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Today Lorna and I began making preparations for our summer holiday next year.  Our plan is to drive to the Lake District and go hillclimbing for a week.

We've made enquiries about a private cottage in Ambleside, on the north bank of Lake Windermere from where we will be setting out of a morning to start climbing the "Wainwrights".  For those of you not in the know, I'm talking about this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wainwrights

You may have seen Julia Bradbury walking up some of these on TV in the past couple of years.  We'd always wanted to have a go ourselves and seeing the programmes made our minds up about it.

Naturally, we have the Wainwright guides to hand as well as the OS Explorer maps for the region we'll be starting out at.  As much as his drawings are well-produced, I wouldn't ever go up a mountain without an OS map and a compass!

According to Wainwright we're in the region covered by book three (the Central Fells) and our plan is to start with Helm Crag, Gibson Knott and Calf Crag all in one day.  This is made possible by the fact that they all lie on the same ridge of rock stretching north west from Grasmere.  So that'll be three out of 214 done on the first day. 

We may be some time completing them all ...

(Whilst typing this post we received an email saying that the cottage is available for the week we want it so looks like we may well be in.)

Come to British Columbia and climb The Rockies instead!

Sounds fantastic Neil. I was a regular hillwalker up to a few years ago, until my joint problems kicked in. I am lucky to live within a 30 minute car ride of some beautiful countryside and I intend to get back to my walking as soon as I have my hip replacement. Although I cannot imagine I will be tackling the extreme walks I used to do I am still looking forward to getting out and about again. I have a number of walks that I can adapt to suit my recovery and seeing your post has whet my appetite.

Well Wainwright did do a book of the outlying fells which aren't as strenuous as the ones "in the middle".

I also intend to get back to my Leeds Liverpool canal trek. I was doing that in 5 to 10 mile stretches and I always do them on a whim. If it popped into my mind and I had a free afternoon I would do a bit more and cross off another stretch.

We got another email at 11pm last night (of all times) confirming that the cottage is reserved for us subject to a deposit being paid. 

I didn't fancy waiting until April to May to attempt to book up ...