducks waddled over to me, clearly heading for my freshly opened packet of ready salted crisps. I'm quite sure that their diet shouldn't include ready salted crisps, even the Walkers crisps I was eating, but they seemed to know their appetite vocally enough and so I gladly shared the packet. Ignoring the massive hit their metabolism would have with the sudden rush of salt, I'd figured they'd enough water to wash them down with :)
The journey down initially took me through the middle of a fern forest; only waste height mind you but I was still in trepidation that the situation would suddenly turn into some Hollywood scene where I missed my footing and ended up slipping down a gully on my back; although in this case with nice large rock to meet me at the bottom rather than a conveniently placed splash pool... perhaps I should make a complaint to the Director.
Finally making my way back to the correct track I reached the edge of the hill; yes a near vertical drop that would have been difficult on the way up in dry weather, let alone terrifying when on the way down, when tired, in torrential rain, and on my own. Pausing briefly I got on with task in hand and gently made my way down on my hands and feet in a reverse crab action; bottom down. I'm not sure this was the right way to approach the escarpment in hand, but at normally 6ft 2in tall I wanted to be as close to the ground as possible; just in case there was suddenly an extra strong pull of gravity and I went a tumbling. I was also mindful of approximately £4K of camera on my back that I wanted even closer to the ground.
I guess I was fretting unnecessarily as I made it down without too much incident; must speak to the patent office about my reverse crawling action... it would certainly have been fun to see that on video.
After this I was relieved that the journey down was a lot more straight forward; I'm not sure that I could have withstood too many more shocks or incidents. The final event that caught me unawares was the sudden appearance of a chap and his huge German Shepherd dog; I was so engrossed in map reading [okay, twiddling with my Garmin rattle] that it wasn't until they were only a few feet away that I noticed them... the sudden awareness of them certainly made me jump; the two of them must have thought I was totally mad! It was clearly unreasonable that I shouldn't have expected people to be ascending the hill at this time of day and in this weather. We chatted for few moments and it transpired that he was only on a pee-walk [for the dog]... lucky dog to have an owner that's willng go out on a wet evening, up a steep hill in the blackness, just so he could have a pee [the dog that is].
Two more views that caught my breath; the view over Lake Grasmere, and a lovely little pond that appeared from nowhere along the track; I'll let you work out which is which.
More later.... off for evening meal now... strangely I'm hungry!!
All photographs in this entry were taken with an HTC Desire mobile phone!!
1 comment:
I should learn to proof read better... made a few grammatical and typographical corrections... although I'm sure there are plenty of others...
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