The plan had been for Mick to join me on this hill, but then the plan had also been to park in a large lay-by that, it turns out, does not exist. We did find somewhere big enough to leave Bertie without blocking any accesses, but when Mick learnt that I could use my bike for much of the 5-mile outing, he set about emptying Bertie's boot to retrieve my wheels. It's possible that his eagerness in volunteering to stay behind was based upon having seen the hill; I admit it doesn't look very attractive when viewed across the wasteland of a largely-felled forest.
I had three possible routes noted for this top (four if you count combining two into a short-handled lollipop, which is the option I would have gone for had Mick joined me and we'd gone on foot), and my one concern in biking up through the forest was that the felling might have obliterated the breaks leading out of the trees from the upper track. Happily, as I huffed and puffed my way to that upper track (the first ride of the trip that has had me gasping), I could see that to the left of the most recently felled area was a break that was largely free of debris.
A while later, after ditching the bike and walking up to the top of that break, I had to marvel at my lucky timing. I imagine that in a few weeks, now that the trees to the right are gone and the sunlight can reach this ground, all sorts of plant life will spring up there. Today, however, I had a gloriously firm, cropped surface on which to walk.
Even better, with the recent felling activity, I wasn't hemmed in by trees, but had views.
Before I knew it I was at the top, looking over the other (west) side of the ridge. After days of forests (mostly the mess of felled forests), it was lovely to look out over such an area of lumps and bumps:
The stats: shorter than expected at 3 miles cycled with 120m ascent and 1.4 miles walked with 140m ascent.
(Today's 'stupid cow' incident. As I looked east from today's hill, I contemplated the hill on the other side of the B-road and felt sure that it must be a Marilyn. Which hill was it, I wondered, and when did I visit it, as I didn't have it on my list for this trip? It's only just now that I've looked at the map and discovered that it's Larriston Fells - yesterday's hill. I'd forgotten that one of the two options I'd noted for that hill was to approach it from the same (non-existent, as it turns out) layby as for today's top and it had been sufficiently long a drive around from Kielder Water that it made me forget how close it was to Blackwood Hill.)
I had three possible routes noted for this top (four if you count combining two into a short-handled lollipop, which is the option I would have gone for had Mick joined me and we'd gone on foot), and my one concern in biking up through the forest was that the felling might have obliterated the breaks leading out of the trees from the upper track. Happily, as I huffed and puffed my way to that upper track (the first ride of the trip that has had me gasping), I could see that to the left of the most recently felled area was a break that was largely free of debris.
A while later, after ditching the bike and walking up to the top of that break, I had to marvel at my lucky timing. I imagine that in a few weeks, now that the trees to the right are gone and the sunlight can reach this ground, all sorts of plant life will spring up there. Today, however, I had a gloriously firm, cropped surface on which to walk.
Breaks in forests don't get easier than this!
Even better, with the recent felling activity, I wasn't hemmed in by trees, but had views.
Before I knew it I was at the top, looking over the other (west) side of the ridge. After days of forests (mostly the mess of felled forests), it was lovely to look out over such an area of lumps and bumps:
The stats: shorter than expected at 3 miles cycled with 120m ascent and 1.4 miles walked with 140m ascent.
(Today's 'stupid cow' incident. As I looked east from today's hill, I contemplated the hill on the other side of the B-road and felt sure that it must be a Marilyn. Which hill was it, I wondered, and when did I visit it, as I didn't have it on my list for this trip? It's only just now that I've looked at the map and discovered that it's Larriston Fells - yesterday's hill. I'd forgotten that one of the two options I'd noted for that hill was to approach it from the same (non-existent, as it turns out) layby as for today's top and it had been sufficiently long a drive around from Kielder Water that it made me forget how close it was to Blackwood Hill.)
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