Made it!
My walk up Pendle Hill today was a success. :)
No problems with my knee, and the weather was perfect for me - dry, warm rather than hot, some cloud cover, and a slight breeze. My navigation went a bit wrong twice; the first time when the path disappeared so I followed the course of a stream instead, which involved a bit of trudging through bogs (the path rejoined the stream a bit further on), and the second time when the directions said to follow an apparently non-existent footpath across a field. Since I was already down from the hill by that point I decided to ignore the last bit and just follow the tarmac road back to Barley instead.
I took my Garmin eTrex GPS with me, as well as my ordinary magnetic compass and the appropriate OS Explorer map. I found it quite handy to be able to check using the GPS that I was in the right place when the directions mentioned a grid reference. I would be able to tell you how far I walked and my average speed, but unfortunately its batteries ran out before I got back to the car! (they were quite old)
I had my picnic lunch near this interesting stone structure, presumably a former shepherd's shelter:
What I'd like to do next is a bit of walking and camping up in the Yorkshire Dales. I've been browsing the walks in my as-yet-unused copy of Wainwright's Walks in Limestone Country. Maybe even one of the three peaks (Ingleborough, Whernside or Penyghent).
No problems with my knee, and the weather was perfect for me - dry, warm rather than hot, some cloud cover, and a slight breeze. My navigation went a bit wrong twice; the first time when the path disappeared so I followed the course of a stream instead, which involved a bit of trudging through bogs (the path rejoined the stream a bit further on), and the second time when the directions said to follow an apparently non-existent footpath across a field. Since I was already down from the hill by that point I decided to ignore the last bit and just follow the tarmac road back to Barley instead.
I took my Garmin eTrex GPS with me, as well as my ordinary magnetic compass and the appropriate OS Explorer map. I found it quite handy to be able to check using the GPS that I was in the right place when the directions mentioned a grid reference. I would be able to tell you how far I walked and my average speed, but unfortunately its batteries ran out before I got back to the car! (they were quite old)
I had my picnic lunch near this interesting stone structure, presumably a former shepherd's shelter:
What I'd like to do next is a bit of walking and camping up in the Yorkshire Dales. I've been browsing the walks in my as-yet-unused copy of Wainwright's Walks in Limestone Country. Maybe even one of the three peaks (Ingleborough, Whernside or Penyghent).
I'm excited for you about the Dales walk plans :D
I'm excited about walking in the Dales too! :)
Also, what's in the first picture? Is that part of a railing at a lookout, or a fence, or something completely different?
I did notice that in the link you posted last night, there was a bit about the track not always being visible or something... was that the bit you mentioned above?
The thing in the first picture is a trig point. There are hundreds of them scattered across the British Isles, usually on hilltops (though I've also seen one at Dunnet Head, the most northerly point of Great Britain). They are concrete monoliths with a bronze ID plaque and a fitting on the top that allows you to attach a special theodolite to them. At one time there was a line of sight from every trig point to at least two others. By making thousands of careful measurements and doing a bit (OK, a lot) of simple trigonometry it was possible to calculate surprisingly accurately the location and height of each point.
Here is
I'm not sure which bit of the route the "track can be hard to follow" referred to. It might have been the bit between two stiles across the escarpment. The first part where I found myself following a stream instead of a track was because I misunderstood the instructions and went off the track, either because they were misleading or because the track has been moved to the opposite side of a fence since they were written. There were a few places where the instructions could have been more clearly written (particularly for novice walkers like myself).