It’s a Kinder Magic

My second bout of training was taking a train to Sheffield, on to Edale and scrambling up Kinder Scout in the snow. I stayed overnight wid kid so I had an earlyish start. I’d bought some snow grips for my boots and they worked a treat. Two geysers went a pisser on the way down but I overtook them with ease. I only saw eight walkers all day.
It was tough getting to the top and for those who don’t know it the top is a plateau of 12 square miles of unspoilt wilderness with deep canyons winding their way through peat making navigation without clear sky or compass difficult. There are Arctic Hares on the top which change to pure white in winter to camouflage themselves in the snow. There are bits of planes dotted about the plateau that have crashed there over the last eighty years, including the remnants of a a US Superfortress that crashed with 13 crew on board in fog. No chance for the poor little buggers and when you stand in the middle of chunks of metal on a bleak day looking across the moor towards Glossop you really wonder what the point is. Only young Yankee kids carrying mail home. Well it didn’t make it and neither did they. Neither did three Boy Scouts on 15 March 1964 when the weather turned bad. It’s an unforgiving place but I love roaming over it. It’s got summat.

I wanted to cross the plateau to Kinder Downfall, a 30 metre waterfall that ices into an amazing Leviathan in winter, but the snow was very deep on top. I thought I could walk up the canyons with the streams being frozen, giving a solid surface, but there were too many deep drifts in the way.

I tried for four hours. I found somebody’s tracks and tried to walk in them to stop plunging up to my snowjones with every draining step. They were a few days old but were the only sign of anyone getting across. I just couldn’t do it. The tracks kept disappearing and I was beginning to get concerned about the light as it was afternoon by now and 4pm was shutdown for certain. I turned round and thought if I aimed for the sun it would bring me to the plateau edge just west of where I needed to be at the top of Grindsbrook. I wasn’t worried, just being wise for a change. It was a right trek. As on the back end of Ingleborough I ended up swimming on the top of the snow for part of the way to avoid sinking in.

I was glad to get to the edge of the plateau and have footsteps to walk in. It’s difficult but it’s lovely you know.

I dropped down Grindsbrook and made it before dark to a pub by the station in Edale that I got chucked out of 44 years ago for singing ‘the Red Flag’ on a Sunday. They didn’t recognise me so I got served and then got the train home to a warm fire and a warm missus. Retirement’s alright you know.