Plans: April

There’s no really big walk this year. The furthest we’re going to walk in one trip this year is 500 miles. Building up to that one, we pencilled in a couple of shorter walks: the length of Wales (finally completing our ‘lengths and breadths’ series) and the TGO Challenge.

A few weeks ago, I started plotting the length of Wales walk, based on Tony Drake’s Cambrian Way guide, with it in mind that we would take 3 weeks over the outing. However, when I plotted it, I couldn’t quite get on with the route from Cardiff to Llandovery – particularly the big loop in the Black Mountains which involves spending three days to make 3 miles progress northwards:

The Cambrian Way Route

I’m not adverse to taking meandering routes on a linear walk so as to take in the best scenery or to link good features, but I also like to make meaningful progress in the direction of travel, so couldn’t quite bring myself to plot a route that involved a day and a half of walking south on a northbound walk. I’m sure there’s merit in that loop, and at some point we will go and walk it as a stand-alone trip. For our Length of Wales Walk, however, we will start at Swansea and take a direct line.

The result is that the three week walk has become a 15-day walk, which meant that we found ourselves with a spare week at our disposal.

I didn’t have trouble with finding something to fill that week. In 2010 I walked from Horton-in-Ribblesdale to Edale along the Pennine Way. In 2011 we walked from Dufton to Horton. This April we will walk from Kirk Yetholm to Dufton, thus completing my second walk of the Pennine Way (although I’m still not going to do it properly; we will once again modify part of the route, and I’m not ruling out catching a bus to miss out the dull day between Haltwhistle and Alston).

Train tickets have been bought for both trips, and with the sudden realisation (not to mention a touch of panic) that April isn’t dreadfully far away, today the cooking and dehydrating has started (5 meat pasta sauces and 5 meat chilli are drying as I type).

Llangollen Day 2

Saturday 29 January

Distance: 11.6 miles (2000’ of ascent)

Weather: Sunny and delightfully crisp

As unlikely as it seemed as we listened to the rain fall last evening, today dawned clear and bright, with a good frost adorning the grass. Seeing the conditions caused us to put a spurt on, curtailing our pre-walk faffing, and we managed to get ourselves out at 9am.

A slightly different route was taken to get to the path up to Castell Dinas Bran, this time passing an information board which had apparently been covered with blobs of water from last evening’s rain at the point that freezing level was reached:

The speed at which we ascended the hill was entirely the fault of this sign. Had it been less definite about the time it would take to reach the top we would probably have had a leisurely stroll, but so firm was it in telling us that ‘It will take 25 minutes to reach the remains of the castle’ that we saw it as a challenge. Mick was amongst the ruins in 10 minutes; I took 12 minutes, although I did pause briefly to take a snap of the escarpment under which we had walked yesterday:

This really is a fantastic oversized-pimple of a hill, with incredible 360 views, augmented by the remains of the castle. Definitely worth the walk. Compared to yesterday afternoon’s greyness:

It was much nicer today:

A good poke around was had, oohing in every direction, particularly to the north where the mist hung in the valleys and capped the hills:

Afraid of slipping on the steep descent (it had been very slip-slidey on the iced-up stones on the way up), it was a bit of a nervous descent, but we made it intact to pick up Offa’s Dyke Path. After a bit of road walking, through some pleasing woodland we went. Trevor Hall Wood said the sign. “Who’s he then?” asking Mick, supposing that a hyphen was missing.

The main purpose of this walk, for me, was the Pont Cysyllte aqueduct and by-and-by the route took us to the canal:

I have clear memories of not crossing the aqueduct when I was somewhere between 9 and 11. We got onto the end of its lengthy span, my grandmother (who has no head for heights at all) appreciated what we were about to do and refused to go any further. No amount of cajoling would convince her that there was nothing to worry about, so back we went. Finally I had the opportunity to rectify that unfinished business.

It’s a truly incredible structure:

Mick tried in vain to try to take a sensible photo of me on the crossing:

It was a long way down to the river!

Having crossed the span twice (our circular walk came very close to the end of the aquaduct, but didn’t require us to cross it, so it was a bit of an out-and-back side-trip), we detoured further to a local road bridge in an effort to find a vantage point where we could admire the entire magnificence. We didn’t find that vantage point, but we could still admire sections of it between the trees.

Our way back to Llangollen was a simple stroll along the canal, the tow path of which was unsurprisingly busy on this fine Saturday morning. No narrow boats were moving on the canal, although there were a few people making other use of the waterway:

Dinas Bran had been within our sights for much of the day, and so it was as we paused for lunch. Finding a picnic bench for our break was an added bonus:

As regular readers will know, I’m not always a fan of canal walking, but some canals are better than others, and this one is lovely:

Reaching Llangollen a detour was had into the town before we made our way back to Colin. It seemed obligatory to join the other tourists on the bridge to take a snap of the river:

Equally obligatory was a trip to the butcher for a lamb oggie for Mick. He was quite pleased with it:

So, a good couple of walks had. I think we’ll be back to explore the area further.

Llangollen Day 1

Distance: 7.25 miles (1500’ of ascent)

Weather: decidedly rainy, with a few brief dry interludes

Having scrapped the idea of a backpacking trip last weekend due to the high winds (those winds that blew the tea out of my cup!) and having had the previous weekend’s late-proposed trip vetoed, I was determined we were going to go somewhere this weekend. Great indecision surrounded whether it was going to be a backpack or a Colin weekend and finally I came down on the side of Colin. With that decision not finally made until Thursday morning, I was left with only a couple of hours on Thursday night to get everything together, chose a destination and print some maps.

After much consideration, at 9.30pm I declared that a conclusion had been reached as to venue – we were going to Llangollen. Just over twelve hours later we arrived in the town and wasted little time in getting out for a stroll.

To the north we went, pausing to look up at Castell Dinas Bran which (as the name suggests if you’re familiar with Welsh) is a castle atop a hill, which was due to be on our route for Day 2:

Picking up the Clwydian Way, which wended its way very pleasantly along a hillside, we passed above the remains of an Abbey, although it was the caravan park to the side and the hill beyond which dominated such that you could easily overlook the Abbey in the view:

The surrounding views were worthy of consideration too, which is probably why the trouble had been taken to create some seating overlooking the vista:

With the climb needed to get to the upper seating level, the picnic bench was noted as being ‘for the less nimble’!

Having paused for lunch in between showers (it was turning out to be more ‘rain with a few brief dry periods’ than the forecast ‘sunshine and showers’) we made straight for the escarpment which dominates the views to the east. A fine geological feature, we declared, but the weather wasn’t conducive to good photos:

Even in the miserable weather, we could appreciate how attractive were the surroundings and many a pause was had to admire the features. By and by we got to the point where we were to leave Offa’s Dyke Path, with the intention that we would skirt Castle Hill. There had seemed little point in going over it in this weather when we would be up there on Saturday morning, when the weather was forecast for wall-to-wall sunshine. However, when we got to the junction where we would have turned to go around the base we were both in firm agreement that going over the top seemed like a much better plan.

Up we sploshed, got rained on a lot at the top (I did take plenty of photos, but they’re all very grey), and then by the time we got down the other side the sun was out! Even the bird life was sunning itself on every available perch:

The sun was but a brief interlude. It was wet outerwear that got stripped off as we returned to Colin and it was hard to believe that the weather was going to make such a remarkable about-turn overnight.

January

(Subtitle: Work is a Restrictive Practice)

By the amount that I’ve posted on this blog so far this year (i.e. nothing), I’ve probably given the impression that we’ve had a month of laziness. Although our mileage isn’t as high as previous Januaries (I refer you to the subtitle of this post), we have been out and about a little bit; I just haven’t written about any of it (yep, that subtitle again).

So here’s a bit of a taster of what we’ve been up to in January:

New Boots!

I started the year with new boots! Father Christmas had bought me a new pair of Brasher Superlites to replace my old knackered pair (I would say ‘worn out’ except that it’s more that I never cleaned or treated them and the leather finally cracked, but they did last five or six winters of muddy local walks). Alas, Brasher felt the need to change the design beyond recognition in the intervening years. The new pair no longer look new, but I fear they’re never going to be quite as slipperesque in their comfort as my old pair.

5, 19, 27 January – it’s borderline whether these counted as proper walks, as on these three dates I walked from the edge of Derby to work at Pride Park and back again. It’s not a walk without merit; almost the entirety can be done on off-road cycle paths and some of the length follows the river Derwent. There were storms raging on 5 January. The river was mightily high and I got blown along, glad that the wind was mainly behind me; I was even more glad that the winds had calmed down before the return leg of the journey.

8 January – Martin mentioned that he and a group of other people were going to go for a 10-mile (or so) walk from Taddington, which seemed like a jolly good idea to us, so along we went. Martin & Mick took it in turns to adopt ridiculous poses:

Photo of Mick is copyright Martin Banfield

I chatted myself hoarse:

(Sorry JJ & Viv; I obviously don’t get out in company enough!)

And in all honesty I didn’t pay an awful lot of attention to our surroundings, except for the old mine buildings:

And the skein of geese:

You can read Martin’s full account of this outing here.

11 January – I noticed that there were crocuses out on the estate, which struck me as being rather early.

The snowdrops took a couple of weeks longer to appear. I looked more of a sight that usual on this outing; people stared quite a lot

You can’t quite see the half-a-reel of tape over my face!

(I was on my way home from the hospital; the patch came off a couple of hours later).

14/15 January – Finally a bit of crisp winter weather! Mick vetoed my suggestion, made bright and early on the Saturday morning, that we should quickly pack our backpacks and get ourselves up to the Peaks for a quick overnight, but we did get out for a couple of local walks.

Gorgeous conditions!

I’d already done my ‘local villages’ circuit the previous weekend and noted three big trees which had been downed by the late December/early January storms. Someone was busy cutting these up for firewood:

21 January – It had been a week short of 3 months since we’d set foot on Cannock Chase! Well overdue a visit, that’s where we headed on the 21st, spending a good chunk of the day walking a 13.5-mile route. Not much had changed except for the complete disappearance of one of the forestry plantations on our route. No photos from this walk, other than this sign which had me confused as to what it is they’re trying to convey:

Is it where cyclists arriving by car should park? Is it where cyclists should go, and also where there’s a car park? Or is it a cycle park badly described?

22 January – With spray coming off the river, a swell on the canal and white-tops on the lake, it was another breezy weekend as we did another repetition of one of our local circuits. I even had a gust blow the tea out of my cup! Of all the interesting things I could have photographed on this outing, this is the only snap to be found on the camera:

Not an interesting snap, and taken purely because a new footpath-fingerpost had appeared during the previous seven days. There’s currently no evidence that anyone else uses this path; maybe it will suddenly gain popularity by the addition of this post?!

27/28 January – We were always going to go somewhere this weekend, but it was gone 9pm on Thursday night when I decided that Llangollen was where I fancied. I think that deserves a post or two all of its own…

So, there’s January been and (almost) gone, with just a smidge over 100 miles walked.

2011: Illustrated

It’s that time of year when I get ridiculously gratuitous with my graph production, demonstrating quite how obsessive I can be about collecting and playing with data (although I haven’t quite succumbed to Mick’s suggestion of calculating how many miles we walk per year per dehydrated curry!).

First off, the headline is that I went out for a walk on 172 days of 2011, covering 1892 miles, which was broken down between the months as follows:

The usual pattern prevailed, with the miles dropping off considerably in the second half of the year

It’s not a difficult calculation to see that I met and exceeded my target of averaging 5 miles per day for the year. From the day we set out from Lowestoft heading to Ardnamurchan, my average miles-per-day stayed above the magic number for the whole of the rest of the year:

The pink line marks the magic ‘5 miles per day’. The blue line shows how my year tracked against that. The X axis is a mess, but I’ve given up trying to make it look prettier.

My ascent-by-month chart isn’t entirely accurate because I haven’t worked out rough ascent figures for the Madeira trip in November. Most of the other ascent figures are taken from Anquet (and always rounded down), so may not be overly accurate either:

I wore a lot of different pairs of shoes this year:

Unfortunately, I didn’t fulfil my aim of reducing my shoe collection. I threw away one pair of worn-out shoes, but gained three new pairs.

As for the weather, I walked in more wet weather this year than last, with over a quarter of my outings involving some sort of precipitation:

The ‘dry’ and ‘sunny’ entries were mainly thanks to the incredibly dryness of March and April. As I’ve observed before, if we hadn’t popped home for a week in the middle of our East to West walk then we would have walked the entire thing without any significant rain (thankfully we did take that week off and thus found out that the tent was leaking before the TGO Challenge, during which it rained every day). This chart shows how much our full waterproofs were used during the 46 days of the East to West trip:

The categories are: Blue = not worn; Salmon = worn for less than half an hour; Green = worn for more than half an hour but less than an hour and a half; and Purple = worn for more than an hour and a half.

I got some quality miles in during 2011, with far fewer repetitions of my usual local circuits. I’m hoping to get some quality miles walked in 2012 too, but have my doubts that I’ll get anywhere near this year’s mileage. Shall I set myself a target? I’m not sure.

(Not) Patterdale – Day 5

Saturday 31 December 2011

As I mentioned, our fourth night wasn’t spent in Patterdale, as it turns out that it’s necessary to book well in advance if you want a hard-standing on a campsite around New Year. A bit of phoning around did eventually find us somewhere to spend the night, just south of Keswick, and once we were all pitched up, a look at the map told us that our final walk for 2011 was going to be a quick trip up Seat Sandal. It was the obvious choice for a quick outing, given that we’ve already been up all of the hills around it.

Unsurprisingly, given the preceding four days, we weren’t greeted by a blue-skied morning when we first peeked outside. Undeterred by the greyness and low cloud, by half past nine we were parked up at Dunmail Raise and our pre-departure faff had commenced. Somehow it turned into a mega-faff and by the time we were ready rain was falling.

It was but a shower, and a quarter of an hour later not only had it passed, but we had ascended above the first layer of cloud and into a clear pocket. Things were looking up!

Bit grey. Lots of water around.

Of course, it couldn’t last. By the time we got to the top it was raining in earnest and we were well and truly in the cloud again, but the walk to get there had been an easy and pleasant one alongside the rushing burn.

On another day we would have made a circuit by walking down the spur towards Grasmere, but given that we couldn’t see anything anyway there seemed to be little benefit in doing that. We simply performed an about turn and back down we went.

The rain didn’t let up the whole way down, so once again it was two soggy people who stripped off raingear on returning to Colin. His shower room is a handy place to dump wet stuff, and we had plenty of it.

So, five days walking, seven Wainwrights visited, five rainy days and two windy days. Can’t complain really. It was all good fun in spite of the wetness, and the law of averages would suggest that we were overdue a wet and windy December trip to the Lakes.

Our holiday wasn’t entirely over. On the way home we popped by to see Conrad, with whom we enjoyed lunch and swapping of plans for the upcoming year. Then we spent a ridiculous number of hours trying to get home (a lengthy process due to a closure on the M6 which involved the passage of an hour and a half during which time we progressed a paltry two miles south). We made it home in good time to see in the New Year with a bottle of something appropriate.

New Year already! Must be time to publish my annual graphs describing last year’s walking statistics, mustn’t it?

Patterdale Day 4

Friday 30 December

It was not a stormy night! All was calm and dry, hence we sprang out of bed bright and early this morning (relatively, we are on holiday after all) ready for another hill.

The rain started just as we left the campsite and even dithering for an hour in the car park by the Kirkstone Inn didn't make it stop, so eventually, with time marching on, off we set. Red Screes was our first of two targets for the morning and from the map it looked like it would be a quick outing.

What I hadn't banked on was how much the temperature had dropped overnight, and how snowy and icy it was on the way up Red Screes. The extra care needed slowed us down considerably.

The rain at the pass was soon falling on us as snow, and so it continued as we made fresh tracks all the way to the summit. We had met one family on our way up, but with three young children in tow, they had decided that the summit wasn't for them today. Quite right too - some of those scrambly bits required perhaps a bit more care than you would entrust to a five-year-old.

With no view to admire we didn't tarry long atop Red Screes. For the first time since I'd put my boots on, blood was threatening to return to my toes, so I was anxious to keep moving. By the time we reached Middle Dodd my toes were back with me, but we still didn't tarry very long because there still wasn't much to see.

Having followed the trodden path for a while down the north spur (during which time we descended enough for the snow to turn back to rain), off we veered to take a route that Wainwright would not have recommended. It was a tad steep.

Knees were grumbling by the time we hit the valley, where the rain was getting heavier. Pausing only to shove mini chocolate bars into our mouths, we barely broke stride on the return to the car park.

With rain/snow having fallen during the entire 2.5 hours we were out, we were two very soggy people by the time we reached Colin and, having stripped off the wet stuff and donned dry stuff, the kettle was set upon the stove. A steaming mug of hot chocolate washed lunch down nicely.

Tonight we've moved location (by lack of available pitches in Patterdale, not by choice). Tomorrow, if the weather clears up just a little bit, there'll be just one more hill before we wend our way home.

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Patterdale Day 3

Thursday 29 December

It was a dark and stormy night and the rain came down in torrents. Well, actually, the wind finally let up a bit, but the rain most certainly came down.

Seven o'clock came and lying listening to the rain falling I decided that we may as well give it a while to stop so a lie-in was had. The same decision was made at 8am, 9am and 10am (that I was reading a very gripping book may have had an influence, on top of the continued rain).

Finally (with our planned long walk long-abandonned) we had to conclude that if we didn't make a move we wouldn't even be having a short walk, so at 11.30 off we set.
We didn't pick the easiest ascent route to get up Dove Crag. In fact, given the plethora of paths that litter the fells, we probably picked one of the harder going options, as we slogged pathlessly onto the ridge. The ascent and distance was hard won ("good training!" we said), moreover, as in the latter stages we were being lashed painfully by hail and trudging through inches-deep wet snow.

A chat was had with two chaps out doing the Fairfield Horseshoe, when we finally reached the ridge-path. No progress could be made at that point anyway, as we all stood braced against a gust of wind.

On the top of Dove Crag we had a lie down, simply because we couldn't stand. And when we did ajudge it safe to get back to our feet again Mick scurried off almost bent double to make headway, whilst I got blown over. Harrumph!

With another blow-down on our way along the ridge our hopes of getting up Hart Crag were abandonned. Being up there in that weather was madness. We started our descent as soon as we could...

...but Hart Crag was so close and it seemed such a shame not to even attempt it and with the squall having passed through the wind did seem to have dropped a bit. Back up to the ridge we climbed, dithered a little more as to whether our next move was the sensible one, and then we almost ran up to the top, from where we could see the next squall approaching.

With just a quick glance around and a shouted comment about the incredible view the top offers, down we scurried again, glad when we got into the lee of the hill.

Not that things then became easy. The next squall brought snow rather than hail and by then we were making our way down a steep (semi-snow covered) stone staircase where now and again the wind would also find us. I did manage to get below the snow-line in one piece, before next finding myself sprawling on the ground. I'm really not prone to falling over; this was becoming a record day for me, and not in a good way!

Once down the tricky section we soon rejoined our outward route and our thoughts turned to hot drinks and lunch. It was gone 3pm and lunch hadn't yet been taken.

Again, the light was dimming by the time we got back. A good day, we declared (having long forgotten my hunger-induced maudlin rant on the final, slippery, snow-covered bit of the ascent).

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Patterdale Day 2

Wednesday 28 December
(That last post should have been dated Tuesday 27 December - seem to have lost track of the days)

It was a dark and stormy night and, my goodness, did that wind blow? I imagine it would have been a quite 'interesting' night in a tent.
Alas, it hadn't blown itself out by this morning and soon plans were being tempered. The plan hatched last night was heavily influenced by the realisation yesterday evening that both the pasta and the rice, which were key ingredients in our planned evening meals, were still in the cupboard at home. As a result we would take in Middle Dodd and Red Screes on our way down to Ambleside to rectify our grocery gap. We would also take the opportunity to buy yet another map case as all five of our existing ones were also still at home. Doh! More checklists required (or maybe if we'd even glanced at any of the ones that already exist...).

As the wind continued unabated it was clear that I didn't want to battle that wind for 12 miles (although I suppose it would have been behind us for at least some of that distance). Instead hopes of hills were abandonned in favour of a short, low-level stroll into Patterdale. Such a crying shame as the cloud was well above the summits and the day not a bad one (save for the wind).

Patterdale's Post Office saw us right in the grocery department before we fell into the White Lion for a cup of tea. That was over an hour ago. We're still making our way through the vat of tea served to us. I'm not sure that we've ever been defeated by a pot of tea before - but eight cups apiece does seem a little excessive.

The weather forecast displayed in the Post Office suggests that today's 'hurricane force winds on summits' will abate tomorrow to a more reasonable 30-40mph. As for today, after a stroll back to Colin there are books to be read and I'm sure that more tea will feature in our leisurely afternoon.

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Patterdale Day 1

Wednesday 28 December

Our long-held plan was to be in Scotland this week, playing in the snow on some hills. A few weeks back I looked for, and found, a suitable campsite, but held off booking it as such was the snowiness of Scotland at the time that I didn't want to book if snowy roads were going to prevent us getting there.

In a complete about-turn in the weather, winter suddenly receded and Christmas day saw a record temperature of 15 degrees recorded in Aberdeen. Desperately we scoured the forecasts for some hope of a return to winter, but all we found were reports of positive temperatures on the summits and webcams showing only patchy snow. Acknowledging that our ice axes were going to remain in the cupboard a while longer we looked for somewhere to go closer to home; it didn't seem worth the fuel to travel so far in the absence of snow. We'll save that fuel for a snatched weekend in February.

And so, here we are in Patterdale, chosen as it offered the most un-bagged Wainwrights accessible directly from the campsite.

We wasted no time in our bagging. Colin had been settled on his pitch for all of half an hour (during which time a quick lunch was grabbed) before we set out with just 3 hours of daylight remaining.

Our jaunt wasn't a long one. High Hartsopp Dodd was attacked head-on (which didn't feel as steep as it looked - a good thing as it looks thigh-burningly steep), and then, having ascended into the cloud, the wind was battled on our way over to Little Hart Crag. The wind made us stagger before Scandale Pass was reached, but finally our route became sheltered again and down below the cloud we dropped.

The light was dulling by the time we climbed back into Colin. The wind was rising too. Colin is being buffetted and we can only hope that the wind will blow itself out overnight. There are more hills to be climbed on the morrow.

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Martin & Sue’s Christmas Walk

Just before 10 o’clock this morning the last couple of cars pulled into a layby on the A515 east of Coldeaton. It was a good job that the layby was a big one, as 30 people accepted Martin’s invitation for his annual Christmas walk.

I’m not sure that Martin remembered to renew his ‘good weather’ subscription when it lapsed earlier this year. Over previous years he has been renowned for having fantastic weather for every walk he has arranged. There have been a few blips in his 100% sunshine record this year, and today’s forecast was decided wet (heavy rain from 9am to 6pm said the forecast when I checked it last night). The straw at which I clutched was the knowledge that the weather in this country is seldom as bad as forecast.

Rain wasn’t falling as we set out along the Tissington Trail, nor as we slip-slid our way down the steep, muddy side of Wolfscote Dale:

The muddiness of that descent was nothing compared to muddiness encountered later!

Wolfscote Dale is a lovely place, but today attention was captured by chatting with others more than by the surroundings. This was a social occasion, after all.

Elevenses marked the time when the rain started to fall, but that didn’t put anyone off their flasks of tea and the CCS and Fudge Brownies provided by Martin and Sue. Mick & I were particularly happy to lighten Martin’s load on both counts, as (in a repeat of last year’s Christmas walk) we had arrived at the start point only to realise that our morning snacks were still at home. Do I need a checklist every time I leave the house? Apparently so!

The river was running high, a couple of herons flew past just metres away, and a bit more mud was encountered, and before we knew it we were approaching Hartington.

The Charles Cotton Hotel was the venue for lunch, and they did a good job of feeding 30 wet and hungry walkers. They had interesting murals too. This one was in the Ladies’ Powder Room and was entitled something like ‘Why Men Shouldn’t Flyfish Naked’:

It’s always a bit of a wrench to leave a warm, inviting place when you know that it’s hammering down with rain outside, but a move had to be made and so move we did. It was something of a bonus that by the time shoes, bags and jackets had been retrieved, the rain had stopped. It stayed stopped too, until a whole 2 minutes into our drive home.

There was, however, a bit of standing water on the return leg:

I was glad to have discovered a pair of long-forgotten waterproof shoes lurking in the depths of my wardrobe before we set out this morning. They served me well.

It was still daylight (just about) when we got back to the start point, said our goodbyes and tootled off in the direction of home. Thanks go to Martin for another excellently organised Christmas walk (during which not a single navigational error occurred!). Same again next year?

(Another account of this walk will appear on Martin’s blog, and also likely on Alan Rayner’s blog, and on Helen & Colin’s blog.)

Day 5 in Madeira

Saturday 19 November

Sitting supping beer on the roof terrace as the sun set the previous evening a consensus was quickly reached that we would return to Camacha the following day to walk the Levada de Serra.

Camacha is home to a basket factory and shop, so that’s where our day started (click here for the photographic evidence of what our tour involved…). Following a premature coffee break, off we headed out to seek the levada that we were to follow. From a promising start to the day, the weather took a bit of a nose-dive when soon after setting off it started to rain with some vigour. A handy bus shelter gave us (ummm….) shelter whilst we donned waterproofs and by the time the waterproofs-faff was over the rain had almost stopped.

Five minutes after donning them, off came everyone’s waterproofs (except for my jacket, which stayed on for most of the day – it was decidedly cooler than previous days).

The surroundings for this walk were so different to the previous day it was hard to believe that we were on the same hillside, just a bit higher up. Woodland (notably eucalyptus, but with oak, chestnut and beech too) was the main feature, and with the fallen leaves I could have believed that I was somewhere much closer to home (except that I was wearing shorts in mid-November!).

Yep, we were a matching-hat quartet in our Tilleys. Mick, Martin and Sue even had the same colour.

The Levada de Serra walk is a fine and interesting, but not overly long, so when we reached (mumble, mumble, if I knew what I’d done with the map I’d look up the name of the place) Martin suggested that we headed down the road to pick up the Levada dos Tornos that we’d walked the previous day, but that before we got to the nasty, evil, exposed bit that we should cut down the valley to Funchal. Everyone agreed it was a good plan.

The most notable thing about the Levada dos Tornos today was how much water it had in it. The previous day I could have just jumped in the water to avoid the exposed bits, and I would have been paddling up to my ankles. Today I would have been wading up to at least thigh level.

Having all failed to notice the side-path we wanted to take (even though we’d walked past it three times in a bit of to-ing and fro-ing for a photo-opportunity), we almost reached the nasty, evil, exposed section before realising that something was amiss. We’d not overshot it by too far, though, and we soon located our turn. Down, down, down we then went. It seemed to me that we descended steeply for about 4000 feet, even we only started at about 1500 feet. Thoughtfully, some path-makers had put in steps to help us on our way:

Eventually things flattened out when we reached another old levada, but the respite was brief, before we headed back down again, this time to pick up some alleyways into Funchal.

Somewhere along the 10.5-mile route, I had met and gone past my mileage target for the year (1825 miles) and so when we reached Funchal my resolve to see the walk through to its natural conclusion at the hotel was sorely tested as we passed a taxi rank. If I hadn’t tripped and accidentally fallen into the open door of a taxi, I promise that I would have walked the last 2 miles. As it went, Mick and Sue jumped into the taxi to retrieve me and before we knew it we were back at the hotel in time for the quiz. Martin, having missed the whole falling-into-a-taxi incident, wasn’t part of the rescue party and thus had to walk back. He missed the quiz, as did Sue who had an appointment with a masseuse, and so Mick & I had to put in extra effort to maintain the team’s reputation. We succeeded (by a clear five points too ).

 

That evening, over wine, beer and too much food, we discussed what to do with our final full day on the island.