A short miscellaneous post, firstly to wish everyone a happy Xmas season, whatever you are doing, though probably not a prosperous one for most.
There was some interesting talk of inversions this week and we anticipated a trip to the mountains, but from the look of the weather charts and the description given by MWIS, probably only the highest peaks would be above it and we would likely be in dank clag most of the day. The depressingly grey scene here tipped the balance and we decided to wait a few days to see how this cloudy high pressure area develops. S.A.D sufferers must be burning out the elements of their daylight lamps this week.
The end-of-year backpack review will not be impressive this year, certainly in terms of statistics: it’s our lowest mileage ever. Not that such numbers are important per se of course, but given the variety of backpacks we used to enjoy - a mixture of short intense mountain circuits and long linear treks - they do give an overall perspective on the year, and what a year!. We assumed the weather couldn’t be any worse than 2007 but it was abyssmal, the best spell being in February on the Langdale Fells and Yr Wyddfa & Hebog trips. There are still a few days to go yet and I’ll publish the stats in the new year.
In the meantime we are nevertheless looking forward to the photo slideshow for the backpacking year. This is a computer driven system that is integrated into our AV (Audio-Visual) system in the living room, used for rendering both photos and high-definition movies on the large plasma screen which has a resolution of 1920 x 1080. Just the job on a horrible evening in early January, whetting the appetite for all the good weather coming our way in 2009… maybe!.
6 Comments
Evening Geoff and Merry Christmas to you and V.
Charl and I took a chance on the weather on that same weekend in February and took ourselves over to Buttermere. We spent the Saturday walking along the ridge from Red Pike to Scarth Gap and had an amazing day of walking and weather.
I have to say I like the sound of your slideshow night, I bet you have some amazing images after that year in the hills.
I just wanted to post a comment to say thanks for helping me get into the hills this year when I spent my first night on the hill doing a route taken from your blog - The Buttermere fells. Your advice on routes in the black mountains was really helpful, as was your input on my Golite Lite-speed pack. Not to sound too much like a hanger-on but your Coniston route was the destination for my first solo wildcamp in July.
This New Year I hope to get out some more, especially now I am almost happy with my gear list for most seasons.
Merry Christmas.
Thanks very much Marcus and a Merry Xmas to you.
We are running out of ideas for fundamentally different routes in the Lakes and Snowdonia and I don’t like repeating the same routes exactly, but I’ll come up with something.
I might do an article on the slideshow setup some time, it behaves just like the old slide carousel shows but the digital images on disk are advanced by a cordless gyroscopic mouse.
Thanks for sharing so much with us on your blog Geoff. It is appreciated. I want to thank you as your effort here really inspired me to give the blogging thing a go. Thanks and happy Christmas to you and your family.
Yes, abysmal indeed after a preceeding year just as bad. It does me psychological damage - really - the endless, dreary, wet, grey, grey, GREY.
I too had a fabulous February trip in the Lakes but that was it for the entire goddamn year. Tried 6 days in Borrowdale in July and got about 5 hours of sunshine on a good day, admittedly, but the rest was cloud and rain.
This country is like a toilet - I hate it.
Martin,
Very kind of you, and a merry Xmas, happy new year and good walking to you.
Bip,
After the February trips, we prophetically said ‘…maybe that was the summer…’ - spot on.
It’s just as well we have indoor interests to fall back on!.
Greetings to you too Geoff. My thoughts are similar to Marcus. Though your mileage may have not been as good as hoped I still enjoyed reading your reports. After thinking of wild camping for some time I finally got out there in 2008, with my daughter. The weather was far from ideal, but she enjoyed it - so did I and she wants to do more in 2009! So thanks for providing the inspiration.
PS, had great trouble posting this over the last couple of days - just didn’t appear. Something changed??