Scafell Pike

Here are the pics from Scafell. To read the story go to "What a Weekend" below.

1. Lake at the YHA and 2. Scafell from a distance

3. The beautiful YHA building and 4. The lake again

5. and again... 6. and again...

7. Last one! and 8. another YHA Resident

9. Very impressive Sir! and 10. We set off at last!

11. The cool natural path and 12. the misty mountain

13. Not a real cairn! and 14. THE TOP AT LAST!!!

15. Now you see it and 16. Now you don't

17. A real Cairn and 18.

19. & 20. Just Beautiful !

What a Weekend!

Wow what a great time!

The three walkers decided to climb Scafell Pike last weekend. We chose Scafell as it is notorious to navigate in the dark, rain and mist. As we will be tackling it at about 3am, and none of us had ever been there before we thought we better become a little more familiar!

Saturday

Nicole and I drove up there on Saturday afternoon and arrived about tea time at a lovely old building that had been bought by the YHA. we were on the side of a lake ad could see the foot hills of Scafell Pike at the other end of the lake in the swirling mist. It looked cold, desolate and very very wet!

The Lake District, for anyone who has never been is one of the most beautiful parts of our green and pleasant land. Wet, yes but absolutely beautiful, relaxing and everyone is so friendly. If anyone needs to get away from it all for a long weekend I cannot recommend enough hiring out a B&B in the Lakes and going for a few walks, even if it rains.

Brigid had been working at the Nottingham Tournament and couldn't leave till later but she eventually meet us at about 11pm. Quick dinner and to bed in the YHA dorms.

Sunday

We were up early (well 8.30), YHA breakfast and out the door. We drove to the car park that we would be starting the real walk from. It started raining. Waterproofs on and off we go. Then it started raining hard, nice.

There were a few minibus' scattered around and we guessed that another three peaks challenge was going on. It was for the British Heart Foundation, another very worthy cause. Everyone coming down the hill looked knackered. Best not to dwell on what was ahead. We continued up the hill and the weather continued to rain. Despite the rain the walking was great and the view was fantastic when you could see through the rain.

The first part of the path was on a muddy track but then it turned to stone. The track had been built by tightly packing boulders that were on the mountain naturally. It was just like a dry stone wall on its side. I though this was a brilliant idea. It stopped erosion caused caused by the high volumes of walkers, lets everyone know where the path was and used natural, local material and didn't need vast quantities of concrete to keep it in place. On top of that it looked really good in it's surroundings.

We carried on... in the rain.

About half way up the weather took a turn for the better. The rain stopped! :0) Then the mist set in. :0( One of the reasons that we chose to climb Scafell Pike was that the top is really tricky. There is no path, it is totally scree (large rocks and boulders) covered and visibility can be reduced to just a few meters in a few seconds. We needed to know our route in the day before we could tackle it at night.

Another excellent idea that the custodians of Scafell have implemented is to cover the top in cairns. Cairns are just piles of stones about three feet high. They were placed about 10 to 20 meters apart so even in the mistyist (?) of conditions we should, in theory, be able to find the top. The trick was to make sure we followed the right ones!!

Eventually we found the top. Woo Hooooooooooo!

The view was mist. It was cold and wet so we had a quick sandwich. Sorted ourselves out and we were on out way down again. Besides the lads that had carried their iPod and speakers to the top were playing rubbish music!!!

I was a bit disappointed with the way other walkers had littered the top of the highest mountain in the country. There weren't that many crisp packets but there were alot of apple cores, orange peal and banana skins. I do understand that they are biodegradable items but what they don't seem to comprehend is that there is no vegetation on the top of Scafell Pike, let alone Banana trees. This means that fruit skins and cores are alien items and haven't got anything (i.e. soil) to biodegrade into. Duh!!

Anyway, rant over, back on the trail. We made our way back down the mountain, the weather held off and the views were fantastic when we got out of the mist belt. We could see the lake we had seen from the other side that morning.

We got back to the car six hours after we left. We had been taking it quite easy but there is still alot of work to do. we need to get our fitness and our stamina up. So its back in the gym this week for some serious cardio work and some hours on the stepping machine.

Going to be a lot of solo training going on over the next couple of weeks. While John is theoretically pounding the Spanish beaches, I have to contend with the hotel gym in Nottingham, or if it isn't too hot, running around and around and around the lake at the Uni. Which leaves Nicole doing the Richmond Park routine. Me and Gunnar walked around the perimeter of Richmond Park yesterday in about 3.5 hours, giving me a chance to get used to using hiking poles (I am beginning to see their merits, but still felt like an idiot). Gunnar took a hit for the good of the team, by letting me carry everything. What a gentleman.



Last week, Mark gave us some navigation refreshers and tips to save our bacon if the weather turns spectacularly rubbish and we can only see 30m in front of us! Will be able to put these skills to the test when we do a training hike of Scafell Pike on 24th June. At least this one will be during daylight hours, unlike the real thing that will hopefully start at about 2am.



Fundraising is going well - we've just hit the £1000 mark, but we still need another £2500... So, a enormous thank you to the people that have already donated so generously. But we still need further support. Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeaaasseee help us.... www.lta.org.uk/3peaks

lazy days!!

I must admit I am quite excited about the 3 peak challenge. I do enjoy climbing mountains and although I have never climbed any of the peaks in the three peak challenge I have done lots of walking in the welsh black mountains and some of the french pyrenees. That was over a decade ago though!

Right now I am in full training mode. Todays routiene consisted of waking up to the dulcet tones of my 9 month old daughter demanding her morning milk. This was followed by coffee and toast in the sunshine on our balcony with my daughter and partner. Soon, we will get ready to go to the beach for a swim followed by a lunch of MASSIVE prawns smothered in some lovely sauce.

Yes we are on holiday...

Though I do feel a little guilty about leaving my fellow 3 peakers to train with out me I am sure they will manage the training runs (Is it raining?) While I order another cerveza (cold draft beer) in the sunshine. Of course I do realise the girls will have the last laugh. When I return they will be zooming round the training route as I huff and puff and force my garlic saturated carcas after them. Hmmmm.

With that in mind maybe I'll go for run on the beach. Maybe after one more cerveza.

See you in a week girls.