BB1730 : Fifty Things To Do With A Ferret

Wednesday 23rd August 2017

“I’m not sure where we are going” said Tony, who was driving.  “You’ll have to navigate.”

It was a not unreasonable request.  I did know where we were going.  I just didn’t know where we were.  I hadn’t been paying attention.

“Turn right at Greenodd,” I said.

“But we’ve passed Greenodd,” said Tony.

“OK.  Turn right at Ulverston.”

“We’ve just been though Ulverston.”

“Then we’ll go cross country.”

You may gather by now that we didn’t have SatNav.  Not that it would have helped. My cunning cross country route ran into a little bit of a problem.  After what seemed like many miles, which weren’t doing Stan’s bad back any good, we ran into the helpful sign: ROAD CLOSED.  Why didn’t they tell us way back?

So that’s my excuse for us being very late to meet Mike & Terry.

Our aim was to adapt a walk that Mike had found to circumnavigate Harter Fell (the Furness version) by adding a detour so that Terry could claim the summit for his Wainwright count.

The first section was a gently rising deforested track that later turned into a wooded path.  

When we reached the designated point we left the path to head up the quite steep then very steep path that led directly to the summit.  Or summits.  There are three of them and all rocky.

The first one we attempted defeated Mike and me.  The rocks offered few gripping points and what there were were greasy.  This was not the main summit so no-one else bothered.

The second had the trig point and was no trouble.  It made a fine view point and lunch stop.

The third was the true summit and proved to be a simple and safe short scramble.

Perhaps our next decision was a mistake.  The original intention was to return to the circumnavigation path more or less by the way we had come up.  However Stan and I advocated the direct route to the summit of Hard Knott Pass.

Direct is a misnomer as there were several bogs to wade through and crags to avoid.  We did, however, get a glimpse of the Scafells.

Eventually we reached the Hard Knott Pass and amused ourselves by watching the cars making a hash of climbing the narrow, steep and tightly winding road.

We could see the Hard Knott fort but it was further down than we remembered.

Hard Knott itself could be seen straight ahead.  Despite its name it is quite an easy climb.  However, we decided that both could wait for another time when we could sing the classic “It’s been a Hard Knott’s Day and I’ve been walking through the bog.”

Instead the boggy path we chose took us back to the cars.

We debated where to go to round off the day.  We had spotted a tiny little pub, the Newfield Inn at Seathwaite (the Furness one).  It turned out to be a Tardis but one with some interesting old features.

It was here that Tony started telling us about the fifty things you can do with a ferret.  He should know.  He owned one. To be precise it might not have been a ferret; Tony reckoned it was a Pine Martin but it doesn’t scan so well and there is little difference.

So what are the fifty things you can do with a ferret?  Tony had us laughing so much that I can’t remember and anyway I fear they would lose their impact in cold text.  For the full set I recommend that you buy Tony a pint or three and let him loose.  A bit like his ferret, I suppose.  I can only remember two.  The first is how to acquire a ferret and the fiftieth is what to do when, as Tony was, one is faced with the ultimatum given by one’s wife that “It’s me or the ferret.  One of us has to go.”

Fortunately Tony made the right decision.

Don, Wednesday 23rd August 2017

Comitibus : Terry,Tony, Mike, Stan, Don

Map shown: Ordnance Survey 1:25k

BOOTboys routes are put online in gpx format which should work with most mapping software. You can follow our route in detail by downloading bb1730 .

To discover which Wainwright top was visited on which BB outing - although it may not be that up to date - or for the totals of the mileages and heightages (ditto) see the Excel file: BB Log.

You can navigate to the required report via the Home Page

Photos have been gleaned from many sources
although mostly from me and other BOOTboys. Likewise written comment.

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BOOTboys 2017

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