Snowshoeing in The Peak District and Sierra Nevada

As snow is covering the Peak District today, we took the opportunity of getting out on our snowshoes.  O.K., so the snow is only 8” deep (though deeper in the drifts), but at least we were out there doing it.  Arctic it felt in the strong winds, with snow being blown horizontally.  Here’s a couple of pictures that we took in and around Silence Mine:



Not quite like the end of season opportunity we had last May to ascend Pico del Caballo, which at 3007m is Europe’s most westerly 3000m peak. 






Snowshoeing is a great way to explore the mountains and back country.    If you fancy giving this a go, visite http://mountain-house.co.uk/snowshoeing/

November snow in the Derbyshire Peak District

Woke up to around 8" of snow in Foolow, The Peak District this morning, deeper in the drifts. Excellent, and a chance to get out on the snowshoes later! 

 

No busses and not much traffic. It's great in the village with folks walking out greeting one another. Here's some pictures to enjoy.

 

Countryfile at Rockhall Cottage

Mike and Jane help to look after The Don Whillans Memorial Hut, Rockhall Cottage up at The Roaches.  This is a unique climbers hut built into the rock.  Recently, the BBC’s Countryfile programme visited this part of The Peak District and were filming some rock climbing scenes at The Roaches with The British Mountaineering Council.

Initially Mike offered the programme makers the use of the hut as a base whilst filming there.  However they were so taken with the hut that Mike received a phone call asking if he’d be prepared to be interviewed about the it's history.

The picture here shows Mike being interviewed by Matt Baker who was earlier filmed climbing Central Route VS 4b on the Roaches Upper Tier.

The programme is due to be broadcast on Sunday 28th November, BBC1 6.30pm. You can find out more about it on the BBC Countryfile website

If you would like to know more about the history of the hut and how to book it, go to our website at:

http://mountain-house.co.uk/  and click the Don Whillans Hut button.

Making the most of our Satmap GPS

Earlier this year, the kind folks at Satmap offered an Active 10+ bundled with a couple of memory cards at cost price.  Jane has been using it over the summer months and we took it on our intermediate navigation course over Kinder Scout last saturday, where it really came into it's own.

The course navigates over the Kinder plateau, seeking out some of the well hidden aircraft wreckage in order to practice a range of navigation techniques.  The Satmap is perfect for checking out bearings and distances, which it does with ease and speed.

I can't claim that I have plumbed the depths of the Satmap, but I have grown to like it very much.  One of the reasons we opted for the Satmap were the extensive range of maps, however my only reall quibble is the need to change memory cards when moving around the country.  We still use Viewranger on our mobile phones, and it is extremely easy to add mapping on this device - almost too easy, if you have an iphone and itunes account!  With Satmap you have to buy the map on a  memory card, wait for it's delivery and swop them around.  However a small price to pay for a gadget which does it's job very well, is much more robust than the phone, and easy to use when outdoors on a cold winter's day.

There is more information and the chance to try out the Satmap, Viewranger enabled phones and a couple of Garmin GPS machines on our Making the most of your GPS course in the new year.

Night Navigation on BigMoor

The Mountain House team were joined be 3 intrepid adventures for an evening of navigation in the dark.

Fortunately for us all, the weather held out until only a few minutes before our return to the cars, and everyone declared it a great adventure - to be recommended.