BB1114 : A March Through The Mist

Wednesday 1st June 2011

Poor Jamie.  A visit home and the rare chance of an outing with the BOOTboys but the forecast for the chosen day was for low cloud and high winds. Not exactly Flaming June!

I had in mind a gentle tour round the villages south of Penrith where things looked likely to be better; however Jamie was keener on Kentmere although not the route initially suggested by Bryan which involved a 1,500 foot more or less direct ascent of Ill Bell from the reservoir; a route that he defended as being one of Wainwright’s.

Stan suggested the choice be left to Jamie and so a more gentle approach was agreed, being the traditional route up Crabtree Brow to the Garburn Pass motorway.  Until, that is, we reached the race route.  Here, predictably, Bryan advocated the more direct ascent of Yoke.  However, this I had done before and knew that although steeper in parts, there were no lurking terrors even though the path soon disappeared into the mist.

On breasting the ridge, our path, a normal one, ran on the opposite side of the wall to the controversially surfaced motorway but before long the two merged.  Yoke, then Ill Bell then Froswick all succumbed with no real photo opportunities other than summit shots.  

We briefly joined the High Street Roman Road but quickly detoured right around the rim of Kentmere valley.  It took rather longer than we expected to circumnavigate Mardale Ill Bell but eventually we dropped down to the Nan Bield Shelter and found it unoccupied. The ideal lunch stop with its stonework protecting us from the howling gale blowing up from the south.

Afterwards, we braved the wind and, fortunately, soon dropped down out of the worst of it into the Kentmere valley and the long walk back to the car.

Kentmere Reservoir with Ill Bell behind

It was not quite our longest outing of the year but certainly by a long way the one with the most climbing, although I am pleased to report that once I had completed the first half hour or so, I felt in good fettle all round.

It’s just a pity that conditions did not favour more meaningful photos so here is one taken earlier in the week at Arnside .....

..... and one from last week when Jamie climbed Crete’s highest peak, Mount Psiloritis, which, at 8,058 feet, rather puts today’s efforts into perspective!

To see more of this expedition, visit Flikr Psiloritis .

Don, 1st June 2011

PS To my surprise, we have another Big Josie contribution.  
See A National Institution.

STATISTICS:

BOOTboys routes ares now being put online in gpx format which should work with most mapping software. You can follow our route in detail by downloading BB1114.

To see which Wainwright top was visited on which BB outing see
Which Wainwright When?

For the latest totals of the mileages and heights see: BB Log.

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Archive

2011 Outings

BB1101 :
Wasnfell Revisited
Tuseday 11th January

BB1102 :
Recuperation Scar!
Thursday 17th February

BB1103 :
A Promenade of Pensioners
Thursday 24th February

BB1104 :
The B Team
Thursday 3rd March

BB1105 :
A Little Bit Of Wind
Thursday 10th March

BB1106 :
A Linthwaite Round
Thursday 17th March

BB1107 :
Home From The Pulpit
Thursday 24th March

BB1108 :
Taking The Brunt
Thursday 31st March

BB1109 :
Up The Spout
Wednesday 6th April

BB1110 :
Not The Royal Wedding
Friday 29th April

BB1111 :
Kentmere Parts 1 & 2
Thursday 5th, Saturday 7th May

BB1112 :
Five Unknown Tarns
Wednesday 11th May

BB1113 :
Gurnal Dubbs Revisited
Thursday 19th May

BB1114 :
A March Through The Mist
Wednesday 1st June

BB1115 :
Brief Encounter
Wednesday 8th June

BB1116 :
Extraordinary and Lesser Mortals
Wednesday 15th June

Click on the photos
for an enlargement
or related large picture.

 Wainwrights

To see which Wainwright
top was visited on which
BB outing see Which Wainwright When?.

To download a log of heights and miles and which Wainwrights have been done by which BOOTboy in the "modern" era, i.e. since the advent of BOOTboys
click on BB Log.