Bob!

[Stolly]

Right I’m awake and feeling a bit more sparky now. Like I said our ‘Bob’ (attempt in brackets) was a fantastic adventure in the hills and the fact that we flunked out in the end hasn’t really worried me at all

A relatively major factor in our failure was probably our anti-clockwise 9am start on Saturday; amongst other things it placed the Dunmail to Threlkeld leg (which should be a time maker upperer I’d have thought) smack in the middle of the night which, to make matters worse, coincided with really thick hill fog and a strong biting wind. There had been hill fog all day above about 600 meters and, lets face it, it was always likely to be foggy up there but, what with the fog, the dark and the wind, we just struggled to find the first few tops on that leg.

Firstly Fairfield, then the best line off Fairfield, then the scree descent to the tarn, then the top of Dollywagon (which we had actually found but weren’t convinced that it was actually it - a hugely underwhelming cairn I’d say ), then Nethermost Pike which, by the time we’d figured out where it was (up from the path to our right), we’d reached the point of being an hour behind our schedule. By then even running on the track was hard with all our headtorch light being bounced back at us by the fog so our moving speed was just too slow. And our schedule didn’t leave much room for manoeuvre (set for 23 hr 19 minutes) so, given that we had little hope of making up time in the fog and that all the map reading was chilling everyone to the bone, we pulled the plug and dropped down to Thirlmere.

We’d actually been ahead of schedule by 39 minutes at one point (Bowfell I think) and I’d imagined that we’d do the Rosset Pike to Dunmail bit really well….. but we didn’t and gradually had lost most of our time cushion by Dunmail. My legs felt strong all day but I hit a really nauseous stretch going up Steel Fell from Calf Crag and Gavin my co-bobber was struggling on the climbs. That said a dozen slowly eaten Pringles sorted me out and we both felt much better by Dunmail. Even the climb of Seat Sandal (which must be brilliant running down the other way) felt good. But then all navigation wheels fell off in the fog.

So…. apart from all those excuses what have the Romans done for us

Thanks to all the team helping us; Hes on leg one (and who was primed and ready to rock and roll for leg 5 with Brett and Stewart), Karl and Jason on leg 2 (I owe you a rice pudding Karl), Stewart on leg 3, Billy and Martin for trying to set up a rope on Broad Stand but (rightly) deciding it would be fricking madness and Noel and Pete on leg 4. And thanks Stewart for not breaking your neck/cranium/legs/arms/spine on your 6 foot backward somersault with a half twist onto boulders on Broad Crag. And also Gavin’s mum and dad for their completely brilliant logistics and road crossing organisation.

I feel pretty damn fine and dandy today and can’t wait to have another crack! Hmmmm….. August?