UKY Ramblers

Hi, I really like my poles.    

Also, that is more for hiking than Nordic walking.  The poles are slightly different.  Nordic walking poles are lighter and they tend to have less of an adjustable range.  

The walking ones are mainly designed for people who want to walk on generally even surfaces. So you aren't using them up the side of a mountain where you need to really shorten them. 

Especially after seeing Mrs R save us from the ferocious dog with her fast-action pole maneuver! 

Don't worry, he was only a little jack russell and wasn't harmed.  She used the pole to shut the dog door. 

Just call me The Pole Maneuver Ninja. 

Hi, I really like my poles.    

You're a pole expert!  Thanks for the information!

Just call me The Pole Maneuver Ninja. 

 

Because I useed to work on the AT in NH I met a lot of weird hikers.

I knew quite a few thru-hikers who were ultra-light and used thier hiking poles to make their tent each night.  So they didn't have the extra weight of tent poles. 

Some people are slightly more extreme than I am.   

Thanks for the pole input. 

I rambled a total of 18 miles this weekend!  (interspersed with lots of pub action) 

We did a quick 4 miles on Saturday, about 7 3/4 miles on Sunday (I haven't gone that far in a long time so I was well pleased with myself), and then 6 1/2 miles today.  We spent the holiday weekend up the Yorkshire Dales, together with HME (whose husband, sadly, couldn't come because he was whisked off to China on a business trip at the last minute) - it had been awhile since we'd been up there, and I forgot just how breathtakingly beautiful the Dales are. 

I'm tired, a few sore leg muscles & just one blister (AFAIK) on my pinky toe, and I still have this cough that I started the weekend with - so off to bed here shortly!

That sounds great Mrs R!

I rambled a total of 18 miles this weekend!  (interspersed with lots of pub action) 

We did a quick 4 miles on Saturday, about 7 3/4 miles on Sunday (I haven't gone that far in a long time so I was well pleased with myself), and then 6 1/2 miles today.  We spent the holiday weekend up the Yorkshire Dales, together with HME (whose husband, sadly, couldn't come because he was whisked off to China on a business trip at the last minute) - it had been awhile since we'd been up there, and I forgot just how breathtakingly beautiful the Dales are. 

I'm tired, a few sore leg muscles & just one blister (AFAIK) on my pinky toe, and I still have this cough that I started the weekend with - so off to bed here shortly!

That sounds like so much fun! And I'm glad your back... I get to see you next weekend! 

Wow, Mrs R, that sounds amazing! What a fit bird you are!   

Hope we get piccies soon a la Mr R.

I get to see you next weekend! 

Hope you mean the weekend of the 15th? 

Wow, Mrs R, that sounds amazing! What a fit bird you are!   

Hope we get piccies soon a la Mr R.

Hope you mean the weekend of the 15th? 

Yeah, not this weekend, but next weekend.

Yeah, not this weekend, but next weekend.

OK, good, I am not cupcake ready.  (Sighs relief) 

Wow, Mrs R, that sounds amazing! What a fit bird you are!    

Ha ha - not really!  Have been recovering ever since:  sore muscles, sore feet, and still have this horrible chesty cough, sometimes losing my voice - because I went rambling all weekend, instead of resting & trying to get over this crud.  

Hope we get piccies soon a la Mr R.

He is still working on the Cornwall snaps!  

Hope you mean the weekend of the 15th?  

She's excited & getting ahead of herself!  

So this is what we did...  We stayed at this very remote pub/inn:  White Lion Inn in Cray, North Yorkshire.  Rooms could use a bit of TLC, but the bed was good, the bathroom clean & the food & beer/cider all excellent!  The White Lion is about all there is in Cray, except for being what I would call, in the Midwest, a 'wide spot in the road' - except the road is narrow, not wide.  Lol!

The weekend brought back all kinds of memories for Steve & me, because we were up in the area at the top of Wharfedale, where we had to give up our Dales Way trek for one afternoon - on that infamous day (flashback alert!) back on 25 June 2007 (hard to believe it was 3 years ago!) when it started to rain & never stopped raining (flash flooding, Leeds, Hull & Sheffield were flooded, we were walking through water over the tops of our boots, climbing over tree-blocked walls, and crawling through the branches of a fallen tree, etc etc) so we gave it up at the pub in Buckden & called the farmer (where we were staying that night) to come & get us.  So technically, we never really got to the 'top of Wharfedale' - where the River Wharfe begins, which was sad.  

Anyway, back to this weekend...weather was a bit iffy on Saturday (scattered showers) so we parked at Buckden & walked downstream for a couple miles to Starbotton - we had walked this piece before from the other direction, back in 2007.  Had a picnic lunch by the bridge in Starbotton, and then stopped at the Fox and Hounds in Starbotton for a pint - just as a brief shower was passing.  It's a very small, cosy & snug traditional Yorkshire pub.  We sat near the open fireplace & drank our pints, then walked back to Buckden, and then drove up to Cray to check in at the White Lion.

The White Lion is a cosy, traditional Yorkshire pub, with an open fire, great food & great beer/cider too - we had our evening meals there on Saturday & Sunday.

Sunday the weather looked a bit more promising, if a bit windy & chilly.  That was the day of the big hike.  We did what is sort of a squashed triangle shape in walking from Cray to Yockenthwaite in Langstrothdale - Yockenthwaite being a tiny ancient hamlet (the place name is Viking/Celtic from "Eogans’ Thwaite" meaning clearing of Eogan - how you get Yocken out of that I don't know!).  Then from Yockenthwaite, walking to Hubberholme, where we had a picnic lunch and then went to The George Inn for a pint.  The George Inn is a cosy, traditional Yorkshire pub, where we sat by the open fire & had our pints.  

Then we walked to Buckden from Hubberholme and then up Buckden Rake (huff & puff), but not Buckden Pike, back over to Cray again.  This overall walk is fairly well known & in several walking guidebooks.  In fact, all of these pubs are part of an even bigger walk known as The Inn Way (Yorkshire Dales):  76 miles, 6 days, 26 pubs.

Monday, we had to check out & so we headed down to Burnsall, which is really one of the loveliest villages in Wharfedale, I reckon.  They were having some sort of carnival/fair there for May Bank Holiday.  But we just parked there & took off on another walk.  We walked another portion of the Dales Way there along the Wharfe (familiar to Steve & me) to Linton Falls, then on to Linton (near Grassington) where we had a pub lunch at The Fountaine Inn.  It was more gastro-pub than traditional, but very nice all the same, and the food and drink were excellent.

After all that food & drink, I felt like I could barely move & thought I might just take a nap on the village green but Steve & HME thought someone would come along & move me off, so we kept on walking back to Burnsall.  We had an ice cream there in Burnsall & then it was time to go home.

That sounds amazing Mrs R!!!  Wow... do you think you would ever do the 76 mile / 6 day walk? I think if I did something like that it would be the biggest accomplishment of my life! 

Wow... do you think you would ever do the 76 mile / 6 day walk? I think if I did something like that it would be the biggest accomplishment of my life!  

Ha ha...well... I already did walk about 80-85 miles in 8 days one year (the Dales Way - June 2007) - except for a few miles we missed out the day it never stopped raining.  We were drenched to the bone for 3 days of that walk, but there was only one day that it just didn't stop raining & I mean pouring (not normal English gentle rain)!  

Then in June 2008, I walked about 90-odd miles in 8 days for the Cumbria Way - the trail itself is only about 70-odd miles, but for that we had to do some off trail walking to get to our accommodation at the end of some days.  I was especially proud (and very foolish) about that one because I busted my right knee up pretty badly in a fall on the third day of walking, and still finished the final 60 or so miles on a seriously messed up knee (thank goodness for ice, cocodamol & ibuprofen!).  A&E told me off after I got home so it was really a pretty bad injury & I was foolhardy to finish the walk on it - but it was our holiday we had planned for so long & you know we take no prisoners on holiday!  

But no - I've not done 76 miles in 6 days yet.

Not this year, but in coming years, we are considering the Yorkshire Wolds Way, the Cotswold Way, and possibly doing the Dales Way again.  

(Some would say we cheat a bit, because we pay a luggage carriage company to collect & deliver our heavy luggage bags from one night's stop to the next - allowing us to just have daypacks for each day's walking with our lunch, waterproofs, water & maps, camera, binoculars, etc.  However, we have seen people along the trails who are packing all their stuff on their backs & to be honest, they don't look like they're having very much fun.  So...)

Ha ha...well... I already did walk about 80-85 miles in 8 days one year

Then in June 2008, I walked about 90-odd miles in 8 days for the Cumbria Way

WHOA! 90 miles is like from here to Edinburgh - or even further than that!  Holy tamale... that is a long way! That's seriously impressive, woman. I'd love to do something like that, but I guess I'd be doing it alone. I can't usually get DH to even take a short walk on the dunes.  Also, that is crazy about your knee. What a trooper. I think I would make someone carry me the rest of the way if I busted my knee!