Head of Ullswater

Yesterday, we'd made plans to head over to the Lake District and climb up Angeltarn Pikes, but after a little heads up from Mark Littlejohn, we decided to change plans slightly. We decided to head up Gobarrow and as it's a short hike, to then head along and do Angeltarn Pikes later on... didn't quite go to plan! Read on.....

We left the house at just after 5am with full intentions of getting up Gobarrow Park via Aira Force for sunrise... There's a couple (note couple) of problems though....

1st... Fog, which slowed us right down and probably lost 30mins all together.

2nd... Stopped for a coffee on the M6, plus some windscreen washer fluid. I put the coffee on the roof of the car (as I normally would do) and it slid off; all the way down the side of the drivers door window and the door... Oh, and me! The cup, well that ended down the forecourt somewhere after I'd launched it! Andrea went back in for a 'new' coffee while I tried to get rid of the caramel cappuccino from the drivers side window - not that easy!! That knocked a good 20mins off too!!

We eventually arrived at the car park (after driving past it!!) (yep, at this point we should have given up and gone home..) just as the glow of sunrise started!

There's more to come yet... Stick it out!

Anyway, as we arrived late, the sun was coming up and what a stunner it was too! Lovely orange sunrise with a simply beautiful cloud inversion over Ullswater..

Oh.... We'd taken the dog by the way... This next but is relevant to her!

We'd probably got to the top of Green Hill (maybe further, but I don't care), past a few sheep, when... Yep, I said wait for it... I normally have Nila's lead attached to my pack via a good strong carabiner and never had an issue! We we're transversing across the path, when all of a sudden, she took off, pulling the lead out of my hand and ripping the carabiner away from my pack... Off down the fell she went at full steam after the sheep!!

Fck.... Fck.... Fck..... I pulled my pack off and ran down the fell (how I didn't break a leg I don't know), but imagine me running down a steap snow covered green hill shouting Nila, watching her go over the crest at the bottom! My heart sank (it had also stopped at this point as had my lungs!).

I eventually reached the bottom of green hill / Bernard pike and there was no sign of her! You can imagine the thoughts going through my head at the moment!

I carried on calling for her as I walked along the top of Bernard pike and she eventually popped her head up and came running to me... Tail wagging... I'm sure if she could have spoke she would have told me all about her wonderful adventures!!
With her back, so started the climb back up.. I was a wreck by this point, no legs, no lungs.

As this was only supposed to be a short hike, she didn't have back pack on as we wanted to keep that for the much longer hike later on that we'd planned - Daft as it sounds, she goes into work mode with the pack on and listens so much more, but in this case, I'm somewhat pleased she wasn't carrying 10kg as she pelted down the fell, but then again, she may not even have bothered with the sheep had she had it on?

So.......... I didn't get the sunrise shot and never under estimate a Malamute's prey drive, but I did witness a stunning inversion all the way along Ullswater up to Glenridding! This is one of three I'll be uploading over the coming days.

Shot handled with the D800e and 85mm 1.4G.