Kinder Scouting!

Last weekend, with cracking weather again, we headed back to the Peak District, but a little further north this time, to tackle Kinder Scout, and the excellent Fairbrook Naze series of caches.

We covered just under 10 miles, parking up east of the plateau, and followed the valley to the north, then returned to the car along the northern ridge, tackling the caches in reverse order after grabbing a couple on the outward journey.

Some piccies of the day out.....


The start of the Fairbrook Naze series


View from the north ridge of the plateau


The landscape along the north ridge


Yours truly on the outward journey up the valley

Caches found at time of posting...........2265

Lake District - Day Three

Despite the weather forecast predicting some rain, Bank Holiday Monday proved to be a nicer day than Sunday, with sunshine all day and temperatures in the low 20's.

After packing up the tent and the kit, we decided to head into Windermere, park the car, and do a bit of a leisurely circular walking, taking in the banks of the lake, and of course a few caches along the way.

Nothing more to report! Oh, my neck got sunburnt!

Caches found at end of trip.....2134

Caches found at time of post.....2137, courtesy of 3 new caches within a couple of miles of home.

The Lake District - Day Two

Day Two began nice and early with a hearty breakfast at the campsite, followed by a one and a half hour drive to Wasdale Head to the starting point of our trek to the summit of Scafell Pike.

The weather seemed to improve as we got closer, and when we arrived, there wasn't a cloud in the sky. Lots of people around, and we only just about managed to park the car!

We were toying with the idea of going up to the top of Lingmell, and then across to Scafell Pike, but in the end we decided on the more conventional tourist approach, mainly so that I could grab The Path to Death or Glory on the way up.

I did find it, but on the way down, as a 10 minute search on the way up proved fruitless, and on the way down I found it straight away...isn't that always the way?

There were some fantastic views of Wast Water on the way up.



Finally, after almost four hours of steady climbing in the heat of the midday sun, we finally made it to the summit, where 2 more caches (one Trad, England's highest physical cache, and one Virtual, the highest cache in Engalnd) awaited us, along with the incredible views across the Lake District.



It was pretty busy on the top, must have been 200 people up there, and a constant stream of people leaving and arriving, we only just about managed a photo!

After a quick bite to eat and a drink, we started to make our way back down again. It's just as tough coming down, very hard on the knee joints!

Once back at the bottom, the day started to get weird. We were making a brew in the back of the Cachemobile, and a guy with his wife and two kids came up to us and asked us if we were camping at Wasdale, which obviously we weren't, and he asked us if we would give them a lift to the head of the valley so that they could get a bus back to their B&B near Keswick.

For those of you unfamiliar with Wasdale Head, it's a dead end up a 5 mile long road, and has no bus service! Apparently, some friends of theirs had told them they would meet them there and give them a lift, but they had called and let them down.

After a bit of a discussion, we decided that we could do far better than a lift to the bus stop, and as we were going to go for a bit of a drive anyway, we offered to take them back to their B&B, a journey of 15 miles in a straight line, but 43 miles on the road!

As we made our way north then east towards Keswick, somehow the conversation turned to geocaching, and the young lad, Daniel, seemed very keen, so I promised that when we got to their B&B, if there was a nearby cache, he could join me on the hunt. As luck would have it, a cache was to be found only 320ft from the car when we parked outside the B&B!

After a quick beer, Daniel and I plodded off to find the cache, and during our search his sister, Lucy, and his mother, Linda, joined in the search, and with 4 pairs of hands, the cache, HERRIES HOUSE - The Herries Chronicles, was soon found. I got Daniel to sign the log, and gave him the GC code and some brief instructions on how to join up and log the find....I have the cache on the watchlist!!!!

We returned to the bar, and said our goodbyes, but not before Mike presented us with a very nice bottle of red wine as recompense for our kindness! Nice one!!

An interesting day! At the end of it, I'd climbed the highest peak in England, found 5 caches (two more boxes filled in on the D/T grid), and met some interesting people!

I also realised whilst at Wasdale Head that I found the cache at Wasdale Head Inn last year, and forgot to log it, so that has now been rectified.

Caches found at the end of Day Two.....2128.

The Lake District - Day One

We arose early (well, early for us anyway) at 7am, loaded the X-Trail up and set off for the Lakes around 8am.

Following a brief "comfort break" at Sandbach Services (there was a cache there, obviously), and after battling our way through the Bank Holiday traffic, we finally arrived at the campsite just after noon.

Got the tent up in double quick time, and then realised that Julie had brought the pump for the air bed, but not the adaptor to plug it into the car!!!!! Luckily the guy setting up his tent next to us had one, and he kindly loaned it to me.

Had a quick brew, and as planned, made a short drive to Staveley to have a crack at the Jason's Jaunt series of caches, based on Jason and The Argonauts. I'd planned these in advance, and from the listings they seemed as though they may be tricky, as they were all micros except for the final bonus cache. As it turned out, all the micros were contained in a further container, that made them far easier to find, and we managed to find every single one, although a couple still needed a bit of a search. Managed to pick a further cache up that wasn't in the series, but was on the route, making 13 caches in all for the day, not a bad start for the weekend.

We got back to the car around 6.30pm, and got the kit out for a well-earned brew and a bite to eat, closely followed by an early night ready for our assault on Scafell Pike in the morning!

Unfortunately, the air bed decided to slowly deflate through the night, and we woke up on a cold hard floor.....never mind....

Report on Day Two to follow.

Total caches found at the end of Day One......2123.

Scafell Pike

Way before I started this blog (last July in fact), my non-caching girlfriend decided it would be a great idea for her to visit relatives in Greece without me.

Who am I to discourage a week of relative freedom (for me, not her obviously)?

I therefore planned a week to attempt to find the highest geocaches in England, Wales and Scotland (which are where you would expect them to be, on Scafell Pike, Snowdon and Ben Nevis).

So, the geo-mutt and I set off on our quest, but to cut a long story short, we failed at Scafell Pike, as the weather during our 2 day stay at Wasdale Head wasn't conducive to climbing a mountain, so we spent the day in the Wasdale Head Inn and got drunk instead!

We did, however, manage to get to the top of Snowdon and Ben Nevis, but annoyingly both were under heavy cloud cover at the time, so there was nothing to see at the top other than the trig point.

This has been nagging at me for some time, so I've now managed to pursuade Julie to purchase a tent, a couple of sleeping bags and a few bits of camping paraphanalia, and visit the Lake District during the forthcoming Bank Holiday for another attempt.

I've got three alternatives.....

1. Ascent from Wasdale Head and up Brown Tongue
2. Ascent from Wasdale Head and Lingmell
3. Ascent from Boot/Eskdale

Last time I went for option one, but due to the amount of rain we'd had, the stream was a raging torrent, and I reluctantly turned back.

Maybe option 2 this time......full report on my return!

A Sunny Day in the Cotswolds

I spent 4 hours doing an 8 mile figure of eight walk today taking in the Hinchwick Valley series, plus four other trads to the north-west, all by Stag Ramblers.

Lovely sunny day, great views, nice caches....sweet as a nut....





Caches found at time of posting.....2045......

2000 Up!!!!

I wasn't expecting to do any cachin' this weekend, but after doing all the shopping etc on Saturday....Julie (my non-caching girlfriend) wanted to go out for a walk as we are off to do Scafell Pike in 3 weeks and she needs to get some "practice" in before we go.

She therefore offered to accompany me and the dog on a caching expedition in Gloucestershire to do a little "Hillside" series of 9 caches, plus another one on the way round.

This is the first time she has been out caching with me, as she maintains it's a bit sad (which it is) for sad people (of which I'm one).

She actually spotted one of them before I did, so although she won't admit it, she "gets it" now....I think....

Anyway, on Sunday we headed for the Clent hills for 6 caches I'd identified a few weeks ago, so I wasn't expecting to reach 2000. However, the wonders of the PQ ensured that the 5 new caches placed in the Clent Hills by the National Trust gave us 11 to attempt, and we found the lot!

Cache No.2000 turned out to be GCD488 Clent Eastwood (Worcestershire), and it wasn't a micro, it was a big ammo can! A fitting cache for the 2000th!!!!

Caches found at time of posting.....2001!

Mega Caching Day "Up North"

Having failed to bag a single cache on Saturday, and hence finishing my "cache a day" quest on 63 consecutive days, I was cheered up considerably by an excellent caching trip 90 miles north of Birmingham in the rolling hills of the Lancashire countryside, in the company of 8 other likeminded weirdos who like hunting for tupperware in bushes.

The team photo below, from left to right.................The Washers (Ron, Diane stayed in the car!), [Monki] (Ashley), Pete3 (Pete, obviously), Blue Nora (Nikki), Team Balders (Kev), yours truly, [MF]Taz (Lee), Graham1875 and AJIGeo (Alan).

Alan turned up with the height of fashion, a Tilly hat, so, not to be outdone, I got mine out of the boot of the cachemobile.

The day started at 5.15 am, when Nikki and Pete turned up at my house, and after a short diversion via Balders Manor, 4 of us were on the M6 headed for the rendevouz point at the reservoir.

Graham, as you can see from the photo, was sporting a fine pair of legs, despite there being a distinct chill in the air at 7.20am!

Our team were last to arrive (we stopped for a splash and dash at the services), and soon after we were on our way, heading in a vague southerly direction for our first cache of the day, then heading west on the Witton Weavers Way. We almost got ourselves lost on the first cache, but soon realised our error and we were soon bagging cache No.1 of the day.

After 11 hours we arrived back at the cars, after finding 1 Earthcache, 65 Letterboxes and 18 Traditional caches, a fine effort by all! We managed 3 DNF's in the day, 2 of which we think are still there....one we think has been muggled, but who knows...they're on the Watchlist for the time being to see if one cacher can succeed where 9 failed!

The terrain was tough in places, but worth it for the fine views along the Witton Weavers Way. Even Kev's one-liners didn't deter us from having a good time!

At one point (on a DNF) we were searching through the undergrowth when a couple came from nowhere, and Kev said "I knew we shouldn't have brought the damn lizard" and carried on searching. The couple moved on.....quickly.....

We even managed to see a couple of new born lambs....bless 'em!



After arriving back at the car, a very brief discussion was had about walking around the reservoir to bag another 15...... surprisingly no-one seemed that bothered, probably due to the fact that we had walked 23.1 miles thus far!

So, the 100 caches in a day eluded us all, and I'm not sure when the next opportunity will surface, not long I bet!

84 was a personal best for every one of us, so 9 people went on our way happy....but knackered.

After a good nights sleep, I decided to do a little light caching to stretch the muscles, especially as 8 new caches had been published within 2 miles of home while we were up north. I managed 4 finds and one DNF before the heavens opened and I headed for home.

I have the rest of the week off, so beating my record for caches in one month looks likely, and I might even break through the 2000 barrier before work beckons.

Caches found at time of posting.....1919.

Geocaching Plans for April!

Letterboxing and Geocaching "up north"!

The plans to go up to Blackburn to grab a few of the excellent Witton Weavers Way letterbox caches are well underway. The trip is now schedule for Sunday 26th April.

I've signed up Team Balders, Graham1875 and Monki to the team, no doubt more will join us, and we will be attempting over 100 caches on a route exceeding 20 miles over hilly terrain, so a challenge for all!

The image below gives a rough idea of the route (going anti-clockwise), with the caches plotted on the map. We will be starting from the car park at the Turton and Entwistle Reservoir, continuing on a circular route all the way round to Edgworth, and back to the car. We will then attempt to circle the reservoir itself to grab even more caches.