The main purpose of this blog is to keep in touch with friends and family, and maybe entertain others with common interests, particularly in relation to the outdoors. We hope you enjoy it, and your comments are valued....
Sue and Martin in Mallorca 2019
Saturday, 31 July 2021
Another parkrun at Wythenshawe
Friday, 30 July 2021
April 1980 - Granny's Ramble and Bob's Saunter
Here are some more scanned slides and diary entries from April 1980.
On 20 April, five of us enjoyed a stroll around Over Haddon in the Peak District on a dull day.
We walked through the woodland of Hardcastle Crags, an area visited many times subsequently on both the 'Calderdale Hike' and the 'Calderdale Mountain Bike Marathon'.
We passed close to this disused mill.
My red pullover seems to have been superseded by an equally chunky blue one. These pullovers, knitted by Dot, were used over a period of many years. It's a shame that none survive to this day.
Next - an early Scottish backpacking trip. A quick glance at the slides is encouraging, so it's 'Happy Scanning' whilst I listen to the Olympic Games commentaries and the rain drums on the office window.
Thursday, 29 July 2021
TGO Challenge - Wild Camps (No 69: 19 May 2016)
22 km further on from our mountain top campsite, we'd passed the Black Bothy and reached an enticing sward of grass about 3km short of our intended destination. It was 4:30, and rain could be imminent. So we stopped at NH 889 325 at a height of 390 metres. Another excellent spot.
Wednesday, 28 July 2021
Saturday 12 April 1980 - 'The Big Walk'
Only a few days after returning from Mull, Nick, John, Dave, Ian and I rose early and drove to Yorkshire Bridge.
Our objective was the 'Derwent Watershed Walk', as described on Page 171 of 'The Big Walks' book published in 1980 by Diadem. (I know this entry will have some readers reaching for their copy of that book to re-read Phil Cooper's narrative.) Our own diary entry, assiduously typed up by Nick, is reproduced at the foot of this posting.
By 7am we had parked up at the start, gone over Win Hill, and were walking into the village of Hope, as pictured above.
We made good progress over Mam Tor and other tops, reaching Brown Knoll by 9:30, with Ian lagging behind - just pacing himself.
Bleaklow Head and the Wain Stones were reached by 13:30. Ian found time to gobble down his lunch and practice his climbing skills on the stones. It was a fine day to be out - a blue sky day, but dry enough for peat dust to be flying annoyingly in the wind as we continued across the Bleaklow moonscape.
Tuesday, 27 July 2021
TGO Challenge - Wild Camps (No 68: 18 May 2016)
After nights in the Cnoc Hotel at Struy, Lovat Bridge Campsite, and a B&B in Inverness, we finally got to wild camp again on the 548 metre summit of Beinn Bhuidhe Mhor (NH 786 406).
It was blowing a gale, otherwise a comfortable flat site. Some fellrunners whose training involved running up and down this hill seemed somewhat surprised to find us there. On the misty evening we were equally surprised to see them!
The following morning we woke to good views over the Moray Firth and many miles of peat hags ahead of us.
Monday, 26 July 2021
4 to 8 April 1980 - Another Visit to Mull
4/4/80 (Good Friday) - a red letter day in the annals of diary records of our ('our' = numerous different people) trips. Laurie's bird watching notebook was stolen, and Nick recorded the events of the long weekend by way of small, spidery writing on 45 pages of the said A6 notebook.
I'm not, you'll be relieved to hear, going to try to type out the drivel lengthy novel that resulted from Nick's efforts, as some time later Nick himself typed out those words onto eleven pages of redundant audit programme stationery.
There were 14 of us, many of whom located themselves in Tobermory Youth Hostel. The rest utilised the small lawn just above high tide that I discovered in 1971. This was a few minutes walk from Tobermory along the path to the lighthouse.
Nell remembers: The frogspawn hatched out as frogs – well observed process - then we took them to the nearest bit of water and disposed (or released, depending om how you look at it) of the frogs in a suitable place.