Wainwright Fells

[The Night Parrot]

I'm planning to walk the Wainwright Fells in the Lake District over the course of the next year or so, and would be interested to hear from anyone who would be up for joining me and my OH, or has done them all before and can share any tips and/or experience about it. I've done quite a few of them before, but am looking at this as a bit of a project.

[tinkettle]

Have also been thinking this would be a great challange - trouble is we live in Bedfordshire so plenty travel to and from the lakes.

[MariaD]

To be honest, I'm fairly ignorant about which the Wainwright Fells actually are. Is it all the ones over a certain height, or just all the ones Wainwright wrote about?

I get over to the Lakes as often as I can (every weekend if I've got the time), but it's usually on a fairly ad hoc (and therefore unpredictable) basis, unfortunately! Which are you thinking of doing soon & what dates? If I can't make it I can almost certainly give route advice / tips, as the Lakes are my local mountains, so to speak...

[The Night Parrot]

tinkettle- the distance is a bummer, but if you do get up this way PM me and we could see about joining forces.

Maria - As far as I know the Wainwright fells are just the ones he wrote about. Scotch people sometimes get confused on this, as the "Munros" refer to all over a certain height as do the "Corbetts" etc, but I think AW was more into the quality of the hill than the height, ergo his favourite was Haystacks at the end of Buttermere. I don't have any specific dates or hills planned at the moment, but have a vaguely formed plan of tackling the hills guide by guide, starting in the northern fells as they are generally less interesting than the rest and it will get them out of the way. I'm up for meeting at some point, and will PM you when I have fixed plans to see if you are available. Hope this is OK.

[MariaD]

Haystacks is a damn fine hill. Nice and knobbly..

[tinkettle]

Had a great day on Haystacks in some pretty wild weather a couple of years ago - on the way down Fleetwith Pike the wind was so strong you had to drop to the ground to stay on your feet, it was plucking moss from the hillside and "throwing" clumps at us - which actually hurt! Oh, and it p****d it down.

I love Wainwrights description of Haystacks, "a fierce terrier of a fell".
Cheers Maria and Night Parrot - Meeting up would be good (hills or Dog and Gun), planning a trip in Nov and then some winter trips after that (please snow!). I will let you know when I'll be in the area.

Have added a little pic of Haystacks (just cos' I can) to the gallery - was taken after walking Mellbreak, from the pub!

[The Night Parrot]

Nice one - If you are up in Nov. tip me a nod and we'll try and sort something out.

[MariaD]

Hopefully there'll be some early snows in time for your trip in November. Last year the first really decent snowfall in the Lakes wasn't until early/mid December, but in 2004 we spent a fantastic November day doing Striding edge & Swirral edge on Helvellyn under masses of snow. Gorgeous blue skies as well....

[tinkettle]

Lets hope so but not too likely for November. Can't wait all the same - Mountain Porn (ie, Trail Mag) just isn't enough - I need some hills.......

[MariaD]

I find the photos (i.e. the 'porn' element) are better in TGO. After all, they have Colin Prior on the staff, which can only be a good thing!

Have you seen his book "Scotland: The Wild Places" (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Scotland-Wild-Places-Colin-Prior/dp/1841193151)? Whenever I'm feeling wistful and in need of hills I get it off the shelf and just stare. I always get his Scotland calendar as well - it has pride of place on my living room wall!

Another good 'mountain porn' book is "The Cuillin" (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cuillin-Gordon-Stainforth/dp/1841195413). Just look at all that craggy ridge to be scrambled on....

[MariaD]

Having said that, I did buy Trail this month for the waterproofs test. I got very frustrated by it though. Lots of jackets come out in separate models for men and women (e.g. the Rab Latok & Infinity are basically the same jacket, but one's for a man and one's for a woman), but they haven't bothered to employ a female gear tester to test the women's jackets. As a result, most of the "through to final" jackets (including the ones that got 1st & 2nd place) were only available for men.

TGO, on the other hand, employ gear testers of both genders. When they test jackets they'll have 3 or 4 pages of reviews of women's jackets, followed by 3 or 4 pages of reviews for men's jackets. It's helpful, as it means you only look at the section you need. And you don't see something, think "Hey that's really good, maybe I should get that one" and then notice the tiny little logo in the corner of the square that shows it's only available for men.

Also, Claire Maxted - the new features writer - drives me up the wall.

[tinkettle]

I havn't seen the new trail yet but I see what you mean, can't say I'd ever noticed the whole womens clothing thing until now (being a man'n'all) but my OH makes similar coments and complains that there are never as many womens clothes in gear shops - hmmm not convinced, still seems able to spend. For some reason I can't remember now I didn't like TGO, maybe I'll try again. Cheers for the book recomendations, I might take a look.

[MariaD]

There is a reasonable selection of jackets for women if you shop around, it's just frustrating that a leading magazine doesn't test them. Thank god for TGO! Maybe I'm just saying that because I'm a bearded middle aged man at heart though... :)

This month's TGO also had some routes for winter walks in Scotland. They looked good, and not too challenging for anyone who's relatively new to winter walking. If anyone out there hasn't visited Scotland in the winter before, they could do a lot worse than spending a weekend trying out a couple of the TGO routes.

Those books are definitely worth getting - stick them on your list for Santa!

[tinkettle]

Just got the TGO you were talking about - looks like good stuff.