As planned in our last walk up Gable, we stuck to our date of 11th December for the Christmas Walk. Peter called me the day before and suggested a similar walk to the one we did in June last year although missing out Bowscale Fell and just doing Blencathra. As it was a shorter drive and we were only doing one top he came for me at 6.30 am and we picked Steve up 5 minutes later. As we drove west the snow was clearing and we were quite surprised when we got over the other side of the Pennines that there was hardly any snow at all. Especially considering the A66 had been closed for several days only a few days before our walk. We got to the parking spot about 8.15, we managed to get Pole Position and tucked into the Angus steak pies Peter had picked up the day before. We set off around 8.30 and took the same path as we did last June, up through the ferns. Half an hour or so of steep climbing until we reached the “Alpine Valley” and then just a steady walk. There were only a few patched of snow here and there, it had mainly settled on the paths and whenwe did hot some we were knee deep at times and, yes, I fell over a couple of times!! (Taking the Tumbles title from Steve).

We had our Christmas lunch at the same bait stop that was covered in midgies in June last year, although no sign of them this time! Usual Christmas fayre, turkey legs the size of a horse to start, Mince pies and custard all accompanied by wine and of course we all pulled crackers. Stuffed, we set off up the path around Blencathra shortly after.

There were great views of Sharp Edge and Fowl Crag from where we were and in the next couple of photos you can just see the tiny figures taking on Sharp Edge.

For some reason I was really struggling today though, trying to get my breath and my legs were like jelly. I could see there was quite a steep climb coming up on the last push to Blencathra so I

decided to turn back at this point. I had already done Blencathra but it was still a tough decision

as I would have liked to have got there again. I have since got full blown Man Flu so that was obviously the reason for my shortness of breath and dizziness! Well that’s my excuse anyway. We were at this point on the walk, just before the crossroads and doubled back onto the other side of the valley to walk in the sun.

This was our route back down on the left side of the valley.