Walk 46 done

High Crag and Buttermere, seen from Rannerdale Knotts

Despite having only got back from Russia at 10.45pm the night before I did not want to miss this opportunity for a walk; I will not get many more this year, and possibly none, if the weather does not play ball on the one or two days that I might just squeeze one in. Glad I did – once again, there were some spectacular weather conditions for photography, although the walking was made more difficult by a freezing cold wind. Read about it all on the walk 46 page.

As of today, then, I have bagged 142 of the 214 Wainwright fells, thus have 72 to go. I have walked 464.12 miles and ascended a total of 133,760 feet.

Walk 45: Man, oh man oh man

Sunbeam shining through clouds, near Stonethwaite road end. The fell is a shoulder of Glaramara.

You could say I was quite impressed by the haul of photographs I managed to bring back from the walk I did yesterday, walk 45. Let down once again by Virgin Trains, for the second walk in a row, I had to pull another reserve plan out of the hat and ended up going up Ullscarf from Grasmere, then on to Great Crag. In itself this is a decent but not exciting walk, over some relatively (but not obnoxiously) boggy terrain.

However, a mixture of sun, clouds, autumn colours and great light made for some impressive photographs. I am happy to share them with you. I think there’s enough material for next year’s calendar in one walk!

On that subject – there are plenty of calendars left so if you would like to buy one (for £7.50) to help raise money for Mountain Rescue, please do email me on drew.whitworth@manchester.ac.uk. (Easier to do this than try to use the PayPal page we set up which is another example of private enterprise being singularly unhelpful. Just email me and we’ll sort it out.)

As of today, then, I have climbed 140 of the 214 Wainwrights, thus have 74 to go. I have walked a total of 455.2 miles and ascended approximately 130,194 feet.