Langdale to Derwentwater

Dato:

11.12.2009

Stony Cove Pike

Dato:

28.11.2009

After a long-ish drive up to Windermere from Leicester the previous evening, we woke up to a fresh covering of snow all over the fells. Exciting for everyone who was coming for the Adventure Peaks Christmas party, (even though it was admittedly still a bit early for Christmas celebrations) we drove up to the car parking place at the top of Kirkstone Pass, opposite the inn and began the walk at about 10am. At first the weather was dry but quite misty so there was not much to see apart from a lot of whiteness, and it remained like that all the way over Pike How to Stony Cove Pike. No views, chilly and a bit boring. Once we'd descended down Threshthwaite mouth into Pasture Beck it was just a bit drizzly but warmer and we were down at Hartsop in the early afternoon and walked back along the road >>>

Langdale

Dato:

09.11.2009

To start the day I had an absolutely beautiful drive from Grasmere to Langdale via the High Close road in crisp and cold conditions. Frost was accessorizing the strands of grass and a cool temperature inversion kept some low level mist nearly down to ground level. The walk itself was not exciting, but the views and sunny weather made it a very good day out, cut short only by the fact I had to be on the road ideally by 4 pm to make my way down to Aberystwyth so unfortunately I didn't complete the circuit by going all the way over to Esk Hause and onto the Langdale Pikes. After Bowfell it was a descent down to Ore Gap and then on to Angle Tarn, returning to Langdale via the steep steps down into Mickleden and along the valley bottom.

Fairfield again....

Dato:

08.11.2009

Snowdon horseshoe

Dato:

04.10.2009

Scafell Pike with Mum

Dato:

29.08.2009

Bank holiday weekend was spent taking Mum on our annual trip to the Lakes together; this weekend was unfortunately not blessed with the most fantastic weather ever, and on the Saturday we drove to Seathwaite from Borrowdale youth hostel to join several other parties of walkers who were making the trudge up to the top of England's highest despite the miserable and dreary wet weather. Surprisingly my Mum, even though not a hiker - didn't complain once. Even I didn't find the walk up Grains Gill particularly inspiring with the lack of views, but we carried on anyway. By the time we'd passed Sprinkling Tarn and gotten up to Esk Hause the wind was blowing really rather strongly and I was cold enough to need to put on extra layers. Probably wearing more on the summer bank holiday weekend than I sometimes >>>

Hamperokken

Dato:

05.08.2009

Turtype:

Fottur

I did this trip with some friends during the EISCAT workshop being held in Tromso. Since there was an afternoon free without any seminars or talks and the weather was forecasted to be warm and amzing all week, we were all psyched up for doing a mountain hike, especially since the three of us had climbed and summited Mont Blanc together only a few weeks earlier. Hamperokken was our destination of desire, and we managed to convince a few other workshop friends to join us too, which was also quite handy because they had a car after having driven from Sodankyla in Finland to Tromso. It was quite an unpleasant start to try and get up and out of the forest and at times too unenjoyable to want to carry on with the hike, especially since the temperature was in the 20s and there were lots of midges around >>>

Mont Blanc

Dato:

15.07.2009

Turtype:

Alpintur

© Hannah Vickers Wednesday, 15th July 2009 Bumming around in the morning and generally not rushing around was quite nice after 2 days of early starts. In fact, 10am actually came round pretty quickly and we were soon met at the apartment by our guides Hannah and Anthony to make the drive over to Chamonix (yes, it became something of a joke that there were actually three Hannahs in a group of 6). The general plan was to have lunch in Argentiere and then continue to the Aiguille du Midi station in Chamonix. Surprisingly it took less time to travel by car than it did when we took the Mont Blanc Express train, despite all the switchbacks in the road which probably made the route longer. It was about midday by the time we parked up in Argentiere and we sat at some park benches to eat our sandwiches. Chamonix was >>>

Weissmies

Dato:

14.07.2009

Turtype:

Alpintur

© Hannah Vickers Having a day trip to the Weissmies meant that we could carry relatively light rucksacks and there wasn’t too many things to have to think about packing. So at 6am, we bundled back into Anthony’s Audi and drove down to the Tamoil garage at Sion to meet Hannah, our other guide and also split up into 2 cars which would be a lot more comfortable for the journey up to Saas Grund. It was a dry, slightly overcast morning, which was getting gradually sunnier as we progressed further east and up the valley again. Saas Grund wasn’t particularly high up, and we were going to take the Hohe Saas gondolas up to the station at about 3100m, which would place us quite nicely for the ascent to the top of the Weissmies at 4027m. We left the Hohe Saas station about 20 minutes after jumping on at Saas Grund, >>>

Pigne d'Arolla

Dato:

13.07.2009

Turtype:

Alpintur

© Hannah Vickers Sunday, 12th July 2009 It was a nice, fresh morning we woke up to but it looked like it was gradually becoming more overcast as the morning drew on. Anthony, our guide, pulled up at the chalet at about 9.50am and our first stop was a gear hire shop in Les Hauderes, a couple of km down the road. Tobbe needed some proper boots and crampons, and Dan also needed to hire crampons. My chesty cough was still giving me much hassle, so I waited outside while they sorted out all the bits they needed. Once we'd driven to Arolla and parked up we began the walk in to the Dix hut. Mont Collon dominated the views at the top end of the valley, which stayed pretty much to our left. The air was warm but not too intense. At about halfway to the hut we reached a nice grassy plateau and stopped for some lunch. It >>>