Walking With Williams

2nd training walk happened yesterday, this time just Nick and myself as Chris was sunning himself down south at Motorcyle racing – typical as we had no sun.

We started early to get upto Hathersage for about 10ish. This would allow Outside (great shop!) to bash my Scarpa’s into a comfortable state before walking the ridge between Lose Hill and Rushup Edge. As the weather has been great over the last few days and I have been trying to lose weight from the rucksack, I decided to leave waterproof trousers and a fully waterproof coat at home. Instead my trusty new Paramo Fuera windproof and water resistant would keep me warm and dry (as if it would rain!).

As we drove up from Walsall, the weather disappointed as it was cloudy and looked like rain was a possibility. This was confirmed with a few rain drops as we entered Buxton and continued through to Hathersage. I comforted Nick by suggesting it will brighten up as the sun burnt away the moisture. We got to Hathersage in the end about 10:15 and I spent around 30 mins having the Scarpas repeatedly smacked with a hammer to try to prevent my previous ankle rubbing issues. Whilst I sweated and worried about my £150 boots being bashed, Nick enjoyed a cup of tea in the cafe upstairs.

We finally arrived at Castleton about 11.20, parked up and started walking 11.30. Starting by walking through the village, we brought some pasties and sandwiches then turned uphill towards Lose Hill. Initially the hill ascended gradually until about 50 metres before the end and the legs started to suffer. This suffering was exaggerated as the light cloud turned to mist then finally rain. My waterproof less legs were getting wet though luckily for me, Nick was windward of me and therefore got most of the rain. It was at this point that I realised the difference between waterproof and water resistent the Fuera was starting to let in a bit of water due to the constant raining even if not heavy.

At the summit we turned left toward Back Tor straight into the wind and rain. Nice, now the hooded face was wet. We kept our heads down and continued at a considerable speed over Back Tor, grabbed lunch in the shade of Hollins Cross and speeded again over Mam Tor. It was disappointing that we couldn’t see anything other than mist. Only 2 after the start and we were descending our final hill of the day – well back trekking from Lords Seat on Rushup Edge. We got to the road and turned towards Castleton and the most interesting section of the walk for me. It was interesting walking along the old Chapel-en-le-Frith – Castleton Rd that finally collapsed in ’77 after many rebuilds over the last 100 years. Very strange walking on what appeared a decent quality road other than the huge cracks and totally displacement of the surface.

We got back to the car about 3.30 expecting the ‘Journey From Hell©’ being a bank holiday. Amazingly it was one of my fasted return journeys, less than 2 hours. Note to self: waterproof that Fuera.