A very short break to the Lake District. Leisurely start yesterday. Tea and amazingly good cake at Rheged.

Traditional mooch round Needlesports. Tea and cake in Flock Inn.

Wet plod up Castle Crag. Seemingly Wednesday was exceptionally wet even by Cumbrian standards – there was a lot of water about. 

Back to Keswick. Queuing out the door of Square Orange so defaulted to the go-to option that’s been unchanged for some 30+ years. The chippy on Victoria Street. 

The chap served us. Food was good. We sat down (you can eat in). My ‘usual’ table by the window.

We then noticed another man serving dressed the same as the man that had served us. The man that had served us had long hair and a beard. The other man had a shaven head and a ‘tache. 

It was the same person. With a quite unique style. But that was only the start ….

As we were eating, a young lad on a bike came in and asked the chippy chap if he ‘was Boop Boop’.

‘Yes i am’ he replied. There was then some exchange of fandom and the filming of a clip by ‘Boop Boop’ with his fan. 

I finished my chippy tea and as we were leaving, Ben looked up ‘Boop Boop’ on Instagram. As we crossed the road and walked towards the Moot Hall, Ben tried to explain to me what ‘Boop Boop’ does on Instagram.

We then went for a pint at the Dog&Gun (only realised after we’d ordered that it is now Greene King owned 🙄) and tried, and failed, to make sense of Boop Boop’. Maybe that was the point we realised we were getting old ? 

*In this scene ‘Boop Boop’ has chained himself by the neck to a kitchen drawer and is eating chip shop tea and poppadoms off the floor. Hash tag ‘poppodominatrix’.

Apparently Boop Boop goes around the UK doing things we don’t understand. People buy things off him. Almost 30,000 people follow him. 

We made haste to the B&B near Threlkeld. 

Sleep never really arrived (perhaps i was just too busy trying to ‘compute’ the chip shop incident), and before long we were the other side of a full English

and heading up Scales Fell towards Sharp Edge. 

A drier sunnier day was forecast with a warning that the tops would ‘feel about minus 5c in the wind’. They did. 

Along to the start of the Edge and a sort of look and grip test to make sure it wasn’t still minging from all the rain. Maybe we’re a bit old for unnecessary risks these days. It was fine and the scramble across it was really enjoyable. In the late 80s and early 90s i’d run to Scales from home in Keswick and run up Sharp Edge then down in to Glenderaraterra and back home. Today i just huffed and puffed. Puffa jacket, hat and gloves in June!!

Being aristocratic mountaineers we stopped for caviar and oatcakes on the summit

and then decided to descend Halls Fell via the ridge. I think i’ve managed to avoid descending this for about 30 years. I recollect someone in Keswick MRT telling me in the early 90s where the bodies of people that have fallen off the ridge most often come to rest. Wouldn’t want to fall off there thought i.

And then i fell off it!!!

I was stood admiring the view in to Doddick Ghyll when the edge of the path i was on gave way and i set off cartwheeling down a very very big slope. And stopped after about 2 rolls. And i stood up and looked at Ben. Ben looked very concerned. I was fine. We howled with nervous laughter. And continued descending the ridge chatting about the film about my escapade – a parody of Touching The Void, which we called Touching The Cloth. 💩🫣.

Down the ridge in good weather and along the path alongside the fell wall under Doddick Fell and under Goat Crag. Where this path crosses Scaley Beck the landowner has gone further than anyone i’ve ever known to make the path an absolute dangerous bastard of a route. Barbed wire, fence and pallets obstruct the ideal path and push walkers to a descend a 5m high damp steep buttress on poor holds where a fall  will result in a long stay with the NHS. Unbelievable. 

All that was left then was to sit on the motorway.

I’ve vowed that that’s the last overnight visit to the Lakes (or indeed any mountains further than the Lakes). No sleep, a hard hill day and two busy motorway drives do not make for a relaxing break away. 

Note to self, stay longer next time.

Good to get away though. 

Standing on Castle Crag in the clag remembering the months (some 35 years ago) spent living in Millican’s Cave when i was a much different person and the valley was a much different place. This used to be home …

‘The fleeting hour of life of those who love the hills is quickly spent, but the hills are eternal. Always there will be the lonely ridge, the dancing beck, the silent forest; always there will be the exhilaration of the summits. These are for the seeking, and those who seek and find while there is still time will be blessed both in mind and body.

– Alfred Wainwright

Not Burbage Brook ….

To Liverpool to @outdoorindustry Outdoor Trade Show Summer 2026 with @bencooper_bc1 to look at new stuff and things for an article for the mountain rescue journal.

Some new bits and pieces. Some interesting stuff.

Nothing mindblowing imho.

But there was the annual shaking of the hand of @christownsendoutdoors. He’s done a bit.

I’ll leave most of the stuff for the article but a few things that personally caught my eye ….

This MG B on 🇨🇭plates in the car park.

@petzl_official cams

The @petzl_professional Expert 55 sack 👌

The new @mountainequipment Tupilak

The goat curry from @firepotfood

The Aria 2R RGB (red green blue) hybrid headtorch from Petzl

The new @scarpa_uk Ribelle (in purple 🥰)

The Guide Hoody from my friends at @mont

The @aarnpacks mountain magic 50

The DFS II Gtx shoe from @aku_embracetheoutdoors

But most of all this 45 year old mint green Ford Cortina on the way home 🥰.

A species based report by the RSPB covering a decade of raptor persecution in the UK.

Data over anecdote.

Report

or ‘Normal Service is Resumed’

Part 1

A schlep up to Stanedge Pole to see the extent of the gate damage. Some time from Thu evening the new barrier at Dennis Knoll has had the lock cropped, as has the gate behind it, as has the gate over the Causeway midway between the pole and the res.

Reference is #1039 23 May @derbyshireconstabulary if anyone knows ‘owt.

You may see the advisory touch of @eastern_moors_partnership (and my photos 😉) in the new post from @outside.co.uk regarding keeping fire out of the @peakdistrictnationalpark – a doff of the cap to them for using their money and platform to record and publish that message 👍👍

And on that note, after chatting to 4 lovely cycle tourists at Redmires on their way over to Castleton, i ended up pleading with 3 separate groups intent on heading up to the Pole armed with the new supersized disposable barbecues.

In fairness they did all see sense …. but i’ve no idea where their Plan B location is !!

Part 2

Between the EMP and the PDNP / BMC rangers we dealt with 12 incidents of people either walking in to woodland / moorland ‘armed’ with a disposable BBQ, or campers with a lit BBQ or campfire last night.

And that was only in the north end of the EMP patch and nearby areas. We were too flat out busy to get round all of the Eastern Moors.

For balance we did also chat to several campers that had a discreet set up and didn’t feel the urge or need to set fire to anything. For imbalance we also chatted to a group that broight ao much shit ‘wildcamping’ with them that they needed a wheelbarrow to cart it all the 400m from the lay-by.

The moors, valleys and woodlands were alive with birdsong last night, long eared owl and nightjar amongst the stars of the chorus.

Trying to normalise your actions by using sentences akin to the Kinder Trespass, ‘we’re just hardworking people coming out of the city to enjoy the countryside’, doesn’t really ‘cut the mustard’ when the enjoyment involves having a fire in bone dry woodland in a protected landscape.

There was also a hare-coursing incident last night for some of the local farmers, and the early shift of rangers have observed and reported several incidents of fly-tipping this morning.

P.S. The gamekeeper for Featherbed Moss (the area devastated by the wildfire 3 weeks ago), counted 47 campfires in Snake Woodland last night adjacent to his moor.

Have a lovely weekend.

Please remain vigilant to the risk of fire and ring it in if you see it 🙏👍📞999🚒.

Several times today, when looking back along the line make sure i was herding the right number of cats, i was struck by the depth of mountain and alpine rescue experience therein … probably somewhere above 300 years worth.

Finally out of the lecture rooms and out on to the moors after their four days of conferencing, i wove a line with as much shade as possible for them whilst interspersing the walk with fact, fiction and folklore whilst they nattered and made new acquaintances and compared experiences.

Via holloway, Higger, Stanage and North Lees they went. From Aberdeen, Alaska, Calgary, Bavaria and many other places they came. It was a joy.

Thank you to the International Commission for Alpine Rescue @icar_alpine_rescue Spring Conference attendees for letting me show you the Peak District, and thank you for the cold drinks afterwards (it was swelteringly hot) ⛑️👍.

I never finished the second one as i had a rescue to get to !!

And in to the Shire of Burbage yesterday i did welcome the Chuckle Brothers aka the Brothers-From-A-Different-Mother aka @jcxplore and @bencooper_bc1

And onwards we did march and we spake in fluent Northern tongues. Pet. I did showeth them mine deer herd. Into the woodlands we did venture and i presented unto them some poop d’ Long Eared Owl which we did rub under our arms to ward off evil, illness and Reform voters.

On and on we did go until two golden bags we had filled (with acoustic recording units which had been in the woodland several weeks as part of a nightjar monitoring project).

And when all such treasures had been found we did rejoiceth out loud about how it girdles ones loins to be out with your marras ont’ moors in the sunshine having a canny bit of banter. To our chariots we did then returneth accompanied by our harpist who did serenade us with the well known karaoke number ‘Les Courses de Blaydon’.

Quiet drum roll …… 🥁🥁🥁🥁

If any of the words, pictures, acts or deeds on the blog, socials or website (or indeed the stuff that never makes it in to the public space) make you momentarily think …. ‘He sounds like a decent chap …. I’d like to buy him a coffee ..’

You now can

Thank you.

I was exchanging messages with Dickie today. Dickie is one of the young ‘uns that’s just joined the rescue team (albeit he’s getting on for a decade older than me). He’s currently somewhere near Richmond (after a pub lunch) walking the Coast to Coast walk to raise funds for the rescue team. Good lad. 

I asked him if he had the Wainwright guide with him. He had not. I’m not sure i’ll ever forgive him.

I then sent him a link to the Desert Island Discs episode from September 1988 featuring Mr Wainwright. 

It’s a while since i’d listened to it so i popped it on just now whilst on a mission to Lidl to resup on their peanut-pretzl-chocolate trail mix. Top stuff. 

I had to pull the car over three times and wipe the tears of laughter from my eyes. 

He doesn’t like people. He doesn’t like music. He asked if there was a chippy on the desert island. He actively avoided other people on the fells. He doesn’t blame his wife for leaving him (and taking the dog) due to his all-consuming obsession with the guidebooks. He refuses to take the Bible and the Complete Works of Shakespeare with him. Opts for a mirror as his ‘luxury item’ so he can keep his beard in check. 

How someone so incredibly grumpy and self contained manage to write and illustrate possibly the greatest ever collection of walking guides, never ceases to amaze me. 

Link to the episode.

Bio of Mr Wainwright and link to the Wainwright Society.

It was cold and wet last night and cold this morning, so foolishly i put winter softshells on and a thick Capilene baselayer …. so of course there was a full speed trip up Grinds Brook in blazing sun. Of course there was. It were reet warm.

I’m now spending what’s left of my Sunday afternoon listening to lapwings and skylarks whilst airing my feet and my socks and giving my Aku boots some tlc with Scarpa cream.

Is there ‘owt better than a cool breeze on wrinkly feet !! These boots are like a suit of armour for my feet and they had a particularly hard time on the fire last weekend. Several of my ranger colleagues have now managed to source themselves a pair.

The boots are AKU Tactical KS Schwer 14 GTX Cold Wet Weather Boots

Perhaps i’ll wander off and forage some steak pie in a bit …..

Completely unrelated but on my way round the parish this morning, someone has cut and cleared the old marker for the toll bar.

An excellent article in the Guardian today covering the July 2022 fire in Wennington. A fire in a field quickly moved to neighbouring properties and 18 homes were burnt down.

‘In total, 70 houses were destroyed across the UK that day in a record 600 wildfires – the largest loss of British housing to a threat previously assumed to be more relevant to California or southern Europe, and evidence of the worsening climate crisis.’

This is the study by OS that the article references. It has used GIS to map those populations most exposed to wildfire crossing the ‘rural urban interface’.

On wildfire courses in the UK students cover the ‘hierarchy of response’ which, understandably from a human perspective, places People then Property then Landscapes as the priority for emergency fire response. And there is also, somewhat understandably, a resistance to committing resources to fires that don’t threaten people or property.

On the recent Snake Pass fire we saw the tremendous speed – and resultant damage – that a wind direction change (from a westerly to a southerly) can produce.

I hadn’t realised that currently in the UK there is no legal requirement upon the private utility companies to have water available at an appropriate quantity and pressure for firefighters !!

I don’t think it will be long before the rural-urban interface fire prevention measures that are legal requirements in places like Jasper and Alaska (like a 5m vegetation and combustible material gap around properties) start to become commonplace in the areas illuminated in the OS analysis.