Saturday 19th March 2016, Dinner at the Lantern Pike

Only thirteen sat down to an excellent meal at the Lantern Pike in Little Hayfield, those who were absent missed a treat. We were treated to very substantial helpings of proper steak pie & chips followed by enormous helpings of apple pie & custard – all washed down with TT Landlord served in lovely condition. Many were driving so they were limited to just the one, unlike those fortunate enough to be being chauffeured. Oh well.

We had a lovely run too. The pre-run description, c/o the guilty party (Young Wilson):

‘Little Hayfield on Saturday north towards A624 pass summit,then Burnt Hill (452m) Harry Hut Trig on Chunal Moor (441m) Descent to A624 north again to almost Chunal Village,then return south and climb back up to Monks Road (near A624 pass summit) Glorious descent back to Little Hayfield, Some quite scary wall stiles on the climb back from Chunal Village. Then a couple of pints and some good food. mileage under 20!! The climb up to Burnt hill is pretty dire as they are sorting the path. The conditions underfoot were slippy going on very slippy!’

Howarth, who hasn’t been seen by the Club for many years, was spotted at the start of the run but he didn’t sign in. He’d vanished by the time the rest of the membership returned to the pub. Where came from, where he went to, nobody knows.

It was a good do, I ran with Prez Park and Merciless Winterbone who proved to be fine and entertaining company – as always. The weather conditions were perfect, dry with very little breeze and not at all cold.

We lost trail less than a mile into the route – a walker was sat on a lump of sawdust by a stile that we should have crossed. We weren’t alone in losing trail at that point – Whitworth & Co (legal advisers to the dodgier members of the Club) also flew past the turning.

Wilson had chosen his route well and had bravely volunteered to lay trail on his own as Vinny had to cry off due to work commitments. Trail was a bit on the light side but in spite of this we didn’t get very lost….not very often anyway. 

Patches of the white stuff were visible over to the higher ground to the east of Harry Hut although it certainly wasn’t a cold day. The ground was generally dry, some of the usually muddy paths were in the process of being paved which made for good and steady going.

Prez Park speeding away

Merciless heading for Vanishing Point

Joe, Harry & Des

Meself, Harry & Des

On final approach to Little Hayfield

8 miles after leaving the pub our elite pack arrived back, unscathed and quite mud-free. After a nice hot bath and a change into clean(er) clothes we sat down to our meal.

A good day out, thanks to Prez Park & Merciless for putting up with me and to Wilson for laying on a fine route.

Where we went (widdershins):

8 miles with 1500’ ascent.

Thursday 9th April 2015, Baby on Board

I needed to cycle up to Chorlton’s Unicorn earlier this evening. It was a lovely evening, an ideal excuse to get the bike out for a ride up the canal towpath. There was a rather unusual and very interesting bicycle in the bike park:

 Available to buy from Manchester Bike Hire, baby not included

For those not in the know, the Unicorn is a co-operative supermarket selling vegan and organic food. I’m not vegan or vegetarian but the the Unicorn sells stuff at far lower prices than the usual high street supermarkets. It’s where I buy all my dried fruit, nuts, cereals, herbs, spices etc. It’s good.

Friday 13th (ooh-er) March, Tracksterman’s Flapjacks

Backpacking food

The size of my girth is testament to my enjoyment of food – the more I enjoy my food, the more I expand. Funny that, I wonder if there’s a connection?

Tracksterman has been a man on a mission of late – trying (successfully) to lose some weight. His blog has detailed some of the stuff he’s been eating in his quest – what caught my eye was a recipe for flapjacks.

For some reason I can’t load a link to the relevant page on Tracksterman’s blog, but if you look at the entry for 9th March 2015 you’ll find it.

The recipe copied directly from Tracksterman’s blog:

200g oats (I used ordinary porridge oats)
3 large desert spoons black treacle
100g dessicated coconut
100g chopped nuts
1 jar of good quality apple sauce (I used a jar of Aldi apple sauce)
3 desert spoons olive oil
Mixed spice (I used a level teaspoonful – not enough)

Warm the treacle, oil and apple sauce. Mix in the dry ingredients then transfer to a greased baking tray. Cook for 15-20 mins 180C (Gas 4), or until firm to the touch and golden brown.
This makes 6-8 pieces, approx 350 Kcal each. They’re good, healthy energy bars - protein from the nuts, slow release carbs from the oats, potassium and sugar from the treacle, quick energy from the apple sauce.

You can freeze them for future use.

I baked them in an aluminium foil lined 8” square tin, 1.5” deep.

Anyway, they were dead easy to make and they turned out well:

They have fairly dominant flavour of apple although the mixed spice flavour is noticeable too of course. I’ll make them again but next time I’ll double the mixed spices and perhaps add some grated root ginger.

Thanks to Tracksterman for the recipe. Unfortunately his blog doesn’t have any contact details or any means to leave comments or thanks – so I hope he’ll accept my thanks and appreciation here.

Anyroadup, these bars are good – they’ll be coming with me on my next backpack…which might just be next week.

29th October: For Mick & Gayle

…who will know precisely where I am!

This was so good I may just have to drive north and try another one tomorrow!

Annabel’s High Energy Flapjack Recipe

Seriously yummy, terribly unhealthy, packed with energy, easy to make….what’s not to like?

This recipe is from Annabel, a fellow LDWA walker and all-round good egg. Not that she’s round of course. Or an egg.

Annabel (who has a Blog) dished out these flapjacks whilst on the CarpetBaggers 50 walk, it’s like rocket fuel.

High Energy Flapjacks

310g Oats

250g Holland & Barrett Breakfast Sprinkle (A very fruity, nutty, seedy mix)

80g Roughly chopped nuts

170g Dark soft sugar

230g Butter

4 tbsp Honey

2 tbsp Sweetened condensed milk

100g Roughly chopped dark chocolate

½ tsp Powdered ginger

Melt butter, honey, sugar & condensed milk.

Mix in dry ingredients.

Press into a baking parchment-lined shallow baking tray

Cover with a layer of baking parchment or foil if you prefer it to be softer rather than crunchy.

Bake for 20mins @ 170degC / Gas 3.

Leave to cool.

Cut into 2” squares and wrap in either foil or baking parchment. I store mine in the fridge….right at the back so I’m not tempted to dive in and grab a piece when I walk past. 

Obviously this recipe isn’t suitable for those with a nut allergy. I recently made a nutless batch for a friend with such an allergy, it tasted fine and had a good consistency. Rather than use the Holland & Barrett Breakfast Sprinkle, used a mix of dried fruit, more oats, seeds etc made up to the same weight. This worked out very well – although I don’t know if the seeds would cause an allergy flare-up.

I didn’t get round to giving it to my allergy friend so I ended up eating it myself.

A chap can’t have enough flap-jack in store….can he?

Carpet Baggers 50

Another in the series ‘A bit out of order’, the Carpet Baggers 50 is an Anytime Challenge Walk….that means it’s a challenge walk that can be done at anytime. And it’s 50 miles. Obvious really, innit?

The Plan was to complete the route in 16 – 17 hours, with a 6am start there was half a chance of grabbing a pint at the end of the walk. It’s good to have an incentive.

At almost 6am precisely the party, led by Aaron, left Birchen Coppice and headed to Bewdley and the western bank of the River Severn. It was a bit muddy.

River Severn at Bewdley @ Stupid O’clock  

The River Severn is spanned by some beautiful ironwork, real engineering:

After a muddy 5 miles of Worcestershire Way, the route briefly left the banks of the Severn and went through Seckley Wood. It was in this wood that I thought it prudent to examine the path very closely indeed. It was a sudden decision, very sudden. Only another 45 miles to go. With muddy knees. Oh well.

The paths through Seckley Wood weren’t as clear as the map suggested. Having only recently acquired the SatMap Active 10 GPS I was keen to try it out in anger. The SatMap wasn’t any help –it took 25 minutes to compute my location, by which time we’d succeeded in navigating out of the wood using map and compass.

A more detailed report on the poor performance of the SatMap can be found here.

 

Crossing the Severn Valley Railway, just after Seckley Wood

5 more miles of riverbank to cross the river at Highley and a stretch of very welcome dry tarmac.

The first breakfast / lunch stop was at an ancient stone near Alveley, the ‘Butter Cross’. It’s a stone cross that dates back to the Black Death, it was where food was left when the village was quarantined.

The Butter Cross 

Miles and bloody miles (about another seven actually) of reasonably dry fieldery and roadery took us to our next breakfast / lunch stop at Claverley.

 Over the fields to Claverley

The plan was to grab some grub in the pub – perhaps a bag of chips and a pint of tea. Unfortunately the long waiting time for food meant we just grabbed a cuppa.

Tower of All Saints Church, Claverley, and the churchyard cross. And a litter bin.

Ludstone Hall, a couple of miles north of Claverley

Signs of the area’s industrial past became evident as we approached the outskirts of Wolverhampton:

Awbridge Bridge on the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal

Judi leading the way 

Annabel leading from the rear

Aaron continued to drag us along way. Some of it was incredibly muddy whilst other bits were just muddy. Some bits (not many) weren’t muddy at all, these were generally the tarmac bits.

High Energy Flapjacks

Another lunch stop, I can’t remember exactly where, but it was memorable in that we were treated to some High Energy Flapjacks. Annabel had been busy baking. These flapjacks were wonderful. I’ll publish the recipe, probably after this posting. They’re not just delicious, they’re a serious source of high octane energy.

Minds were concentrated as the light faded. It pays to watch where you put your feet – when you’re getting tired AND it’s dark it’s very easy to slip, trip, fall into a man-eating fetid swamp or whatever.

I really wanted to see the red sandstone Kinver Edge in the light, but it wasn’t to be. Kinver Edge is the site of an ancient hill fort. Not so ancient are the Holy Austin Rock Houses, which were inhabited until the 1950s. These rock houses are actually built into the side of the Edge. Night navigation onto the Edge wasn’t easy, unkempt woodland concealed the footpaths and it took ages to find our way onto the Edge.

It was around this point that the SatMap actually started to perform. Admittedly it had been switched on for ages and so had already computed our position. The woodlands paths over Kinver Edge and Arley Wood were very muddy indeed and trying to navigate in the dark whilst attempting to stay upright was proving difficult. With the aid of the SatMap we managed to stay on track through the woods. So y’see, the SatMAp Active 10 CAN perform, it just doesn’t do it consistently.

Entering Shatterford I’d twigged that Judi had been quiet. Not that she’s a chatterbox or anything, she was just very quiet. I put it down to tiredness. I was wrong…..I’m a man thing, it’s what we do. All the time. This fact is constantly pointed out to me, so it MUST be right. Mustn’t it?

Judi was feeling quite unwell and really needed to bale out. At around the 41 mile mark we managed to order a taxi for Judi and she was whisked back to CarpetBaggers Control back in Kidderminster. This was exactly the right thing to do.

The last big woodland of the day, well it was around midnight by this time, was Eymore Wood. The route through the wood generally followed the signposted Worcestershire Way this really helped route-finding in the dark.

The poor weather had brought down some trees in the wood, there was no walking round these obstacles – the only options was to climb over…or scrat around and try to crawl under. Not easy when you’re knackered.

One of Eymore Wood’s fallen trees. 

At around 1am a break was called in the wonderfully named village of Catchems End. Heaven only knows what the residents would have thought if they’d looked out of their bedroom windows to see a bunch over-tired, ragged bunch of walkers littering there garden walls at that time of night morning!

We were thankfully back on tarmac once again (I never thought I’d welcome the appearance of a road!) all the way to the eastern bank of the River Severn. A bit of Severn Way followed by some quiet country lanes took us back to our cars, parked just where we’d left them at Birchen Coppice, by the A451. Badges and certificates were dished out, there was much shaking of hands, hugs, patting of backs and so on – the sort of stuff that we stiff upper-lipped Brits do so well. Ahem.

It was now 2am and the pubs were shut. to be honest I was far too tired to go for a pint – or even eat properly. I managed a hot shower and forced some food down, and then promptly fell asleep.

Aaron had put on a good walk. Although it was a published route it can’t have been easy leading a group of unknowns over an unfamiliar route, especially considering that he’d had no opportunity for a pre-walk recce….so thanks Aaron! 

This is where we went:

 

50 miles with around 3300’ of ascent in 20 hours.

More photos here.