Friday 3 August 2007My feet were still playing up. I put the problem down to my Brasher Supalite GTX boots not being tough enough for my route. I’d have to splash out on something more robust before September.
I took to the road to Thwaite before joining the Pennine Way and beginning the long haul up Great Shunner Fell. The first mile is along a horrible, enclosed, stony track, which I remembered with no affection from my 2002 visit to the fell. Attempts to protect my blistered foot by tentatively selecting each footfall inevitably provoked a falter, followed by a painful impact of lesion on rock.
The path soon empties onto open moor. It is mostly paved and provides 
easy progress across the sodden heath. It must have been a very demanding bog-trot through the mire before the path improvements. Purists sometimes condemn such engineered tracks, but they must be better than wallowing in thigh deep ooze and creating enduring scars across the landscape. In any event, stone trods and pannier-ways have been strung across the Pennines for centuries.
There were a few people on the fell, but it was much quieter than yesterday. At the top the weather closed in a shade, foreshortening the view and plummeting the temperature. There was some rain blowing in a strengthening wind. It was not a day to hang around on the summit.
I’d walked over the fell a couple of times in the past, but always from south to north. Heading south, towards Hawes, gave an entirely different perspective to the walk. I wondered what the Pennine Way would be like starting from Kirk Yetholm. Who knows..? Perhaps one day.
My foot problems prolonged the descent, but the lane at Hardrow was eventually reached in improving weather. Soon I was in Hawes waiting for a bus down the dale and a lift home.
The walk is an ideal outing for a long weekend. Other than the blisters, the trek had presented few physical problems and I was pleased with my improved fitness. I must get those new boots though.
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