Duncan dropped me off there this morning on his way to work and I ran up towards Great Hill. The reason for this run, aside from it being quite a nice one up on the fells, was to try to find a good route for Duncan and his mate, Barry, to ride from home to Tockholes on their mountain bikes tonight. I was going to check out whether the conditions were rideable or not, which is a bit tricky for me as I don't ride much so sorry if I get it wrong guys.
The way up from Piccadilly to Great Hill is mostly nice running but with some boggy bits which might be a bit tricky on mountain bikes but there aren't many of them and it is mostly quite rideable, well in my opinion anyway, if that counts for anything.
There is one bit which is quite steep and flagged/stoned which might be a bit dodgy to come down on a bike but, again, it's a very short section so shouldn't be a problem.
Once on top of Great Hill, I realised that the route I had come up isn't overly clear and might be a bit hard for me to explain to the guys so I made a little arrow out of stones, although whether it's still there tonight or not is anyone's guess. Follow the arrow straight on guys, not round to the left as it looks like the path goes in this picture.
The problem is, there is another path slightly to the left of this one that you might take by accident. Basically, if you come up via the flagging from Spitlers, once you get to the top of Great Hill, you pretty much need to do a V back on yourselves. If it is light enough when you get there, this is the direction you should be heading (it will seem a bit boggy at first but honestly, it's not too bad):
So, if you were to stand right in front of that post, looking at the little plaque on it, stick your left arm straight out and that's pretty much the direction you need to follow.
Hope that is helpful and you don't get lost because of me!
After messing about making arrows on top of Great Hill, I headed for home and followed the flags along to Spitlers. Ed would shout at me for running on the flags and I tried to stay off them as much as possible but it was pretty boggy at the sides of them today so I did find myself on them more than off them.
Ever since I first set off my Garmin had been beeping at me to tell me the battery was low so, when I reached Hordern Stoops I took out my phone and used the Strava app on that too so if my Garmin died I'd still be able to record the rest of my run.
From Hordern Stoops I ran along the road a little and then onto Belmont Road for a bit, then up the diagonal to the top of Winter Hill. I was absolutely knackered by now though, feeling very heavy legged this morning so the climb up to Winter Hill wasn't much more than a walk.
I then headed off down the mast road and then cut off the corner cross-country and up to Two Lads.
From Two Lads, it was just a lovely downhill run home through Wilderswood.
Total distance - approx 7.4 miles (Strava is showing 8.8 miles but there is about a 1.4 mile overlap between my Strava recorded time and my Garmin recorded time)
http://www.strava.com/activities/202621968
http://www.strava.com/activities/202620209
No comments:
Post a Comment