Apr
04
Fleeing with my tail between my legs!
I should have seen the signs for this camping and photography trip to Scafell Pike, England’s highest mountain. Camping halfway up a largish mountain needs a little more planning and respect but I sometimes don’t treat the Lake’s mountains with the same respect that I do the Scottish mountains. They can still bite!
A poor forecast, late leaving home with a two hour drive to the Lake District in front of me whilst watching the bright sunny day become cloudy and murky. Forgetting to write down the sunset/sunrise times which meant that not only was I disorganised for making photographs, I was also ill prepared for figuring out my schedule to get to a suitable campsite and set my tent up. A sheltered and pleasant site can make a world of difference to a mountain camp.
Getting dark at Great End, Scafell, Lake District
As it started to get dark the first spot I picked to pitch my little one man tent was wonderful, great views and close to a river for water. And with no shelter as the storm wind picked up I realised the soft ground that I was pegged down into was not going to work, and there were no large stones nearby to anchor the guylines. Time to walk to another spot that I knew to be good, two miles away on the map, in the growing darkness. These things happen though and I got to my familar site and my cosy little tent set up by torchlight.
Then I slid down a steep wet slope in the dark whilst going to get water and twisted my knee and pulled my shoulder. Not badly, but enough to give me a fright and slow me down. Being alone and injured in the hills is a worry.
Then the wind picked up and decided, it must have decided, that one direction wasn’t enough so there were gusts coming from all directions. I’m thinking it’s OK, the tent is getting knocked around a bit, occasionally flattening down onto me, but my site is fairly sheltered and my pegs and guylines are backed up with large boulders, what can go wrong I think as I snuggle down into my sleeping bag? An hour later I know exactly what, as the poles bend out of shape, then one snaps and continues to bend after I fit the repair sleeve, then holes appears in the flysheet where it has been rubbing up against one of the anchor rocks, the doorway zips keep blowing open threatening to inflate the flysheet and blow it into the sky. So I spend four hours in a storm holding the tent up above my head till about 3:30 when one of the corner peg points rips out of the flysheet totally flattening what was left of my wee shelter.
The sky is starting to get a bit lighter, enough to see by, so by 4 I decided enough is enough, stuff my soggy gear and tent into my pack and flee down the hill like a whipped dog with my tail between my legs. I could have left earlier, there are plenty large paths in the Lakes that I could have navigated to and followed down, but the combination of the fall and navigating in a storm in the pitch black seemed less appealing than being wrapped in soggy nylon.
I think what has really messed with my head, and this has messed with my head, is that my tent failed. I, and when I’m camping with my wife in the Scottish Highlands, we, rely on our tent as a safe haven, a place to retreat to in the event of bad weather or an accident. My injuries were just sore, not life threatening, but to be alone and think what might have happened if I’d broken my leg rather than just twisting my knee. I wasn’t expected home for another two days, so I could have spent two days in a wrecked tent, waiting!
There is no moral to this tale other than the mountains can bite, even little ones can savage you!