Having read of Simon et al’s laughs on the High Peak Marathon in March, Chris and I decided to have a go for ourselves. OK, so May Bank Holiday isn’t in the depths of winter, and we planned to wild camp rather than do a non-stop round but 43 miles is still a fair challenge over two days and a good bit of training for the forthcoming LAMM.
Having opted to start from the A628, at the northerly end of the route, we parked up in a glass and beer can strewn strewn layby and waved goodbye to the car stereos. A good path took us up onto Bleaklow and then it was the Pennine Way down to Snake Pass, over to Mill Hill and a very busy Kinder.
By this point I had formed a view that the ground was very dry indeed – a theory immediately dispelled by my thigh-deep disappearance into a bog in the Brown Knoll area. With Chris marching on ahead a kindly group of pensioners with walking poles were immediately on hand to perform rescue duties
With the day steadily getting hotter and water proving very hard to find, the climb to Mam Tor and the subsequent ridge wasn’t as easy as it looked on the map and plans of making it to Cutthroat Bridge by nightfall began to look a little ambitious. Just when the legs were starting to tire, a horrible climb to Win Hill and a sharp, never ending descent, finished the job. Fortunately the Yorkshire Bridge pub was close at hand and after 30 minutes break we pushed on. By now the heat of the day had gone but it was a slow, rather mournful party that made its way up the road past Bamford and towards High Neb.
The last few climbers of the day were making their way down and, finally, after 12 hours on the go we clambered over the Edge and pitched the tent.
As always, the trials of the day were forgotten as I tucked into a home made prawn curry and we toasted the ebbing sun with a few snifters of whisky. After a wet and chilly night, made noisier because of our failure to put up any of the guys on the tent, we packed up around 7.30 am and made our way along the top of Stanage.
Following a damp start the sun did come out but a cold and strong wind made it hard going along Derwent Edge, up to Back Tor and Margery Hill. After a few hours plodding along on autopilot the final trig point of the walk at Outer Edge was greeted with some jubilation – now it was just a case of swinging west across Featherbed Moss and choosing a route back to Saltersbrook Bridge.
Unfortunately we went north for a little too long which necessitated an hour or so of cross-country slogging across knee-high heather with a couple of very steep gullies thrown in for good measure. But we did get to see a couple of mountain hares – something I had never seen in England – so perhaps the extra couple of miles were worth it. Having picked up a good path by the road we were back at the cars, which were miraculously unscathed, by 1.30pm.
Roll on the real thing next year!
Nice one. How was the Outer Edge Bog Monster?
P.S. It's a very risky thing to put a statement like "Roll on the real thing next year" in writing!
Pretty dry at Outer Edge actually. We did about a dozen bog-leaps but it wasn't bad. There was hardly any water about, Kinder Downfall was a dribble. I quaffed a litre from a very still and murky pool on Rushup Edge and then wished I hadn't.
I did mean to put a disclaimer in the article saying 'there is a deliberate error here – see if you can spot it.'