Carlisle & District Rambling & Fellwalking Club

Walk & Event Reports

A fantastic walk today. From a personal point of view, the best I’ve been on for ages, totally pain free. I’d forgotten what it was like to walk without pain. I set off early and went directly to Haweswater, I thought if I went with the rest I would just slow them down but by leaving first I could make my way up slowly and the rest would probably catch me up by the time the climbing for the day was over. I set off from Haweswater about 9.15 and made my way slow and steady up Rough Crag. After about an hour I saw the others setting off from the car park. I had brought my binoculars just in case the eagle made an appearance but they came in handy for keeping track of the main party,  there were nine of them in total but I couldn’t make out who everyone was. I plodded on to Rough Crag and continued on to the cairn at the top of Long Stile. With climbing over I settled down to wait for others. It had been a tough climb, only just over two and half miles from the start but upwards all the way. It was also very warm and humid which made it even harder. The others were finding it hard as well, I was surprised that it was almost half an hour before they appeared at the top of Rough Crag which was half an hour away, perhaps I wouldn’t have slowed them up after all. They were well strung out but eventually the front runner, Heather, appeared  not far below. Heather joined me and we sat and waited for the rest who arrived in dribs and drabs, all grateful that the climbing for the day was over. We decided this was as good a place as any for lunch. During lunch we thought we heard the eagle and at one point we thought we had spotted it but it turned out to be a raven, we did spot a few deer, not as good as an eagle but nice to see anyway. After lunch we set off for the trig point on High Streets then made our way along to Rampsgill Head and Kidsty Pike. The views were stunning in all directions. Heather told us of her week as a Youth Hostel Manager in Pembroke and how expert she had become at cleaning up bird poo, some swallows were nesting in one of the dorms and were prolific pooers. Heather’s assistant ,Gill,  thought Heather was so good at the job she should do it every day, flattery is always a good ploy. Heather also told us about her day sitting on a wall in Snowdonia knitting a pair of gloves which I think ended the day as mittens. Throughout the day she met loads of interesting people all curious to see what she was up to. It was such a fascinating day she was thinking of writing a short story about it. If she does I’ll publish it on the website. She could do a series, " Tales of a Mitten Knitter " she could sit on a wall at different locations throughout the country knitting mittens, see what sort of people turn up. Watch this space. As we left Kidsty Pike, to make the steep descent to Haweswater, it started to rain quite heavily but fortunately it stopped in time for us to arrive back at the cars fairly dry. We headed off to the Haweswater Hotel and over coffee we were treated to a demonstration, by some of our female members, on winding down exercises. Some weird and wonderful positions were adopted and a tiny red squirrel popped up to observe the antics. Fred joined in and took up what I believe was known as the “dog” position, I wonder why. A brilliant day and a brilliant walk, thank you to everyone who came along and a special thanks to Pete for coming up with such a great walk.

John