A Week of Two Halves

I guess this week was always going to be a week of two halves. Our days off in the second half of the week were heavily "booked out" so any activity was set for the earlier part of the week. It started off well with a Causey Pike circuit and a night run up Dale Beck / Roughton Gill. Both were quite short outings with the plan being to step up the distance for the first time for several weeks on Wednesday. Unfortunately the longer outing didn't happen due to a dose of food poisoning! Still recovered now and looking forward to a busy week.

13/11/10 Causey Pike - Run

With: On my own

Weather: Fine clear day with good vis; brisk breeze on summit; patches of snow persisting on higher peaks

Set off from layby at Stoneycroft (same place we park when ghyll scrambling) & ran up track towards Oughterside. Nice steady run. Continued past several sets of waterfalls that I'd not seen before, the ghyll was in spate & looked impressive. Continued up wet path to intersect summit ridge before rocky scramble over & around some small pinnacles to make the summit.

Took camera, so a few views from Causey summit:

Grisedale Pike

Snow on Helvellyn Range

Way down















Relatively short run: approx 4.5 miles; 2,000' of ascent; 80 mins - really enjoyed it!

16/11/10 Dale Beck & Roughton Gill - Night Run

With: On my own

Weather: Cool, dry, clear evening

The relatively short distance from Fell Side up to Roughton Gill along the mine track has been a long time favourite that I repeat often. It offers all kinds of options: just about any point of the Gill is reachable; you can carry on up to the Knott quite easily; head off up Brae Fell; explore any of the numerous Dale Beck tributaries; or just simply run up and back the same way. The list of variants is almost endless. However, I have been looking for an off-road night run for this winter and I'd never done this in the dark before. So I set off from Fell Side just before dark, it was quite a clear evening - easy pace up the track; round the "hairpin" bend; past the ruins & over Hay Gill. A little further on & crossed Dale Beck before continuing on the west side of the valley to the foot of the waterfalls. Gained height as the light quickly faded but my eyes had become accustomed to the dark so didn't need headtorch yet. I crossed Roughton Gill close to the "Coffin Level" mine (wet feet as level was quite high) and scrambled up the far bank before dropping back down to the brick mine building & heading off back towards Fell Side in blackness. Stopped at Hay Gill to take some more photos before returning to civilisation!
This worked well as a night run - so I'll return.

View down Dale Beck - just going dark

Moon over Iron Cra