For newcomers

At the bottom of each post there is the word "comments". If you click on it you will see comments made by followers, and if you follow the instructions you may also comment and I always welcome that. I have found many people overlook this part of the blog which is often more interesting than the original post!

My blog nick-name is SIR HUGH. I'm not from the aristocracy - my middle name is Hugh which relates to the list of 282 hills in Scotland compiled by Sir Hugh Munro in 1891. I climbed my last one (Sgurr Mor) on 28th June 2009

****************************

Friday 11 September 2020

Low Bentham and River Wenning

Wednesday 9th September 2020 - From Low Bentham - 7.5 miles. 

Both BC and I still find ourselves surprised to find this large territory on the northern fringes of Bowland incorporating the Rivers Wenning and Hindburn largely unexplored by either of us. Here we are again with Ingleborough and its neighbours providing a massive and theatrical backdrop to the north throughout the whole of this walk.

Looking across at that panorama I was constantly reminded of a massive outing back in 2004 covering much of that ground and ending in my request for rescue - it's worth a read at the post I wrote a few years after culling from notes I had made pre-blogging during that trig point campaign - it is not long and worth a read - "Don't Forget your Headtorch" :

http://conradwalks.blogspot.com/2016/03/dont-forget-your-head-torch.html

Lower Bentham has a good free car park and we were off just before ten. The town is attractive but sadly showing closed down shops, but still with a pleasant atmosphere.

After crossing the Wenning we were alerted by the roaring sound of forceful water. The weirs just upstream were being bombarded after recent heavy rain - see my little video below.



Pleasant and varied walking although a bit squelchy took us to The Fourstone of Fourstones. BC had often visited here with his children in years gone by and more recently for its bouldering attributes. This huge lump of granite has many short bouldering problems and BC was like an odds on favourite greyhound out of the trap, firstly to reminisce, and then unable to resist, to have a go. I wandered round to the foot of steps cut out on the other side - here I found perhaps my millionth discarded Lucozade bottle. BC emerged on the summit. After watching him descend the steps, not too easily, I decided to stay put at the bottom rather than risk a likely fiasco. We chatted with a motor cycling couple and the chap as a climber himself had to entertain us with a tricky boulder problem not made any easier with his unsuitable motorcycling boots.

We trogged of again now facing full on that vast view of the the Three Peaks and the other hills recalling our many individual wanderings there over the years.

Our return followed the River Wenning again - all had been enjoyment with the bonus of finding such splendid new territory not far from home and with plenty more possibilities there still to come.

Definitely worth clicking photos after reading captions to see enlargements

Closed shops in Lower Bentham

Crossing the Wenning

Strangely "gone-over" Rosebay Willow Herb making an attractive colourful display

BC surveys the raging torrent

The J Marshall massive caravan site across the river. We walked back through this superbly appointed and well kept site on our return. Here you can probably only see a tenth of its extent


Zoom back to Lower Bentham

Distant Three Peaks territory. It looked a lot closer in real life

We were buzzed several time by a pair of these monsters during the day

Embedded in a garden wall where public footpath passed. For the readable script Google's Latin translator gives : "Lo, to kill, tooth..." then next two word unreadable on stone. Your offer to enlighten me will be gratefully received


BC accelerating toward the Fourstone

Yet another.Who are these Lucozade bottle discarders? We have been here before but I still wonder if there are more of these than any other brand of frequent litter because Lucozade sells statistically more units, or is it something about the commodity and its purchasers themselves - one of life's great mysteries? 

BC having conquered the hard way now faces the intimidating descent of the steps. I am proud that my advanced years and gained wisdom held me back from  entertaining onlookers with my ability to turn something apparently benign into an epic




A serious engineering attempt to preserve the road. We wondered if they had made any provision for their effort's being undermined






14 comments:

  1. It's funny, all BC's photos were of your back, and all yours are of his! Do you never face each other then? 🤣
    It must be a pleasant change for BC getting out and about and climbing other things than his house walls!
    Nice pictures btw

    ReplyDelete
  2. Paul. We have a Covid19 policy of back to back.
    Anyhow that is an unfair comment as I took a full frontal of Conrad last week, did you miss it or has it been deleted? BC

    ReplyDelete
  3. Pau and BCl - Perhaps stopping to take the photo is just an unspoken ploy to stop the other racing ahead? I may get paranoid about this and start trying to take photos of my own back.

    ReplyDelete
  4. If BC walks ahead if you but backwards, he can photograph you front on, assuming of course you have not also decided to walk backwards. If you want a photograph of your back, you simply turn round. Varying the system allows for front and back photographs of both of you. Can’t imagine why you didn’t think of this method. The only downside I can see is repeated falls, bumping into trees etc, for the person walking backwards which has an upside in that it provides additional photographic opportunities.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ok, I'll have a go at the Latin, the key to it is I think the middle section which I believe reads 'ad occidentem ' or 'to the west'. So I think it may be along the lines of 'behold a brightness to the west, a sweet light'.
    Thoughts?

    ReplyDelete
  6. Phreerunner - do you remember this from the Goons? Perhaps before your time?

    I'm walking backwards for Christmas,
    Across the Irish Sea,
    I'm walking backwards for Christmas,
    It's the only thing for me.
    I've tried walking sideways,
    And walking to the front,
    But people just look at me,
    And say it's a publicity stunt...

    et al.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sir Hugh - I assume you are replying to me since I don’t see a comment from Martin (phreerunner). If that’s so, yes I remember it well and could hear Spike Milligan’s voice as I read it. Brilliant.

      Delete
  7. Kendal Grufties - Thanks for that, sounds better than my attempt. Good to have somebody on the blog with a classical education.

    ReplyDelete
  8. afoot - sorry for that slip up. I'm not sure which of the two of you should be more flattered by my aberration. The other memory that comes back every time when we were glued to the radio not wishing to miss an episode of the Goons was The Dreaded Batter Pudding Hurler.

    ReplyDelete
  9. There is a saying: to swallow a camel and to strain at a gnat. A swathe of caravans and a Lucozade bottle are telling and appropriate examples of these two extremes.

    ReplyDelete
  10. RR - Your comment doesn't appear to pass any kind of judgement on my use of the linguistic feature. It seems academics are in debate about the intended meaning as it arises in The New Testament. The most promoted interpretation is that Jesus was having a humorous poke at the Pharisees. Hmm -the first time I've come across humour in the Bible if that is so, but then I have not studied it all that closely. By the way I was not critical of the caravan site, rather the opposite.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I think it is a play on words
    behold the light, (whose) brightness fills the west
    (punning 'behold Clara, her radiance filling the west(ern) sky ?)
    or even 'brightness fills the west (ern sky), as Clara comes, spreading her light (brilliance)
    etc. etc. ,
    thus it might a memorial to a (lost?) Clara
    Latin has both precision and concision so context is crucial - and the context here doth lean towards memorialism.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Needlesshaste - Welcome again to you, my mystery commenter. I have to say your translation attempt seems plausible. I did do Latin for one year at Bradford Grammar School but that is so many years ago I fear to calculate the exact number. I stuck to English and did quite well at it.

    ReplyDelete