Walking With Williams

I went to the peak district on Sunday although things were meant to be significantly different. The original plan was to do Aran Fawddwy in south Wales with Chris and Nick – we would do a similar distance to next weekend (Scafell Pike) with a little less ascent. However neither Chris nor Nick could make it meaning I was to do Snowdonia alone. Still, should be good…

That was until Saturday evening when I heard the upto date weather forecast – Thunder. Nice. So a quick think lead to back to the peaks. Weather would be fine and I knew the area sufficiently to not have to plan a route in detail. I would attempt the Edale Skyline AGAIN.

Got to Mam Tor about 9.45am and started off along the ridge towards Lose Hill. It was about 3/4 along the ridge that I thought water (or lack of water) might be an issue. I was only carrying 3 litres and the sun was beating hard – it was only 11:00am. At Lose Hill, I decided to go towards Hope and fill up, which I did. Damn, I had already sucked the camelbak empty. 3 litres later and I was off towards Hope Cross.

The ascent was quiet tough in the heat and I finally got to the cross about 12:30. A pleasent lunch (sausage sandwiches:) ) by a dead sheep and lots of flies went quickly and I continued uphill to Crookestone Knoll. It was only at this part of the walk that the crowds had started to subside. At the knoll, I turned east towards Kinder Scout staying close to the Edale edge.

I had originally decided not to plan the route and as I got to Grindesbrook Clough I had the decision to try the tricky descent or continue on to Brown Knoll and its peaty beauty. No contest really. So I descended the Clough in still great heat. I didn’t feel to bad at this time due to not having to walk up hill but was still relieved when I arrived at Edale in the valley bottom.

Another 2 litres of h2o where brought here ready for the final ascent up Mam Tor. I was pleased at this stage that I had no knee pain – it looked good for next weekends Scafell Pike ascent but I had developed blisters for first time since Cadair Idris last year. This was mainly because I failed to tie the Merrells sufficiently tight.

Finally about 4:00 I started the walk up Mam Tor. Very quickly the heat hit home and I struggled up the hill extremely slowly. Each footstep hurt and I ended up stopping for a few seconds every 10 steps or so. I would deliberately eat salty cashews and drink lots of water but neither helped. I even sat in the shade of a stone wall for about 20 minutes, but when I arose I felt no cooler. It was pretty much 5 when I got to the top and could make the final descent back to the car.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 18th, 2007 at 8:55 pm and is filed under project peaks, walking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.