Peaks Walking 2

For our second day of walking we drove over to Castleton...lots of limestone and caves. Lovely town with norman castle - just 50m from this cross you go through a narrow (4m wide) gorge that opens into a rising valley with limestone outcrops and cave entrances along it.

Little M almost didnt make it past the start line...she had picked up a flower in the town and when she asked me to carry it and I put it in a pocket it was squashed. Buckets of tears and she shot up the side of the gorge and wouldnt come down for about 10minutes.
In the end though the opportunity to clamber about the outcrops was more enticing that sitting up the hill hurling abuse at dad so we made our slow and tortuous way up the gorge. Another very hot day, but she did really well until we got out of the gorge and ran out of rocks to climb. She was bored spitless by the walk across the plateau through farmland, but didnt complain until just before we started heading downhill again...saved by the timely appearance of another limestone outcrop she could climb on.
We stopped for an icecream at Blue John cavern/mine and did the mine/cave tour. They mine a purple fluourspar called blue john in the natural caves of the area...apparently there are one or two bowls of peaks blue john of roman vintage in italy so it has been going on for a while! On the way down to the town again we stopped for every odd shaped rock, dead sheep, butterfly, piece of grass etc. Once again we were out for about 7 hours for a 6 mile walk. She says she had a good time and wants to go again (to subject her brother to the horrors of the peaks). M & J arrived back from Paris with big M running a temperature of 39, so the full story of their trip will have to wait until she is up and about again.

Peaks Walking 1

While big M and J went to Paris, R and little M went to the Peak district for a spot of walking. I think little M really wanted to do the south coast track in Tas, or maybe K2, but life is full of compromises! She has been very excited, we bought books on walks and campsites and she started hassling about packing at least a week before we left and putting aside things which she thought should go (important stuff like doggy, catty and rabbity) as well as trying on her boots and colour combinations for walking clothes.

The campsite at Upper Booth farm was really good - we could have done a weeks worth of walking straight from the tent without driving anywhere (although we did drive over to Castleton for our second days walking for some variety). Took a bit of finding...things like turn offs are not so well sign posted in the UK if you dont know all the little whistle stops on the way to your destination!

Once we had the tent up and located all the facilities we went for a 6 mile circuit walk - total height gained of about 500m. Not bad for 6 year old! Of course the M had to take her pack and the menagerie. If was really hot so it didnt take long for her to decide that dad would be better off carrying her pack (and animals).

She didnt go very fast at any point...except when she saw a rock or cliff she might climb on...but just kept moving a bit, resting a bit, moving a bit. It was hellishly hot until we got up onto the top of the Kinder Scout plateau, then we had a pleasant breeze. The final descent back to the campground went straight down a very steep grass slope for a couple of hundred metres. The track was deeply cut into the turf to about waist height in places (for me), and with the steepness it felt a bit like diving down a rabbit hole. I had a miserable time on the steep slippery surface (sore knees) but M, who was flagging a bit, just loved it. When we got to the bottom she wanted to go back and do it again! All up it took about 6 hours for the walk and we were both pretty tired and slept well.

CERF Summer Party

Another CERF summer party come and gone! Proponents of the bouncy castle won the argument over Bouncy Castle/Magician this year (again) and had a great time bouncing until they could hardly walk. Nicos wins the prize this year for entertaining the children, and should recover full use of his limbs in a relatively short space of time! They had a good go at pulling his arms off.
John finished the evening by making us all sing our national anthems - Australia, South Africa, Myanmar, Venezuela, Bolivia, China, Russia, Germany, Greece, Turkey, America, Portugal and England (he had to sing that himself).
No punting this year due to rain and all having a bit much champagne early on. Walked home across the common in very pleasant 21-22C temperatures at 10.30 at night (not really like being in england at all).

Heat Wave

Its been incredibly hot - hottest July day on record at 35 degrees yesterday and almost the hottest recorded day (which was 36.9). Its been 30+ all week and completely appalling as a result. Humidity is high and none of the housing is set up for it at all. No thick curtains, insulation not very good, no flow through ventilation, so by now all getting pretty grumpy and sick of it. Kids are almost finished school, last day tomorrow - sports day was of course yesterday (yes that was the hottest day on record for July of course). J won 3rd in grade 3 boys throwing the bean bag! All had a good time. This year of course we were in blue team (negating the nice red t-shirts mum had to buy for last year). If you want to see how the kids have grown turn to photos from sports day in July last year - the t-shirts are the same sizes! Its still pretty hot and light at 9:30 tonight, but the light is starting to go faster. J and I are off to Paris next week, while M and Dad go camping. Hopefully it wont be too hot - Monday is forecast to be 34 in Paris which doesnt sound good.

more wedding

Even mum and dad didnt scrub up too bad!!

Wedding

When Mum got back Mum and me and Dad went to a wedding. I was bridesmaid. I had loads of fun and the bride gave me a present from Hong Kong. The end.

Yarmouth

Beach English style. Mum has been away so time to catch up on the news. While Mum was away the kids went to Yarmouth. We had loads of fun and we dug a hole with J. We rolled in the sand when the water was too cold. The day was very hot. We went to a fishing museum.