My son and his family were visiting this weekend and the lad noticed that my diary print-out on the family noticeboard (we have to have one to arrange appointments to meet each other!) - said that I was due to do a reccy of a walk I was leading to Little Dun Fell on midsummer's night to watch the sun come up (and go "ooooh, the sun's come up!"
)
Various family circumstances were about to prevent me going on the appointed night, so sometime during the afternoon, we decided to go and have a look tonight (thats last night)
And so, just before midnight, me and the lad turned up at a small car park at the Knock sheep pens** on the road to the Great Dun fell radar station - and we kitted up and marched manfully and sonfully upwards..... till we got to the hill fog. It wasnt too bad on the road, but when we came to the bit where the Pennine Way turns off, we just couldnt identify the PW at all - so we continued up the road to the station which has helpful white lines on each side of the road.
By now the wind was blowing a real hoolie and the hillfog was hurtling past towards Carlisle at some speed.
Once at the radar station, we had the same trouble identifying the exact line of the PW...... so we abandoned the attempt and retired to a small concrete shed for a brew and some ginger biscuits.
It would have been easy to go from Great to Little Dun fells, but finding the PW after it leaves the summit would have required some interesting zig-zagging and I suspect that interesting zig-zagging would be the last thing to inspire confidence in any punters on the actual night.....
So... the plan is to go back in daylight and gps the thing.
In any case, conditions like last night would cause the walk to be cancelled as there's not much point in shivering the night away with the intent of watching the sun come up if visibility is just a few yards.
No pics taken as it was dark (!)
Back at the car by just before 3:00 am - moon and stars but stll foggy high up - must have been a cloud cap
We did do 6 miles and 1300 feet of climbing, though....
Possibly more on this saga later.....
** note that you cant normally drive to the Knock sheep pens as you'd have to pass a notice saying "No unauthorised vehicles beyond this point". However, the probability that anybody who's bothered would notice is quite low. Wandering around a radar station in the dead of night, however is more likely to attract the wrong sort of attention from peeps in serge outfits....
