Christmas Fell Walking. Death by Orgasm?

Monday 23^rd December.

A quiet day really.

I walked the dogs up Tallentire Hill and then emptied a bucket of warm water in the tin bath outside to wash them down as they had found every conceivable speck of mud between Dad’s house, the trig point and back! It’s a good job they are all short haired dogs or I’d have been washing their paws and bellies all day.

Skyped Susannah and found the Aged P and Step-mum had arrived safely. They were a bit bushed and were sleeping. The girls are excited about a party they are going to at Uncle Chris’s on Christmas Eve. I avoided talking about cricket with Peter. I am now rooting for a 5-0 series victory as I will win a silly amount of money for just $50. If they get a 4-0 or 4-1 series victory I get quarter odds, so that will mean 25-1 instead of 100-1. Still, it will be a nice amount.  I can’t really tell Pete that, can I?

We drove into Carlisle and spent about half an hour trying to park! It was bursting at the seams. We did some last minute silly present buying and had lunch in the Cathedral refectory, which is always nice. The big book shop along from the Cathedral has changed from stickers as loyalty rewards to a stamp pad, plus you get more stamps for every purchase. I had almost completed my 2nd sticker card so the kind lady gave me enough to fill it which was very nice of her [I had just spent £50 on books] this means I now have £30 to spend in there when I am next in town.

A lot of phone calls came through this evening for Dad. All of the callers were inviting him to stuff and being disappointed to discover he was in Australia. Did he not tell these people? In in his wake I have been invited to all the things they were phoning Dad about. A Party in Lancaster. A Christmas dinner. A Boxing Day Party. Two New Year’s Eve parties and a Festive Ceilidh. Whispered convos while each caller was hanging on the line has meant we accepted the Lancaster Party, the Boxing Day Party and the Ceilidh.

The Lancaster one is on Sunday, the Ceilidh on Saturday after New Year. We will crash at Dad’s flat in Lancaster after the party. He’ll not mind. That way we can have a drink or two. The Boxing day party is at Errol’s and the Ceilidh in the Lakes somewhere near Ambleside. I have written down the venue as I had never heard of it before. I love a good Ceilidh. If the caller is proficient they can be excellent, they are the one event I have attended where everybody has danced.

We had local bangers and mash for tea. With baked beans. It is ages since I had this as a meal. We ploughed through mince pies with Cointreau flavoured cream for afters. Laura suggested some other places we could spread the cream so the rest of the evening ended up being a bit sticky and messy.

Tuesday 24^th December.

The weather forecast for Christmas Day looks dreadful for up here. I really do miss Norwich’s weather. It always seemed to have been sunny during my childhood. When we came up to the bungalow [Dad’s home] we used to joke that we were going to get our “rain-fix”. I have just checked the weather stats for the last 10 years for Norwich and Cockermouth. The latter has had over 30 times as much rain in those years on average! No wonder I remember a sunny childhood – it was!

The dogs had a run at Maryport prom this morning. I think they were surprised to be bundled into the car and driven off instead of stepping out up the lane for their first walk of the day. It was blustery on the prom but dry. There was a fair amount of sea weed scattered over the pathway, a sure sign that the weather had been rather stormy recently. We walked right down to the Golf course and then back up along the cliff top path. Once again the Roman Museum wasn’t open for me to have a hot chocolate drink. Never mind, eh? 

Driving to Maryport was useful in two ways. It meant I could buy the food items we were missing from the Maryport Co-op and the dogs don’t get anywhere near as messy as they do going up Tallentire Hill.

I left the Lollster pushing zeds when I left, when I got back she was up and raring to go. I had forgotten we had promised Molly a trip to Keswick for Christmas Eve. So a swift brekkers and off we went. We took Callie but left Dad’s three indoors. They looked a bit miffed, I hope they don’t bully Callie about it later. [Is that anthropomorphic? It probably is.]

Parking in Carlisle was tricky on Monday, I didn’t even chance it in Keswick. I went straight down to the Theatre By The Lake car park. This was quite empty for the time of day, plus it meant we had an excuse to wander out to the end of Friar’s Crag with Callie before strolling round town. Town was pretty busy but Molly and Laura and I had a whale of a time. I do like Keswick, I don’t think I could live here though [the tourists are avoidable, it’s the weather that is the problem]. We had lunch in the Dog and Gun which is a dog friendly pub – I guess it has to be with that name – and then we finished our purchasing and zoomed back to Dad’s.

Molly and Eric are expecting us for lunch tomorrow at about 2.30pm which has hit my Scafell Pike walk on the head big time, but we are still planning to do Catbells instead. I have made a bet with Laura that we will meet over 50 people out on that little fell alone. I hope the weather stays fine for us.

Back at Dad’s I cooked the turkey crown ready to make sangers for the morning and we sat down to watch live TV for the first time in ages. It was the last episode of Last Tango in Halifax. I really enjoyed it. It has become a bit soap opera like in this second series but it is still a really heart-warming programme.

We skyped Australia at just after midnight [UK time] and had a silly chat with everyone down under. They all liked their pressies and we had loved ours too. It was really hot over there and it was strange to talk to the kids who were in the bathers! They are planning to go off in the yacht on Boxing Day, for a couple of days at their mooring on Rottnest Island. Dad had that seafarer’s look in his eyes, I wonder if he will be buying himself a new boat when he gets back, after being in Suze and Pete’s?

We finally hit the charp at 1pm and were dead to the world within minutes. Well, I was at least.

Christmas Day, 2013.

Cloudy and dry at the break of dawn, which boded well for a walk in the fells.

Dogs walked and sandwiches made by 8am. Out with the woofs by 8.30. We drove through Cockermouth and saw that the River Derwent was really high as it flowed through the memorial gardens. Not a good sign. It means masses of rain has fallen over the fell tops. The road to Keswick was deserted and as we went through Portinscale we could have been the only ones on the move. At the car parking area at the foot of Catbells my Dad’s Citroen was the second car there. We had our walking boots on already so all we had to do was clamber out and clamber up. Out of the car; up the fell.

The weather was cloudy and a bit overcast. Grizedale Pike had a cloudy top but it’s over 1200 feet higher than Catbells so we weren’t unduly worried. We struck out up the steep zig-zagging slope for the first brow. Novice walkers think this is the summit; they can get disappointed when they see the real one stretching away in the distance. It was quite windy at this point which didn’t worry me much as there is always a sheltered side if the wind is blowing.

The pups just loved chasing about on playing on the slopes. Callie and Dad’s Weimy get on quite well; his two labs tend to ignore her a bit. They all have so much energy when out on a walk. It makes me very envious of their stamina. [Or lack of common sense!] At 10.25 we hit the flat top of one of the most climbed fell in the Lakes. It had a few less than the fifty people I had predicted on the summit but we probably whizzed passed a good 25 on the way up, so my numbers for people being on the fell were, most likely, pretty close.

I pulled out the groundsheet and we plonked ourselves on the leeward side of the summit to avoid the gale. The view over Derwentwater was pretty spectacular, with a cloud topped Skiddaw looming over it in the background. Laura produced the flask of tea and I got out the turkey sandwiches and bags of crisps. I had smeared some cranberry sauce over the slices of turkey and they were so tasty. There were quite a few families who had made it to the top and they were tucking into to whatever snap they’d brought with them too. I am afraid to say the pups went around every seated group giving them the “feed the poor doggy stare”; luckily nobody succumbed to their mute appeals. I did have a sanger for each of them, made with chicken paste, so the little beggars didn’t go hungry.

Our dessert was a mince pie each and a Jazz apple. The pies were the last two of Christopher’s Mum’s mincemeat ones. I can’t believe we have eaten our way through them so quickly. The pups wolfed their sandwiches without them even touching the sides and then they polished off a half an apple core each. Laura and I had seconds of tea and sat looking at the view and secretly praying that the rain would hold off. I just love this place so much. By that I mean the whole of the Lakes, not just Catbells. I am so pleased I was able to persuade Dad to let me keep my bedroom in his bungalow when he and Mum divorced. I don’t think I could afford to come and stay here as often as I do otherwise.

Sitting on our groundsheet, sipping tea and trying to pretend we weren’t getting chilled to the bone, my bloody phone rang! I was mortified! It was Mum, phoning me from Phil & Jane’s and wanting to wish me a Merry Christmas and to thank me for her presents. I then spoke to Phil, Jane, Angela and Peter who all thanked me in turn for their presents, too. Laura was sat next to me giggling, as she knows how much I criticise other people for blathering into their phones when out on the fells and here I was doing the very same thing! I nudged her in the ribs with my elbow and she nudged me back. If I hadn’t been in the middle of a phone call I think a serious skirmish might have broken out on the fellside.

When the call ended I flicked her ear, so she flicked mine. I pulled her hat down over her eyes and she snatched mine off my head and sat on it. I tried to retrieve it by pushing her over put she rolled away clutching it, so I leapt across gave her a bear hug and pretended to kiss the end of her nose. I nipped it with my teeth instead. She pulled her head back and rolled some more and somehow we bashed foreheads! It really, really hurt. I mean, it was very painful. We both started to say, “I’m sorry!” at the same time. She pushed me over onto my back. She sat on my chest with her knees pressing down on my shoulders and pinning my arms to the floor and proceeded to kiss the tip of my nose and then give it a nip too. Then she started to kiss me.

There must’ve been loads of people watching our impromptu wresting match and subsequent snog on the fell top. But we didn’t care. I don’t know what we’d have done if we hadn’t been rudely interrupted by two silly Weimaraners who, thinking we were hurting each other, tried to head butt us into less violent behaviour. Callie has been known to bark and even bite people with whom I have play fought in the past. This time she and her partner in peacekeeping were content to try and lick us to death instead.

We then had to spend a few minutes trying to find my phone which had gone west in the melee. Luckily it hadn’t gone far and didn’t seem damaged. I was a little embarrassed that we had behaved like a pair of infants but I am convinced that nobody actually either noticed or cared.

We whooshed down the path that takes you off Catbells down to Brandelhow and walked back to the car park along the lake shore. There were far more people (and dogs) along this section of our walk than had been up the fell. Plus there were lots more children. It is nice to see children being brought out into the countryside. One demographic that seemed noticeably absent was our age group, the early twenties type of person. Perhaps they were all busy having mock fights on mountains?

Dad’s two bloody Labs decided to put on a show at Hawes End landing stage and go jumping off it into the lake! Arrgghh! There were only three dog towels in the back of Dad’s car and we got all three thoroughly soaked drying off the dippy duo. The two Weimys had to make do with a cursory wipe and hope for the best. At the car park, where we wiped down the dogs, people were actually waiting for our parking space. This git driver got out of his car [non-local plate, unlike Dad’s] and asked us if we couldn’t just get in and go instead of drying off the dogs! We went on a go slow and made the arsehole wait even longer! In fact we were so slow at drying them off another vehicle left before we’d finished and Mr Git drove into that space. Some people are just so rude.

Christmas dinner at Molly and Eric’s was packed. How the hell Molly coped I don’t know. I bet Eric was sat on his fat backside all morning squeeze blackheads and watching trashy TV while Molly slaved away in the kitchen preparing a lunch for 11 people! Kirsten and Rob’s children being 3 and 1 don’t really count, I suppose, but even so there was a mountain of beautifully cooked food which we all attacked with gusto. Afterwards, I volunteered to help with the washing up, but of course they have a dishwasher, I guess with three girls and a boy Eric and Molly needed one. So I helped load it up instead. I noticed that Eric did absolutely nothing at all. It was Rob who carved the turkey, not his father in law!

I suggested a post prandial walk to help the lunch go down and Laura’s sisters and their hubbies joined us on a stroll to the wooden seat half way up Tallentire Hill. They left the littlies in Molly’s charge playing with their Christmas toys. I snuck round to Dad’s to get the pups to join us, so they wouldn’t be left too long alone in the house.

I had also sneaked a shop bought mince pie for each of us into my duffel coat pocket to scoff at the seat. We had a pleasant chat as we walked and Laura told them about me getting a mobile phone call on the top of Catbells. She claimed I behaved like a Southern Oik, talking loudly and pretentiously down the phone as though I owned the mountain. I had to pinch her bum to stop her!

Kirsten informed me, in a quiet aside, that she always knew that Little Laura was different but this difference was unexpected. However, since she’d been “going out” with me there had been a definite change in her kid sister. She is more out-going and vivacious. She seems completely happy in her own skin, which (according to Kirsten) she didn’t before, at all. Kirsten can actually remember meeting me and Richard a few times and she thought that the way Laura and I interacted is almost identical to the way Rick and I did. Apparently, when she first heard about me and her kid sister, she was worried that I was just messing about with her emotions and playing at being a lesbian with her. Now she has seen us more clearly she can see how wrong she was. I was sort of insulted and flattered at the same time. So I told her. She laughed.

The mince pies had got a bit squashed but we all scoffed the wreckage at the seat and admired the view over the Solway Firth to Scotland. It was clear enough for me to point out all the landmarks on the far shore which I knew. The girls were amazed that I had even been round to all those places to see what they were like. I was amazed that they had grown up looking at them all their lives and had never, once, ventured round to see what the Southerness coast was like!

Rob had to admit he’d never even climbed a single one of the Lake District Fells! At which point Kirsten corrected him and told him they had climbed Latrigg [from the Skiddaw car park] so he had done at least one! We had to laugh at that because from the Skiddaw car park, Latrigg is a very slight slope of about half a mile to the summit. Even a granny in granny buggy could manage it! [I have seen women with babes in push chairs walking that little way to one of the most marvellous view points in the Lakes.]

I offered to let them accompany us up Scafell Pike tomorrow if they wanted. They all declined!

Back at the Thomas’s [after taking the woofies back to Dad’s] we sat and watched mindless TV for a while and then played some silly board games for a while longer. It was quite a different sort of Christmas Day from the ones I have had in recent years and was lovely. Even misogynistic Eric didn’t spoil it.

I have to admit I did shed a tear at the end of Dr Who! I loved Matt Smith as the doctor and I can’t see how Peter Capaldi can match the excellent standard Matt has left. Laura said she thought Jenna Coleman was hot, which resulted in her being bombarded with a hail of cushions from all parts of the room, I pretended to be in a sulky huff too!

Laura and I wandered our way back to Dad’s at about 9pm. I was all set for a slow and sensuous bout of seasonal love making but we both felt too tired. Hardly surprising really, I suppose.

I was woken by a handful of investigative fingers at about 2am on Boxing Day morning and we both found the energy for a little festive frolicking after all!

If I have been good for Laura [as Kirsten said] then she has been so good for me too!

Thursday 26^th December. Boxing Day.

I awoke at an ungodly hour, as usual, and walked the dogs, as usual up Tall Hill. I returned to find the Lollster busy making sandwiches for our assault on the highest fell in England. The view from Tall Hill overlooks the Lakes and there was a broken blanket of cloud covering the central giants but it looked promising enough to give it a go anyway. I had mentally revised my route and changed from a Borrowdale ascent to a Wasdale ascent instead. It takes a bit longer to drive round to Wasdale but the climbing is more direct and offers good chances of escape if the weather turned unpleasant on us.

We piled into Dad’s Land Rover at just after 8am and were at the foot of Lingmell, in the car park by 8.40. The car park is right at the head of Wastwater and you can see any weather approaching along the valley floor.

The fell is part of the Scafell Massif but is really pretty in its own right too. Our route was taking us up the grassy and rounded south west side. On the northern face it is a wild and rugged mountain and has some very tricky sections for a walker to manage [counting as scrambles rather than a walk in several spots] the south west side is much more user friendly. My plan was to climb Lingmell to the summit and if the weather held, descend to Lingmell Col and work our way up to the summit of the Pike using the top end of the corridor route.

That is what we did. We crossed the beck on the old footbridge and then simply followed the line of fence posts, up Brown Tongue [that always makes me smile] all the way to the top of Lingmell. At 840 metres it did take us a considerably longer time than Catbells on Chrimbo Day morning. Wainwright’s old summit cairn on Lingmell Crag has been rebuilt in recent years and is one of the more unusual in the Lakes. The view from here to Great Gable is brilliant. You can even spot Napes Needle, a climbing spot on the old lady where I progressed to climb when I was about 14. [With Dad, naturally.]

Our problem was the clouds. From Tall Hill you could see they were hitting the central giants but seemed to be leaving breaks, from the top of Lingmell we could tell that the breaks were becoming fewer and fewer. Looking down Wasdale there were banks of the buggers lining up out on the Irish Sea, waiting to whizz inland and rain on Laura and me on the top of Lingmell.

I haven’t mentioned Scafell Pike at all so far, for the simple reason it wasn’t there! Someone had stolen it and covered it in clouds! From Wainwright’s column we had a swift confab and examined our options. There were a few. We could drop into the Col and climb up to the summit of the Pike in cloud on a bearing [although the path is very clearly defined at first, the boulders tend to hide it after a while]; we could drop to the Col and head back down to the car park almost retracing our steps so far; we could cross the Col, hit the corridor route [which is like a bloody motorway these days, it is so distinct] or fourth option - we could take the little used path to the east of Piers Gill and have a mini scramble down to rejoin Moses Trod above Wasdale Head. There was a fifth option of sitting there for an hour or so with four bored dogs, getting colder and colder, waiting for the clouds to lift.

I thought the Lollster, being only a novice fell walker would opt for the retrace our steps option, but the little treasure went for my favourite, the tracking of Piers Gill, over Middleboot Knotts and back round to Moses Trod. You have to be very careful along here as there is every chance of falling into the Gill in one or two spots but I was sure we’d cope as long as the cloud didn’t fall any lower. The ceiling was a bit higher than the Lingmell top but we kept getting wet wisps or lower stuff from time to time wafting around us. Off we went to the Col. Here we met a handful of idiots who were yomping up to the summit of Scafell no matter what. We wished them luck and headed north along the edge of the gill. 

This is one of the most spectacular rock formations in the whole of the Lakes. Yes, Mickledore is impressive [even after the rock fall] but the gill is simply awesome as it is so much longer than Mickledore and you can’t walk along it. [Well, you probably could if you knew what you were doing, I suppose. I certainly wouldn't attempt it with Laura or a dog in tow. Too Dangerous!]

At one point past Middleboot we had to slither over the rock face on our bottoms, which was decidedly trickier than I remembered. I guess it is because I had last done this on a dry autumn day, not a wet winter’s one, and the rocks were not so unforgiving. I sort of sat on my hands and shuffled down in a most unladylike manner with Laura following on behind me. The fall from here is straight onto grass, as we were way over from the edge of the gill by now, but it is still a worrying spot to be in. I turned round and looked at my Love coming slowly behind and she looked a bit concerned. Not terrified, but rather more worried than usual.

I shouted back, “It’s fun this bit, isn’t it?” as a bit of moral support.

I caught a snatch of one of my own sayings coming back to me: “That’s obviously a new use of the word fun I wasn’t previously aware of!”

I wanted to turn around and hug and kiss her, but it was a bit too precarious for that. The dogs had gambolled down the face as though it wasn’t there, they do have four wheel drive, I suppose. They were waiting by the huge arrow, someone has painted on the rock face, showing the route; engaged in a bout of ‘bite the ears’. A common favourite among dogs of my acquaintance.

At the bottom of the face Laura half jumped, half fell into my arms and I kissed her. I squeezed her really tightly and we ate each other’s faces for about a lifetime. When we broke apart she said, “Jeez, that was a bit hairy!” Oh, I love her so much. No moaning, no whinging, no berating me for having taken a route which I knew would stretch her ability to the limit, simply; “Jeez, that was a bit hairy!” How can you not love someone who has that approach to life, eh?

I kept looking back up to the place where  Scafell should have been in the hope that the clouds didn’t suddenly vanish and make us wish, “If only…” But it stayed resolute in its determination to deny us access, so I felt quite pleased as we stepped down the Styhead path heading for the Wasdale Head Inn. My main worry now was we get all four dogs into the bar section? I knew dogs were allowed in as Callie and I have been here before, but Four Dogs?

As usual, I was worrying about nothing. We wandered in, had a pot of tea for two and some of their hot soup and bread rolls. The bar person even brought over a bowl of water for the four pups. Revived by the soup and tea I treated us both to a swift dram of Lake District Whisky [the compnay has only been going for a few months]. Laura had hers diluted with lemonade [there is no hope!] but I had mine neat. It is quite a pleasant drink.

After getting the blood in bodies back to normal temperature, we struck out along the river side towards the car park. This was a bit of a challenge as the water level was quite high and the point where you cross the river was much deeper than usual. Normally you can hop from boulder to boulder to get across but they were all covered by the torrent! I bit the bullet and just waded across, confident my boots and gaiters wouldn’t let too much of the river into my feet. They didn’t. Laura was more circumspect but eventually she did what I had done and just waded across. Her left foot was treated to a mountain stream spa, however! For which I was told I would be held to account later!

At the Land Rover the car park had filled up quite a bit. Which I found surprising. I hoped that the idiots who were going on to the summit of the Pike had arrived there safely. Getting a mountain rescue team out on Boxing Day would not be too popular, I imagined. We drove back to Dad’s feeling tired but happy. It was a new Wainwright for Laura and even if we hadn’t got to Scafell Pike’s summit, like we’d planned, it was still a great day out.  

Errol’s Party, in the evening, was a bit of a damp squib as far as we were concerned. Instead of being the life and souls of the party we were just really tired. I sat on Errol’s sofa for almost all the time and Laura, who came and joined me [after a while] fell asleep, resting her head on my shoulder. Errol sat at the far end of the sofa and we talked over Laura’s head, mainly about Dad and Louisa and their trip to Australia. I apologised for being such boring party guests but he was amused by the fact we were so tired out. I had thought about pretending we were exhausted because we’d spent the day shagging the backs off each other but in the end I told him the truth. We had been out on the fells for two days in a row and were feeling the effects.

He did perk up when I told him about the Ceilidh and he said he’d quite like that if I could promise to stay awake long enough to dance!

We wandered home at about 10pm. I know! What party poopers! The dogs weren’t all that bothered about their last walk either. We didn’t even make it to the car parking space before all four had performed and were off home. At home my Lollster was fast asleep in Dad’s kitchen armchair. As we made our way upstairs to my bedroom she muttered, “You know, I was really, really scared on that rock face. If you take me anywhere as scary again I’ll kill you!”

Lying in bed a couple of minutes later she said, “Can you get death by Orgasm?”