Not Moel Arthur Dad

Moel Arthur not looking too big?

I'm good with books, particularly non fiction and more specifically development , learning advice sort of books. We read every 'how to bring a baby up in 3 days' guide that there was. It still doesn't stop you bouncing them on the concrete floor once or twice, perhaps the idea is to cover the floor in books. I digress, having read the 'how to get your kids hill walking' book, or at least a section in Trail Magazine I was a world expert.

As usual I followed the experts advice to a tee.

1) Choose a short distance

2) Pick good weather

3) Make sure there's lots to see

4) Choose easy terrain

And I'm very happy if you copy all of the above and use it with your children, not you Craig, if you could bring Tom with us when we head up Scafell, in wind chill minus 10, in the fog in his flip flops it'll serve him right for stuffing me at air hockey. (not that I'm competive or harbour grudges).

Having said all that Jess didnt fair too much better,

1)It was about 9 miles (the book had said about 2 miles)

2)It really was windchill-10C

3) There were loads of fields to look at

4) the MASSIVE uphill at the start was probably a mistake

But at least I had Shad with me so it was bound to turn out nice. Actually it could have been even worse, I had planned a quick warm up 3 miles over Moel Arthur as a bit of a preamble. I was ganged up on in the car park, they took one look at the Moel to our right and basically said

'No Chance - Loser'

Now I'm sure even all this would have been ok had Jess not had crisps for breakfast swished down with fizzy pop.....standard teenage fare I would have thought. Well the standard except on the hills where even the slightly less steep first hill we chose had a more than nausious effect on the stomach. 95% of the time, Jess is a pretty happy person, somewhat understandably jolliness had now left the hillside. Ten minutes later though she was back 'up and attem' and biased as I am I think that despite her lack of sporting prowess, a Duke of Edinburgh may be attained on willpower alone.

I'm pretty sure I would have cried off, I've seen Craig cry off cos his boot was a bit tight!

And so we headed along the ridge into the bitterest of winds, luckily me and Jess were buffed up, I think the pink buff was actually the key to getting Jess out..exercise meets fashion. It got to the point where Shad actually put his gloves on.....thats really freakin cold. Slight aside

Shads birthday and he never gets any presents except another crap jumper off his mum from Boys stores or the Welsh equivalent. The latest one actually has leaves on the shoulder, its so bad I was lost for words so havent mentioned it yet. BLUE leaves. At work the whole team decided to club together to get him a pressie this year and having a hefty collection, amongst other things he gets a top of the range pair of Thinsulate gloves. The ungrateful so and so then comes out on a walk a week later and says ' I don't know why the girls got me these I never wear gloves'. Two issues mate 1)Me and Ric chucked some cash in too and 2) it could have been another bloody jumper. It turned out he spoke too soon though and has now taken to wearing them....sometimes!

There was a bizarre women (sixty ish) we passed who had a chat with Shad(they all do) and claimed to have been dropped off by her hubby and was walking 30 miles to the pub on the coast where he was watching the football. Odd behaviour.

Well we made it too the top without too much cajolling and it was all pretty successful, reasonable views, warm drinks a bit of food. I did have to do a bit of explaining about the fact we could have parked around the corner, rather than in the carpark 5 miles away with one other car. I think the other 40 people at the top were the main giveaway, still what doesn't kill em...etc etc.

Luckily I decided not to check if the bouncing on the head technique was still working or not.