This is the second TR from The Peak District. On Sunday the weather was a bit changeable. One minute there was torrential rain and then ten minutes later clear blue skies and sunshine. It was very windy so we thought it best to walk today and hope to climb on Monday. Again a wise decision because the heavy rain/strong wind then sunshine cycle kept up all day. First we walked up to Stanage Edge at the Popular End.
View from Stanage Edge
We headed off for Upper Burbage Bridge and walked over Higger Tor and Car Wark. There were quite a few people about despite the blustery and wet conditions.
Higger Tor
Tremendous rock formations.
Rocks and blue skies. This was one of the sunny spells we had.
From Burbage bridge we walked down to Grindleford via Padley Gorge
Lovely footbridge at Padley Gorge
The same bridge at bit further down. I loved this walk through the gorge. Absolutely stunning place.
Taken near Grindleford on the way back to Hathersage by the River Derwent
Hathersage
We were pleased to get back to the campsite because the walk was longer than we had planned at about 10 miles and our legs were tired.
Monday dawned with rain showers on and off and we didn’t know if climbing was going to be possible. There were light winds so we decided to take the climbing stuff with us and see what weather we got when we got to the Edge. In the end we managed 4 hours without any rain.
Stanage Edge and Grotto Slabs in view in the centre of the shot. Beefy climbed the Diff route up this, 14m. I gave this one a miss because I was struggling to even get started on it.
Beefy abseiling down Grottos Slabs before he climbed it.
Beefy abseiling down Zip Crack. There wasn’t enough time for me to learn how to abseil. Unfortunately.
Zip Crack. This is a mod, 7m. I climbed this one first and I found it a bit more difficult than Square Chimney. I had to rest my arms ¾ of the way up because they were starting to get tired. Beefy didn’t have any problem with it, the show off.
It started to chuck it down just as were about to try a Diff climb so we had to abandon the thought of any more climbing but we’d done well to have 4 dry hours. After a delicious pasta meal
we both reflected that we liked climbing and we wanted to try more of it. I found out that climbing is harder than it looks and I need to build up my arm strength a bit.
I am a big fan of the Peak District. I love the scenery and wasn't disappointed that we didn't spend the whole time climbing as we'd planned. The two walks were stunning and if the weather had been better we would have missed out on those.
I must mention the female GP and her husband who very kindly gave us a lift up to the campsite on Friday afternoon. We'd got off the train expecting to ring for a taxi to take us up to the campsite. We were laden down with climbing gear, camping gear, food for 4 days, hiking gear and we would have struggled to carry all that up to the campsite at North Lees. There were no taxis available and the lovely doctor and hubby insisted on helping us carry the stuff to their car and then driving us up to the campsite. What lovely people they were and I can't thank them enough.