Out & About …

… on the North York Moors, or wherever I happen to be.

  • Dow Crag and Goats Water

    Dow Crag and Goats Water

    The great buttresses of Dow Crag in the Coniston Fells down which the vindictive Geoffrey Westcott fell to his death after attempting to shoot Rowf who had been making his way along the foot of the crags. Perhaps not the best panegyric for a fellwalker but Mr. Westcott is a fictional character and Rowf is…

  • Loch nan Uamh

    Loch nan Uamh

    On this day, 16 April in 1746 on a bleak desolate moor, about 6km east of Inverness, a battle took place which, although lasting only 40 minutes, remains an emotive event in Scottish memory, and changed the country forever by securing the Union with the United Kingdom. It could be said to have lead to…

  • The Priest’s Hole

    The Priest’s Hole

    The view from the Priest’s Hole, a cave high on the side of Dove Crag and long-established bivouac but so especially since the BBC included it on their series “Secret Britain“. Access can be a little tricky and there has been at least one fatality as a result of the programme. When I was there,…

  • The old schoolroom, Strathan

    The old schoolroom, Strathan

    A tin hut stands at the confluence of Glen Pean and Glen Dessary at the head of the 12 mile Loch Arkaig. This is Strathan, the end of the public road from Spean Bridge and a parting of the old routes north to Loch Nevis and south to Glenfinnan. It is probable that the Glen…

  • Derwentwater

    Derwentwater

    I wanted to post a photo of Castle Crag today, the smallest Wainwright, but I couldn’t find a decent image, just a long-range shot from Swanesty How near Grange. Instead, I found this photo of Derwentwater taken, by coincidence, on the same day as my photo of Honister Pass posted four days ago. It actually…

  • Yew Tree Farm

    Yew Tree Farm

    Ancestry, the genealogy website, is offering free access during this Easter “break” and I put that in inverted commas as it seems just like any other day. Anyhow, I thought I would do a bit of research on the history of a property rather than my family history. I found that it’s not that easy.…

  • The Legend of Armbroth Hall

    The Legend of Armbroth Hall

    Yesterday’s post, about Sir Guy the Seeker, reminded me of another ghostly story, but from the other side of the country, Thirlmere in the Lake District. Before the reservoir was constructed by Manchester Corporation Water Works in 1894, there was a lake Thirlmere, or rather a pair of lakes, connected by a strait narrow enough…

  • Sir Guy the Seeker

    Sir Guy the Seeker

    This legend reminded me of Freebrough Hill when I first read it. A supposedly hollow hill in which King Arthur, sleeps surrounded by his knights. Sir Walter Scott told a similar tale of Thomas the Rhymer in Eildon Hill, not a million miles away from Dunstanburgh Castle on the Northumbrian Coast. But the hero of…

  • Honister Pass

    Honister Pass

    Looking back on a long slog up to Littledale Edge from Gatesgarth on a glisky autumnal morning. 24 hours earlier the Lakes had been inundated by a tumultuous downpour with 75 mph winds forcing the abandonment of the 2008 Original Mountain Marathon (OMM) that “could have ‘turned mountains into a morgue’” according to one sensationalist…

  • The Giant’s Boot

    The Giant’s Boot

    Northern Ireland’s most visited attraction is the iconic Giant’s Causeway, polygonal columns of basaltic rock formed sixty million years ago when molten lava spread across the land and created clouds of steam on meeting the sea. The lava cooled and began to solidify into basalt. While most tourists only get as far as the Causeway…

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