We had a lovely cooked full breakfast at 8am and got out on the road pretty early on day 2. It looked to be building to another stunning clear day. We had a similar amount of miles to do today and similar elevation. The one thing we had not realised was the type of paths and condition of the terrain. There were very few smooth paths and the terrain was mostly very rocky and steep and made a huge difference to pace at which you could travel. We had three very large climbs on the agenda today.
The climb out of Rosthwaite (can’t remember the name off the top of my head) was particularly rocky and included a fair bit of scrambling this slowed us down a fair bit. Particularly me as I was having trouble getting any momentum due to being a lard arse or my bug I have still not cleared, either way John was again a little stronger on the uphill sections but I was a bit more confident and could hold my own on the very technical descents. That was also a pace reducing part of today’s leg as there was nowhere to make time up on descents. It took almost as much time going down as going up with the technical nature of the rocky paths. Lots of very large step downs on rocks and loose stone almost scree sections interspersed with grassy slippy bits and boxes to cross.
The second very big climb up Greenup Edge was stunning but very steep and again technical with a very interesting scramble on rocks at the end.
The views however were amazing from the tops, views of all the surrounding peaks and valleys. The weather had held again and nothing but sunshine and cool winds at the top. Perfect for walking.
We soon realised today’s mileage was never going to happen as it was taking so long to get the miles in on the terrain so we accepted this would have to be a shorter day and we would try to make up the miles on some of the shorter planned days. We descended the last hill and down into Patterdale and sat at the hotel waiting for Maxine to pick us up with a cold beer for me and a glass of wine for John.
Maxine was just around the corner it turns out but on a different track that came down than the one we had used but eventually we got a message to her despite no signal and off we went to a nice hotel called the New Ing Lodge for a meal and our lodgings for the evening.
We had only managed half the mileage we had intended, around 15.5 miles instead of the planned 27 or so. We had still covered almost the same elevation as yesterday (around 4,000ft) but in half the distance so you could say it was almost twice as hard as the day before but obviously we started on tired legs too.
All in all still a good tough days walking and some very rewarding views and scenic paths along the way. We were sticking to the higher harder paths and trying to not navigate around harder bits and stick to the route. This gave us the best views but we had to work for them.
With me being a little slower on the uphill sections today we decided Maxine would do the first very big climb up to Kidsty Pike in the morning and I would take over after that. She was better on hills than me and rather than just meeting us now and again she would be a bit more of a support role from here on in and we could share the miles with John. After all it was about him getting the Coast to Coast done not me or Maxine. John was still strong and looking good. He is a determined bugger and very fit.
Onwards to the next day.
