Sunburn and Trenchfoot

It's the classic Glastonbury complaint or rather complaints although fairly serious liver poisoning could probably be added to the list. Feel free to comment on any others. (yeah I know la la lala lala lalala la Hey Jude is not for inspecting tonsils).

There is a theory which I'm attributing to Craig and Andy, on the year Glastonbury is off we should all go camping somewhere wet and play our favourite music under a Gazebo while camping. We'd get all the good bits without the trapesing about. Well I have an additional theory for walking weekends.

Meet at my house Thursday night, get trashed till 4am and then lets not bother with the fuss of the walking or camping. It seems to be the standard form anyway. Last time Andy and Craig lead me astray and wouldn't let me sleep, this time Beechy fooled me into doing it all over again. The only bit I remember from this time is 'what song do you want to go out to'......as in when you're dead rather than nipping to the post office. The smart answer was 'oh it hasn't been written yet', however we managed to get down to one each (this week only).

I'm going for The Passenger as its also got loads of lala la la lalalala's in it. Beechy on the other hand is going to try and take us all down with him by playing Atmosphere by Joy Division.

Oh yeah, point of blog...we went on a walking trip to the lakes again this weekend and having actually had about 5 people say 'write up your blog you lazy tosser' well here we are.

Into the car at 1pm with happiest loudest music we could find to singalong to all the way North. 21 belters. Please use paypal and send money and I'll send you a copy :-)

And so prompt at 3pm on Friday we arrived in Glenridding to be met by Shad walking through the main street to the shop. Luckily he saw us just as he realised he'd forgotten his money...doh! It's better than forgetting your tent eh? Despite dire words of 'oh it's full already' (thanks Shad) we headed onto the campsite and bagged two ideal spots down by The River.

The Springsteen clip is actually for my benefit as the TVR has erased most of Springsteens set.

The background river white noise was precautionary against the appearance of the local baboon house snoring team (Craig). And so tents up, hangover landing with a huge thud, the only answer was to drink some cider and wait for Tim's arrival two hours later.

It has to be a 'caption competition'

That all worked out fine....the hangover dispersed and Tim arrived bang on time

with possibly the gizmo of the weekend 'Grill and Go'. Blokes and gadgets always works, but camping gadgets with intrinsic 'FIRE' dead cert winner. So we admired it for minutes on end .........then went to the pub for tea. Traditional hangover food 'Steak Pie' result.

And the plan of completely overdoing it the night before worked perfectly as we were all tucked up by 10pm and 9 hours sleep later we woke to the most gorgeous morning in the lakes. And then Grill and Go we did. The plan ....meet at the campsite gates at 9am and follow me.

9.01am and everyone was there...........it was a miracle. Even Shad was on time. Then I promptly headed off up the hill and took the wrong path......awesome NOT. Quick team review

Beechy

Me

Shad

Tim

Andy Reddy

Aidan

Mike

This was a pretty mixed group of disparate folk from various areas of my life and I was bound to end up 'it' at various points of the day. So just to cover all points made

'directionless'

'over optimistic'

'foolhardy'

'pigheaded'

'intransigent'

and yes, they were my good points....oh except for 'correct'!! it turns out that the hill count does indeed make Helvellyn 3rd and Skiddaw 4th...................yeah whatever

Slight aside, actually bloody big and important aside. Another fairly recent topic of conversation has been the lack of a generation gap these days...............mainly because we've nicked all of the kids culture and refused to grow up. (C geneneration XXXX on previous blog). Well I've found the Gap and my advise is 'Mind this Gap'.

'Kids don't wear coats', it should be a band name, it could possibly move them from the blank genearation to the dank generation. My two have virtually thrown everything out of their wardrobes that even has a semblence of water protectiveness. You'll notice these drowned rats in the streets from now on. Well it'll serve them right!!!! raise your fists, grrrr and shake it at them in a Blakey Style

Blank Generation

Oh yeah the walk was fantastic, we managed to leave Shad and his 'Mavis bonnet' on the first climb, tbf it was a long steep climb being lead by Goatboy Aidan (I would put a Goatboy link in here but it may even offend you lot......look it up) in a ridiculously warm and windfree microclimate. As we reached Red Tarn (which hasn't even a tinge of rouge to it) we split into 2 groups and Tim foolishly followed Aidan over Striding Edge (for future reference chaps, he taught me all the carefree and careless attitude stuff years ago) you were bound to have a 'moment' Tim.

We on the other hand headed over Swirral Edge via a small diversion by a

quite breathtaking and brilliant choice of route up Catstye Cam.

The Swirall Edge scramble was miles better than expected

however Helvellyn is quite high, a bit ridgey and therefore quite windy. It's also bloody cold at all times even in summer, the temperature differential from the valley heat must have been about 12C minimum.

From here we headed over across the tops and began ticking off Wainwrights as we went (well me and Mike did), everyone one else could barely hold back the whisper of 'trainspotters' but you could see it etched on their faces. The views all day were wonderful and the clarity of the air was as good as I've ever seen. Mike has posted some pics on one of the walking websites but heres a taster. All credit to him for getting this pic. Oh and I decided to steal the other ones too. Cheers Mike.

The only tricky part of the walk was getting back down into Glenridding, by any standards it was bloody steep and pretty much overgrown in parts. The sound of the pub calling after 11.5miles miles and 4500ft tends to assist in these circumstances. Oh except for Andy who's climbing down backwards technique is not only slow but could in fact be the next big thing in moonwalk replacement dance therapy. Really really bloody odd mate! And it made you miss the turning to the pub....top tip look where you are going next time. So we did the pub, Craig hid around the corner till Aidan left to head off to a dinner party.....see I have posh mates too. We changed, showered and then went and drank some more and ate more pie. Perfect weather, playing out with your pals, drinking cider and eating pie the lakes........

It doesnt get much better unless you count the drinking cider back at the tent later.

I'll get on to the trenchfoot soon and I'll stick some of Beechys pics on here when I get them next week.