Tuesday 15th May, 2007

How wrong can the weather forecasters be?

Posted by at 12:57 am in Annual Wildie, Great Escapes, Lakes Escapes, Wildcamping.
Tags:

The forecast for our wildcamping weekend was a point for concern. All of the sources were telling us to expect shed-loads of rain, low temperatures and lightning. I'm happy to report that the forecasts were well wide of the mark. Friday afternoon was warm and sunny, the night was a bit rainy, Saturday started misty but soon cleared to a sunny day with a light breeze. A little overnight rain was soon dried out by glorious sunshine on Sunday morning. Because the forecasts had deterred a lot of walkers, for the main part we had the hills to ourselves. Excellent!

Details of our route are as follows:

    • Friday: Parked up outside the Police Station at the Glenridding Tourist Information Centre and bought a 48-hour ticket
    • Took the steamer "Raven" to Howtown
    • Bonscale Pike 1718ft
    • Overnight camp next to the Swarth Beck sheepfold
    • Saturday: Arthur's Pike 1747 ft
    • Loadpot Hill 2201ft
    • Wether Hill 2210ft
    • High Raise 2634ft
    • Rampsgill Head 2581ft
    • Kidsty Pike 2560ft
    • The Knott 2423ft
    • Satura Crag
    • Overnight camp on the shore of Angle Tarn
    • Sunday: Patterdale via Boardale Hause
    • Glenridding via lakeshore and roadside paths

 

We had intended to go up High Street, Rest Dodd and The Nab, but Chris was struggling with her breathing and we didn't want to risk her having problems with her asthma, so we dropped down and took things easy.

Suffice to say that we had a great time, apart from the tick menace (they were mostly small black beasties about 2mm across, but we saw a few evil-looking brown and red ones that were over 5mm across). We tested out some of our new kit, got sunburn, took far too many photos (over 240), saw lots of wildlife and had fantastic views in all directions.

My tally of "Wainwrights" is now 159 (not counting repeats), which leaves 55 still to do. This keeps me on course for breaking the record for the slowest ever "casual compleation" of the famous 214

I've whittled down the photo-stash to a paltry 82(!) which I'll embed in a handful of posts later. Here are a few to whet the appetite:

 

The head of Ullswater

 

Swarthbeck sheepfold - the pitch for the first night

 

Looking back down the High Street path

 

Thornthwaite Crag

 

Reeds and rocks at Angle Tarn

 

Angle Tarn in the morning light

Wednesday 9th May, 2007

Rab’s stunt-double arrives at BG Towers

Posted by at 10:18 am in Car stuff.

The nice people who supply courtesy cars on behalf of my insurance provider phoned yesterday to say that they would be delivering a car of "similar size and performance" to Rab, my poorly Octavia vRS estate. "A Ford Mondeo" was what they said I would get. A few hours later, they turned up and handed me the keys to this:

 

Excellent.

I might just let the good people on OM know about this, seeing as they all like 4x4s 😉

Monday 7th May, 2007

Bacon Risotto

Posted by at 8:30 pm in Dehydrating.

Here’s a variation on that easy risotto recipe. The process is the same, it’s just the ingredients and the order of addition that have changed:

1 onion, finely chopped
1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
1 stock cube
850ml / 1.5 pints boiling water
250g / 9 oz risotto rice (risotto, arborio, carnaroli are best, long-grain will do at a push but the results aren’t as good, any other rice just doesn’t work. I’ve been using dirt-cheap 10 oz packs of “Italiamo” Risotto Carnaroli bought from Lidl – these packs have extra bits of veg. etc. in them, to lend a bit of variety)
250g / 9 oz rindless bacon, cut into 1” pieces
1 large cupful of frozen peas
large knob of butter
1 pinch of salt (optional)
Some freshly-ground black pepper (optional)

Nuke it as follows:

Put the onion, the garlic, the stock cube and a ½ pint of boiling water in a large microwaveable bowl and stir well. Cover (cling-film is OK for this, or use a casserole dish with a lid) then microwave on High for 3 minutes.

Stir in the rice, the bacon and another ½ pint of boiling water, cover it again then microwave it on High for another 5 minutes, then stir it again, then nuke it for yet another 5 minutes.

Stir in the frozen peas and the last ½ pint of boiling water, cover it again then microwave it on High for another 4 minutes.

Check that the rice is cooked (nice and soft), if it isn’t, another 1 minute of cooking should sort it out.

Leave the bowl to stand for 1-2 minutes for the liquid to be absorbed, then stir in the butter. Add the salt and pepper if desired, and stir it all up.

Now weigh your creation and record the result.

You should dehydrate the food immediately to prevent bacterial growth in the rice. Drying usually takes about 8 hours.

When dry, weigh it again to calculate how much water has been lost, this is the amount that’s needed for rehydration.

After you’ve bagged it, freeze it. I divvy it up to make 3 or 4 bagged meals.

Rab’s got a bit of a headache!

Posted by at 8:01 pm in Car stuff.

Rab (the Red-Arsed Bastard) got seriously injured today when somebody reversed into him while waiting to park at Go Outdoors, Coventry. Me and Ella were a bit shook up but otherwise unharmed, as were the occupants of the impacting vehicle. Not exactly what I needed when I'm off wildcamping next weekend - let's just hope that the courtesy-car arrives in good time.

Here are a few pics for all you car-haters to gloat over:

 

 

 

Thursday 3rd May, 2007

Another a**hole with more money than brains

Posted by at 12:59 pm in A bit of a rant, Driveway-blocking feckwits and piss-poor parkers.

For your viewing pleasure: One New Landrover Discovery, cherished registration W222SJM, grey, parked across the pavement and blocking access to my driveway. Apparently, if you've got enough dosh, you can be exempted from the provisions of the Highway Code.

Being a good citizen of the realm, I've sent pics and a report to the local police.

 

Monday 30th April, 2007

Wildcamp route planning just about finished

Posted by at 11:39 pm in Great Escapes.

While other hardy souls are slogging it out across Scotland on the TGO Challenge, we'll be taking it easy. We've decided to do a weekend mini-tour of the Far Eastern Fells, primarily because Chris has been wanting to walk along the High Street for some time now.

I know that there are many people out there who would consider this to be just a long day-walk, but we'll be taking things easy, the pace will be leisurely and we intend to savour the experience, not dash across the hills in a race to the next waypoint. The main route takes in:
  • Howtown
  • Bonscale Pike 1718ft
  • Arthur's Pike 1747 ft
  • Loadpot Hill 2201ft
  • Wether Hill 2210ft
  • High Raise 2634ft
  • Rampsgill Head 2581ft
  • Kidsty Pike 2560ft
  • High Street 2718ft
  • The Knott 2423ft
  • Rest Dodd 2278ft
  • The Nab 1887ft
  • Angletarn Pikes 1857ft
  • Any pub in Patterdale or Glenridding
Optional add-ons from High Street include Thornthwaite Crag 2569ft (just to see that magenta sky again!) and Mardale Ill Bell 2496ft. Wildcamping spots and water-gathering opportunities have yet to be finalised, but such trivial matters should sort themselves out soon enough 🙂 I'll have to get this lot plotted into Memory-Map to see what sort of totals it comes up with, then when we've done the graft I'll do a comparison with the route as recorded by the Geko 201. It'll be interesting to see if there are any major differences. It should be a good weekend if the weather is good.
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »