A test or two

After my disappointing loss of nerve on Blencathra last weekend it was clear to me that a big effort would be required to restore confidence for tackling the rougher steeper lakeland slopes. The reccee of the BGR leg four scheduled for Saturday would be good practise and a test.

Andrew and I met Linda and Geoff at Honister. It was a lovely sunny morning, and marked the start of the sun cream and ice cream season for me! We set off at a steady pace climbing over to Great Gable, skirting round it and dropping down into Wasdale on Moses Trod (Leg four starts in Wasdale and ends at Honister Pass).

Moses Trod was the first (and unexpected) challenge for me. It was narrow, steep, clung to the side of the mountain with a drop off to the side and was covered in loose gravel and rock fragments. I struggled down it as best as I could manage at the head of the group, trying to take Linda's advice and trust my studs but quietly grateful that the trod wasn't a feature of the round. Mayhem seemed to break loose just as I was approaching a walker who had stopped to one side making room for us to pass. All I remember is seeing a look of horror on his face, hearing a warning, and noise from behind that sounded like Linda must have tripped and be falling; I expected to be catapulted off the mountain by an impact from behind. I took a step sideways to try and escape whatever calamity was occurring behind me but as I did so I was hit on the ankle bone by a falling piece of rock. It turned out that I'd dislodged some loose rock and gravel causing a mini (very mini) avalanche to start. Linda had tried to kick or step on the piece of rock to save me but it had evaded her attempt, took a curve and headed straight for me. The rest of the descent was taken on extra wobbly legs with one stop for a bit of cringing as the pain hit me, feeling similar in scale to a badly stubbed toe post marathon. As a precaution to stop any swelling I took some ibuprofen and made use of a stream for icing. The pain quickly subsided to a dull ache and I was ready to proceed with the recce.

The rest of the day went smoothly enough and although I was slower than the others on the more exposed steep ground I was able to make good progress. In an odd sort of way I think the incident in the morning helped me; I'd had a scare and nothing terrible had happened. I felt strong and confident on the ascents. Great Gable and Steeple are probably the most exposed sections and these passed without fuss.

Andrew and I paid our respects to the Dog n Gun and Lakeland Spice in the evening. I was mentally and physically tired and needed an early night. I fell into a deep untroubled sleep.

To be continued....! Leg 2 on Sunday.

I've been through a busy spell and have had to let my blog take a back seat for a while. I'll recap Sunday's run as best I can from my poor memory!

Andrew and I had planned to recce the second half of the BGR leg two as an out and back from Dunmail. The weather was good; sunny and hot, as I recall applying plenty of sun cream. We took a line straight up Dollywagon Pike across grassland and a large boggy area, which was heavy going but we found a good fast flowing spring to dip water from which refreshed us nicely.

Along the way we met some lads with mountain bikes. How anyone can cycle over the terrain with steep technical ascents and descents and enjoy it, I'll never know. We sat down and watched them descend off one of the peaks, I forget which, we'd run down it but it looked pretty suicidal for a bike to me!

My strongest memories of the day are the route from the summit of Dollywagon Pike, via Fairfield, Seat Sandal and back down to Dunmail. This section offers some significant descents and climbs in a concentrated area and Andrew and I attacked it with enthusiasm. We raced up Fairfield, Andrew taking the tourist track, me taking a more direct but steeper line to see which was the quickest. The direct line came out tops and we made use of it on the descent too.

We took a line off the side of Seat Sandall far too early and dropped down on very steep grass, leaving us with a stony and not very pleasant track to finish the descent on; oops!