A thousand miles on Kinder

Tony Bennet (Pennineranger blogger – not the singer…) came up with the idea for this.
The plan was simply to walk along the Lose Hill – Mam Tor Ridge, then on up to Kinder Downfall, camp for the night and then return along the Southern Kinder edge and finish off with Win Hill.
Which is what we did.
I travelled down to Derbyshire by train and camped at Laneside Caravan park and was joined in the pub by Tony at some point in the evening.
Fortified by a Hope café breakfast, we left Hope (..er.. left All Hope….) on a beautiful summer’s morning and quickly bagged Lose Hill.
The walk along to Mam Tor was, as usual, a joy. Its justifiably popular, to such an extent that you’d be hard put to have a quiet wee.
Anyway, the walk went straightforwardly enough and after passing over Rushup Edge we turned North over Brown Knoll on to Kinder.
Here, we met various ladies in pink angel wings, out of a hen “do”. And we shared the trig with them whilst I celebrated my 1000th walking mile in 2009. (Pic shows a one fingered salute – that’s one thousand, not a rude gesture about swivelling.)
Kinder Downfall was devoid of any water, and the Kinder River above it had just standing pools, which didn’t specially bode well for camping. However, we pitched up on a sheltered spot that Tony had camped on previously (he seemed to be very familiar with a particular boulder which needed to be moved to ensure a comfy night0
And so, to the sound of the Manchester Airport aircraft stack, we settled in for the night.
The morning dawned grey and misty with some gently drifting hill fog and soggy tents. We followed the river and hags up on to the peaty top and, on a rough bearing over the watershed to meet the edge which we then followed Eastwards. Eventually, and rather suddenly, the hillfog lifted and we got a grand view of yesterday’s walk along the Mam Tor ridge.
One chap along the way had no idea where he was and asked for the names of locaal features and for directions and a group of senior walkers discovered after a brief chat thet they were heading in exactly the opposite direction to where they were supposed to be going.
By dint of much plodding in the right direction, however, we soon arrived at the summit of Win Hill, which was about to be occupied by a large number of what appeared to be a DofE expedition, intent on camping, in a tilted and breezy kind of way on the summit.
And that was pretty much it. This is a cracking route. Don’t do it, though, if you are a grumpy old rambler who objects to other people being on the same hill – because there’s lots and lots of people everywhere on these hills. Its absolutely heaving with walkers and their dogs and mountain bikers without bells. And there’s a healthy level of air traffic above too – and, even in the middle of the black bog, the sound of motorbikes on far distant roads can be clearly heard. This is no place for quiet meditation. I don’t mind the people and dogs, really. I find these busy places in the hills quite interesting. But if you want quiet – go somewhere else.

Thanks to Tony for a cracking weekend and for the idea...

I will walk five hundred miles and I will walk five hundred more just to be the man who walked a thousand miles... dum de do.....

TGO Challenge English Gathering

Put the tent up, alongside a few others in the ever-so-slightly-tilted grassy bits around Snake Inn’s car park, had a beer, had another beer, had some more beer, then made a cup of tea on my NEW STOVE. Boils very quick and doesn’t scorch the grass.
Friday night at the Snake Inn was purely for a spot of lightweight convivial boozing.

Saturday dawned clear and windy and a large bunch (or is it a bunch of large) Challengers hurtled off to Edale in some laid-on transport and , after some initial hesitation where nobody could decide whether or not there was a walk leader, we sort of started drifting off towards Scotland, up the Pennine Way.

It were windy. At a rest stop Sue Banfield produced a box of caramel shortcake and we all got cold.

Later, Kinder Downfall was blowing backwards, as it does sometimes and nobody could find the Kinder Eggs. There were suspicions that whoever said that this was the origin of the famous kiddie’s sweety may have been telling porkies for their own nefarious enjoyment. Personally, I’m not so sure.

The party split at the North end of the plateau and some went off down the direct path whilst others (including me) padded along the flags for a bit more Pennine Way, cut down Doctors Gate and finished with a flourish in some woods.

The Snake Inn is a fine choice for a grand gnoshup and a fine dinner was had. Various well-know challengers and bloggers and challenger/bloggers were there (as you’ve probably already worked out) and it was nice to meet Sue and Martin Banfield of Postcard from Timperley fame, and Phil (Lord Elpus) and Tina (Miss Whiplash) Lambert who do yer Doodlecat and Alvar and Anne who you may remember we met in the snowy Lake District a few weeks ago. Rather nice to meet Miss Whiplash in the flesh, as it happens and she did assure me that the wheals and rope marks will wear off with time. The hot poker burns may take longer. Anyway, it were a cracking do. Most, or at least some of the usual suspects were there and there was a fair smattering of Challenge virgins, and one or two people who had never done it before either.

Sunday saw me doing a little round around Black Edge and Comb Moss somewhere quite near to Chapel en le Frith. It’s a cracking walk to go around this edge – everywhere steep and rocky below, but magnificently level walking. Go off the path at your peril, though as the dangerously tough tussocks tend to trap the off-route tourist. I bet you can’t read that last bit with a gobful of toast, innit?

Finished with a flourish by driving up the M1.

See who you can identify in the photo. The prize is a night out with all of them at the Park Hotel in Montrose. Make your own way there and you'll have to buy the beer.