BB0935 : A Tale of Crinkley Bottoms

There are excuses and there are excuses.  

Some, like “I’ve broken my ribs” or “I’ve damaged my sacroiliac joint” or “I’ve just burned my house down”, are understandable reasons for foregoing a BOOTboys outing.  

Others, like “I’m having my hair cut” or “I’m going for a massage” are just feeble, although Tony, the perpetrator of the latter, asks “Which would you prefer: pounding up some boggy fell in pouring rain or having a young woman rub her hands all over you for half an hour?”  

Fair point.

Meanwhile Pete (with nearly 300 miles of travel, but more of that later), Tony, Stan and I were pondering whether to stick with Plan A and head over to the north west fells despite an atrocious weather forecast or to travel east to the drier Yorkshire hills.  Plan A won the day.

It was actually a pleasant autumnal morning as we drove up the A591 though the Lake District but it became ominously greyer as we progressed over the Whinlatter Pass.  On parking at Low Lorton, it started raining and it didn’t stop until we reached the road back to the car, more than three hours later.

Our first objective was Fellbarrow, which meant that a substantial amount of climbing was done on the “white” road over the northern shoulder of this group of hills before turning south on a cart track and finally south west across fields to the summit.  The trig point was being guarded by bullocks but fortunately they had the good sense to back off so no violence was called for.

From here, we followed the wall southwards in very unpleasant weather, including, at times, hail.  Strangely, however, the visibility remained quite good for such a wet day.

A first glimpse of Low Fell

Water was somehow getting through my anorak and running down my back into my underpants!  Lovely.  

Low Fell to the left, Darling Fell to the right

We bore west to join the path that comes up from Thackthwaite at the inappropriately named (today, at least) Watching Crag.

The Whiteside and Grasmoor range

On reaching the village, Pete commented that he didn’t know that red squirrels could drive and insisted that I took a photo of the sign telling them to slow down.  I didn’t even know they could read!

One of the properties had a romany type summer house in its garden.

The rest of the journey was an almost pleasant road stroll back to the car where we finished off the rest of our lunch.  We compared our inner dampnesses.  Stan was cold but reasonably dry.  Pete and Tony wet in the upper body.  I was damp up and down and therefore, yes, my bottom had become quite crinkley.  Tony informed us that when he got home, he intended to run a hot bath and soak in it for hours so no doubt his bottom, too, is, by now, crinkley but perhaps that’s too much information!

Pete's crinkley bottom was caused by quite different means - his journey back from Kendal to his home in Cheshire took him six hours thanks to a breakdown and a three hour wait for the recovery vehicle.  A long time to be sat in the same seat!

But would we have swapped the BOOTboys adventure for a trip to Noel Edmond’s Crinkley Bottom?  

Not on your Crinkley Nelly, Noel.

Don, 5th November 2009

Afternote: Bryan subsequently outed himself as the traveller to Crinkley Bottom and attempted to justify his absence with the following contribution:

An interesting read but with an important factual innacuracy.

Crinkley Bottom was of course from the Mr Blobby days. Noel has now gone much more upmarket and his establishment is now called the Dream Factory.

For us yesterday was actually the 17th February. It was an interesting day as neither Liz, Helen, or myself had ever been on a TV set before so all the "warm-up" bits, the pre-recording setting up etc. were completely new to us.

It was also remarkable how involved you got with the actual game, to the extent of forgetting completely that you were in a tin hut on an industrial estate in Bristol!. Although clearly it's just a game of chance, the fact was that we were a few feet away from a bloke to whom £5,000 was a serious amount of money and he was having to decide whether to take it or take a 2:1 chance of getting £50,000.

For me personally it was definitely worth the travelling, with a nice morning in Bristol on a SUNNY day as well. And despite traffic jams on the M6 we still got home quicker than Pete!

Bryan

Bryan was unable to tell us more as he is subject to a confidentiality agreement.
However he was at liberty to show us just what we hadn't been able see from Low Fell:

But then, here are two views that he didn't see:

If you want to comment on this report, click on .

STATISTCS

If you have Memory Map on your computer, you can follow our route in detail by downloading BB0935.

Steve G advises: "For those who like to look at your meanderings but use Tracklogs or other software then your logs can be converted using the freeware utility GPS Babel."

For the latest totals of the mileages, heights and Lakeland Fells Books Wainwrights see: Wainwrights.

If anyone wants to claim other peaks, please let me know and I will submit them to the adjudication committee!

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BOOT boys

This page describes an adventure of BOOTboys, a loose group of friends of mature years who enjoy defying the aging process by getting out into the hills as often as possible!

As most live in South Lakeland, it is no surprise that our focus is on the Lakeland fells and the Yorkshire Dales.

As for the name, BOOTboys, it does not primarily derive from an item of footwear, and certainly not from any skin head associations or other
type of social group,
but is in memory of
Big Josie,
the erstwhile landlady
of the erstwhile Burnmoor Inn at Boot in Eskdale,
who enlivened Saint Patrick's Day 1973
and other odd evenings many years ago!

If you want to contact us, click on

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Archive

2009 Outings

• BB0901 : A Gordon Day Out
  Thursday 8th January
• BB0902 : Thank You,
  Aunty Ethel!
  Wednesday 14th January 
• BB0903 : A Wicked Hike???
  Wednesday 21st January
• BB0904 : Take a Mug With You
  Sunday 25th January
• BB0905 : Down in the Forest
  Thursday 29th January
• BB0906 : Not How But Where?
  Thursday 5th February
• BB0907 : Binsey Can Wait
  (but Uncle Monty Can Not)
  Thursday 12th February
• BB0908 : Badgers on the Line
  Thursday 5th March
• BB0909 : It's not a W!
  Thursday 12th March
• BB0910 : Up on the Roof
  Thursday 26th March
• BB0911 : Not the Blisco Dashers
  Thursday 2nd April
• BB0912 : John's Comeback
  Monday 6th April
• BB0913 : Two Churches, a Pulpit and a Cherry Picker
  Thursday, 23rd April
• BB0914 : Companions of the BOOT
  Thursday 30th April
• BB0915 : The Gale Force Choice
  Thursday 7th May
• BB0916 : The Comeback Continues
  Thursday 21st May
• BB0917 : BOOTboys Encore !
  28th May - 2nd June
• BB0918 : Hello Dollywagon
  Thursday 11th June
• BB0919 : Has Anyone Seen Lily?
  Thursday 18th June
• BB0920 : Ancient Feet on the Greenburn Horseshoe
  Thursday 25th June
• BB0921 : The Tebay Fell Race Walk
  Thursday 2nd July
• BB0922 : For England and St George 
  Thursday 9th July
• BB0923 : The Coniston Outliers
  Friday 31st July
• BB0924 : Little To Be Said In Favour?
  Thursday 6th August
• BB0925 : The Third Night of the Rescue 
  Thursday 13th August
• BB0926 : Long Wet Windy Monty Bothy Fun?
  Thursday 20th August
• BB0927 : Dear Mrs Scroggins
  Friday 11th September
• BB0928 : An Ard Day's Hike
  Thursday 17th September
• BB0929 : A Canter of Convalescents?
  Thursday 24th September
• BB0930 : BOOTboys International Autumnal Expedition
  Wednesday 23rd to
  Sunday 27th September
• BB0931 : A Bit of an Adventure
  Thursday 1st October 
• BB0932 : Paths of Glory?
  Thursday 8th October
• BB0933 : When Yorkshire Was Welsh
  Wednesday 14th October
• BB0934 : Unlocking the Whinlatters
  Thursday 22nd October
• BB0935 : A Tale of Crinkley Bottoms
  Thursday 5th November
• BB0936 : Aye Up What?
  Thursday 12th November
• BB0937 : Where Eagles Wade
  Tuesday 17th November
• BB0938 : After the Floods
  Thursday 26th November
• BB0939 : The Mystery of the Missing Glove
  Thursday 10th December
• BB0940 : A Too Short Walk
  Thursday 17th December
• BB0941 : One Hundred and Onesfell
  Tuesday 29th December

• BH0901 : Back to the Beginning 
  Thursday 13th August
• BSKIB09 : BOOTskiboys in Saalbach
  14th - 21st March
• BB09XX : Los Chicos y las Chicas de la Bota
  11th - 14th May
• BB09Bav01 : Peaked Too Soon
  1st September

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

Wainwrights

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

If anyone wants to claim other peaks, please let me know and I will submit them to the adjudication committee!

 BOOT boys