Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Coniston 10th - 13th July 2009
FRIDAY
"I want to do a handstand on top of Rob's car 'Teenwolf style' were the last words Matt said to me before I was picked up for the annual trip to Coniston. The weeks of preparation and excitement had finally arrived and as per usual, everyone had far too much gear to take and so the car was filled to the brim before we even set off.
The journey was a joyous as ever, with the CD that I made making the journey a proper event. A CD which is so good that Robin hasn't given it back!
It took about 2 hours to get to our destination the sun was shining and everything was perfect, the weatherman had informed us that Friday would be nice but the rest of the weekend would be pissing it down.
The tents got erected and everyone settled in, I gave my tent the once over with seam sealer (a silicon paste the waterproofs the tent seams.) We then sat around and waited for Steve to arrive which he did about and hour and a half after us, his tent was massive, and as I sat there watching him struggle to erect it, I turned to Trelly and told him that any decent person would help him do that, Trelly agreed with me and then thankfully Bradders and Paul got up to help him, I have to admit, it was close, I had visions of me getting out of my seat for a moment, but, they did the job just fine and before long Steve was settled in with a beer.
We went down to the lake and had a swim in the feezing waters, Robin turned a nice shade of blue so he got out of the lake, it was bloody cold but it was okay once you got past your knackers and started swimming around. After about an hour we all got out and went back to our tents. Trelly, Robin, Matt, Paul and myself decided to go do the walk that I did back in March along the lake side and through the woods. We walked for about 45 minutes in a southwards direction ( The question of which direction we were headed caused one hell of a pointless discussion) then we skimmed some stones and made our way back to the campsite, Matt managed to do a brilliant trip, he caught his right foot on a tree root, stumbled forward and promptly caught his left foot on a tree root, it was hilarious from where I was standing. During the walk back it got quite scary as Matt thought someone had thrown a stone at him and Trelly mentioned that he saw someone out of the corner of his eye in the woods and then Matt accused me of throwing the stone at him, I told him I didn't throw anything and Trelly backed me up by telling Matt that I hadn't thrown anything, Matt seemed content that I was innocent and hadn't thrown anything and spent the weekend thinking someone was hidden in the woods throwing stones, when, in fact, it was me that threw the offending stone.
We went back to the campsite and the goats arrived to see what food they could nick, Robin was at the shower so Bradders decided that it would be a good idea to get the goat into Robins tent, with ambitious plans of locking the goat in there to scare the shit out of Rob when he returned. The goat was content eating all our bread and going in everyones tent, eventually we had run out of food so the goat shit all over the place and then buggered off, I suppose that'll teach us to mess with goats.
Once we had eaten and Matt had had his 10th nap of the day we went into town to the pub, we stoped off at the Ship Inn and got bitten by the midges so we went into town to get a drink in the Sun Inn, I was of course only on soft drinks, but they are still overpriced which is really annoying, but that's the way it goes. We went to the Yedale and finally onto the Crown. The darts were apparently broken so we couldn't play darts, Robin put some songs on the jukebox and every single one skipped throughout, which made the terrible selection of songs sound even worse, Trelly, who wasn't drinking because of some medication realised late on in the evening that drunk people are incredibly loud and annoying, I agreed and told him, "Welcome to my world".
Eventually we went back to our campsite and sat in Steves mansion all chatting before one by one, trailing off to bed.
SATURDAY
I got up at about 7:30 and made a brew, the thing with boiling a kettle is that there is only enough water in the thing for about three cups of tea, but everyone wants to nick your hot water, it's hilarious to witness, you could even think that heating up water was a difficult task. Anyway, everyone eventualy got up and had their breakfasts and we sat around for a bit deciding what to do (while Matt had a nap), The majority wanted to stay at the campsite and do some swimming as it was a magnificently hot day, the weatherman had been wrong, and we were going to exploit this fact and enjoy the sun that we shouldn't be getting. Ha, that'll learn him! Robin, Trelly and myself decided to go on a walk to Tarn Hows, my guide book says that it's about 6 miles from the centre of Coniston, so I stupidly decided that we would walk to the start point and then do our 6 mile walk. I slapped on a load of sun cream, put on my hat and the three of us set off, before we had got to the start point I realised what a stupid idea it was not to drive to the car park, never the less, I was in a good mood and was well up for the walk, Robin managed to get the song 'Hi-Ho' stuck in my head, which was annoying, but you've always got to have some song stuck in your head at any one time, otherwise you'll go crazy.
The walk was really nice even though some of the uphill bits were a struggle and we saw a folly like structure which my guide book informs me used to house foxhounds at the turn of the century (I'm presuming they mean 19th to the 20th century), I plodded on like a professional rambler eventually arriving at the picturesque area of Tarn Hows, we stopped to eat our sandwiches and I got a raspberry ripple ice cream which was the best ice cream I've ever had, it had a real raspberry in it too, proper yum.
After about half an hour we set off back to Coniston through the woods and we stopped to look at the Tom Gill waterfall which is very impressive, over 20 foot high and made Niagra falls look like a plumbing accident. The walk back was pretty uneventful but at least it was relatively flat, the next day when we drove to Ambleside we followed the path we had walked and I realised that we had actually walked, (in technical terms)'a bloody long way' the walk was about 7-8 miles in total. We eventually got back to the campsite and told everyone about out walk, and told them that it was at least 10 miles, (with the walking distance increasing with each re-telling or any mention of walking) I went for a shower and chilled for the rest of the afternoon, Matt went for a nap after a hard morning doing nothing and at one point I had to wake him from his nap to remind him that it was time for his sleep. Bless him.
That evening saw us head straight across the fields into Coniston and thus missing out the Ship Inn, which is a shame, but it's not as good a place as it used to be back in the day.
In the Crown we got some arrows and had a game of darts with me being the greatest darts player you'll ever see, even making a three dart checkout from 58, (10, 14,double 17) I went on to win four games before getting bored and letting Matt win.
At about 10:30 the rain started and when it rains in the Lake District it really does rain, luckily I had my waterproof jacket on so I was okay, the rest of the group got a bit wet, we sat in Steves mansion and he put the heater on, everyone got dry and then we all decided to try and kill ourselves by tasting the chilli sauce that comes in the Doner Kebab pot noodle, have you tried it yet? fuck me it's hot.
Eventually everyone went to bed and I listened to the rain until about 3am then it suddenly stopped, happy times, I fell asleep.
Sunday
I got up at about 7:30 and after having a wash and cleaning my teeth, no one else was up so I took a walk around the lake and back to the tents and still no one was up, so I sat and relaxed and eventually people started stirring and before long everyone was up and about, we all wished Robin a happy birthday and everyone set about their morning rituals. It was a bit grey and overcast but it was dry, we all went to Ambleside to Daisy's and I had a full monty breakfast, (Egg, Bacon, Sausage, Mushrooms, Beans, Tomatoes, Fried Bread, Toast, Hash Browns and Black pudding and a cup of tea) and that filled me for the day, I was well and truly stuffed.
We walked around Ambleside and then went back to the campsite, four of the lads wanted to go find a bouldering place so they set off up the old man to look for it leaving Paul, Steve and myself to go for a walk up the arse end of the campsite where it really is in the middle of the woods, the horrible toilets are still there but the door was locked so Steve pissed against that, we found a few rope swings and I found a mallet. We went back to the tents and sat around chatting, eventually the others came back and informed us that they couldn't find the place they were looking for. A woman came round on her bike and asked to see our camping tickets, ( I forgot to mention earlier that when I checked in the man undercharged me, I was paying for four people for three nights but he charged me for three people for three nights, we kept it quiet but when this woman rocked up I though we were rumbled and would have to pay the extra. But, she didn't even notice the error and was content with our reciepts and so she rode off, I let out a long breath and nearly collapsed, honestly, I'd be rubbish under police questioning.
We sat around talking about everything and nothing, the way it always goes. We had our suppers and ventured out to the pubs again, Matt, Robin and me had a strange conversation about bad circulation and things you can do to thin your blood like taking aspirin or rat poison, I gasped, "Rat Poison?" and Matt said, "Yeah, my grandad took rat poison before he died" Rob and I stopped what we were doing for a second and then burst out laughing, Matt hadn't meant it the way it sounded, but it was a bloody funny moment, I guess you had to be there.
Steve got caught trying to take his pint from the Yewdale to the Crown, We didn't get to play darts, so we sat at the big table in the corner and all talked over each other, Robin ran to the Jukebox and put on some truly dreadful tunes so we left him and Matt there and went to sit outside, upon returning to the bar for another coke, I heard a local telling his mate that "the two gay boys over there", (Robin and Matt)"Have just put on the jukebox, Simply Red, Pet Shop Boys and some other shite" I got my drink and went back outside laughing my bollocks off.
We walked home at about midnight and went to bed soon after, I was knackered so I fell asleep easily, although I must have slept in a funny position because halfway through the night I woke up and couldn't feel my entire arm, it was dead, I swung my torso and my arm just swung around as if it was on a rag doll, I was a bit disturbed because I didn't know what to do, eventually I managed to get some feeling back into it and went back to sleep, I had to pack all my gear up the next day and I wan't looking forward to it, I prayed it wouldn't rain, the weather man had been so wrong so far that his forcast of Monday being nice was exactly the opposite of what I expected.
Monday
I got up just after 8am a few people were about it was a lovely morning, I couldn't be bothered buggering about too much so after I returned from the loos, I set to work packing up, I soon realised that I couldn't be bothered, but I eventually got everything packed away and in Robs car (where Matt was already having a nap), Steve wanted to prove how big his tent was and so he drove his car inside it.
Everyone took their sweet ass time to take their tents down, but I wasn't in a rush, I love it in Coniston, I was hungry though and we had decided to go try a café that we found on our walk on Saturday that's in Coniston but out of the way of where we usually venture.
The full english breakfast was very good and cheaper than Daisy's plus I could get a free refill of tea, but the sausage sandwich and bacon butties were rather expensive, so I don't know if we weill be going there again, I think we should though when you consider going to Ambleside takes up time and money (petrol and car parking fees) the price is about the same.
We left Coniston at 11am and said our goodbyes to Steve and had a steady drive back home (Matt napped most of the way), We got home just after 1pm and I was grateful to spend a long time on the toilet before having a blistering hot bath. ahh the life!
We are thinking of going back for the August bank holiday as some of the guys want to do the helvellyn walk (not me I hasten to add), so if you fancy coming (Jof and Jen, Dave and Han, (and any others who fancy it) then let me know and I'll let you know the details, you don't have to do the walking if you don't fancy it, because I certainly won't be.
Woggzeh.
"I want to do a handstand on top of Rob's car 'Teenwolf style' were the last words Matt said to me before I was picked up for the annual trip to Coniston. The weeks of preparation and excitement had finally arrived and as per usual, everyone had far too much gear to take and so the car was filled to the brim before we even set off.
The journey was a joyous as ever, with the CD that I made making the journey a proper event. A CD which is so good that Robin hasn't given it back!
It took about 2 hours to get to our destination the sun was shining and everything was perfect, the weatherman had informed us that Friday would be nice but the rest of the weekend would be pissing it down.
The tents got erected and everyone settled in, I gave my tent the once over with seam sealer (a silicon paste the waterproofs the tent seams.) We then sat around and waited for Steve to arrive which he did about and hour and a half after us, his tent was massive, and as I sat there watching him struggle to erect it, I turned to Trelly and told him that any decent person would help him do that, Trelly agreed with me and then thankfully Bradders and Paul got up to help him, I have to admit, it was close, I had visions of me getting out of my seat for a moment, but, they did the job just fine and before long Steve was settled in with a beer.
We went down to the lake and had a swim in the feezing waters, Robin turned a nice shade of blue so he got out of the lake, it was bloody cold but it was okay once you got past your knackers and started swimming around. After about an hour we all got out and went back to our tents. Trelly, Robin, Matt, Paul and myself decided to go do the walk that I did back in March along the lake side and through the woods. We walked for about 45 minutes in a southwards direction ( The question of which direction we were headed caused one hell of a pointless discussion) then we skimmed some stones and made our way back to the campsite, Matt managed to do a brilliant trip, he caught his right foot on a tree root, stumbled forward and promptly caught his left foot on a tree root, it was hilarious from where I was standing. During the walk back it got quite scary as Matt thought someone had thrown a stone at him and Trelly mentioned that he saw someone out of the corner of his eye in the woods and then Matt accused me of throwing the stone at him, I told him I didn't throw anything and Trelly backed me up by telling Matt that I hadn't thrown anything, Matt seemed content that I was innocent and hadn't thrown anything and spent the weekend thinking someone was hidden in the woods throwing stones, when, in fact, it was me that threw the offending stone.
We went back to the campsite and the goats arrived to see what food they could nick, Robin was at the shower so Bradders decided that it would be a good idea to get the goat into Robins tent, with ambitious plans of locking the goat in there to scare the shit out of Rob when he returned. The goat was content eating all our bread and going in everyones tent, eventually we had run out of food so the goat shit all over the place and then buggered off, I suppose that'll teach us to mess with goats.
Once we had eaten and Matt had had his 10th nap of the day we went into town to the pub, we stoped off at the Ship Inn and got bitten by the midges so we went into town to get a drink in the Sun Inn, I was of course only on soft drinks, but they are still overpriced which is really annoying, but that's the way it goes. We went to the Yedale and finally onto the Crown. The darts were apparently broken so we couldn't play darts, Robin put some songs on the jukebox and every single one skipped throughout, which made the terrible selection of songs sound even worse, Trelly, who wasn't drinking because of some medication realised late on in the evening that drunk people are incredibly loud and annoying, I agreed and told him, "Welcome to my world".
Eventually we went back to our campsite and sat in Steves mansion all chatting before one by one, trailing off to bed.
SATURDAY
I got up at about 7:30 and made a brew, the thing with boiling a kettle is that there is only enough water in the thing for about three cups of tea, but everyone wants to nick your hot water, it's hilarious to witness, you could even think that heating up water was a difficult task. Anyway, everyone eventualy got up and had their breakfasts and we sat around for a bit deciding what to do (while Matt had a nap), The majority wanted to stay at the campsite and do some swimming as it was a magnificently hot day, the weatherman had been wrong, and we were going to exploit this fact and enjoy the sun that we shouldn't be getting. Ha, that'll learn him! Robin, Trelly and myself decided to go on a walk to Tarn Hows, my guide book says that it's about 6 miles from the centre of Coniston, so I stupidly decided that we would walk to the start point and then do our 6 mile walk. I slapped on a load of sun cream, put on my hat and the three of us set off, before we had got to the start point I realised what a stupid idea it was not to drive to the car park, never the less, I was in a good mood and was well up for the walk, Robin managed to get the song 'Hi-Ho' stuck in my head, which was annoying, but you've always got to have some song stuck in your head at any one time, otherwise you'll go crazy.
The walk was really nice even though some of the uphill bits were a struggle and we saw a folly like structure which my guide book informs me used to house foxhounds at the turn of the century (I'm presuming they mean 19th to the 20th century), I plodded on like a professional rambler eventually arriving at the picturesque area of Tarn Hows, we stopped to eat our sandwiches and I got a raspberry ripple ice cream which was the best ice cream I've ever had, it had a real raspberry in it too, proper yum.
After about half an hour we set off back to Coniston through the woods and we stopped to look at the Tom Gill waterfall which is very impressive, over 20 foot high and made Niagra falls look like a plumbing accident. The walk back was pretty uneventful but at least it was relatively flat, the next day when we drove to Ambleside we followed the path we had walked and I realised that we had actually walked, (in technical terms)'a bloody long way' the walk was about 7-8 miles in total. We eventually got back to the campsite and told everyone about out walk, and told them that it was at least 10 miles, (with the walking distance increasing with each re-telling or any mention of walking) I went for a shower and chilled for the rest of the afternoon, Matt went for a nap after a hard morning doing nothing and at one point I had to wake him from his nap to remind him that it was time for his sleep. Bless him.
That evening saw us head straight across the fields into Coniston and thus missing out the Ship Inn, which is a shame, but it's not as good a place as it used to be back in the day.
In the Crown we got some arrows and had a game of darts with me being the greatest darts player you'll ever see, even making a three dart checkout from 58, (10, 14,double 17) I went on to win four games before getting bored and letting Matt win.
At about 10:30 the rain started and when it rains in the Lake District it really does rain, luckily I had my waterproof jacket on so I was okay, the rest of the group got a bit wet, we sat in Steves mansion and he put the heater on, everyone got dry and then we all decided to try and kill ourselves by tasting the chilli sauce that comes in the Doner Kebab pot noodle, have you tried it yet? fuck me it's hot.
Eventually everyone went to bed and I listened to the rain until about 3am then it suddenly stopped, happy times, I fell asleep.
Sunday
I got up at about 7:30 and after having a wash and cleaning my teeth, no one else was up so I took a walk around the lake and back to the tents and still no one was up, so I sat and relaxed and eventually people started stirring and before long everyone was up and about, we all wished Robin a happy birthday and everyone set about their morning rituals. It was a bit grey and overcast but it was dry, we all went to Ambleside to Daisy's and I had a full monty breakfast, (Egg, Bacon, Sausage, Mushrooms, Beans, Tomatoes, Fried Bread, Toast, Hash Browns and Black pudding and a cup of tea) and that filled me for the day, I was well and truly stuffed.
We walked around Ambleside and then went back to the campsite, four of the lads wanted to go find a bouldering place so they set off up the old man to look for it leaving Paul, Steve and myself to go for a walk up the arse end of the campsite where it really is in the middle of the woods, the horrible toilets are still there but the door was locked so Steve pissed against that, we found a few rope swings and I found a mallet. We went back to the tents and sat around chatting, eventually the others came back and informed us that they couldn't find the place they were looking for. A woman came round on her bike and asked to see our camping tickets, ( I forgot to mention earlier that when I checked in the man undercharged me, I was paying for four people for three nights but he charged me for three people for three nights, we kept it quiet but when this woman rocked up I though we were rumbled and would have to pay the extra. But, she didn't even notice the error and was content with our reciepts and so she rode off, I let out a long breath and nearly collapsed, honestly, I'd be rubbish under police questioning.
We sat around talking about everything and nothing, the way it always goes. We had our suppers and ventured out to the pubs again, Matt, Robin and me had a strange conversation about bad circulation and things you can do to thin your blood like taking aspirin or rat poison, I gasped, "Rat Poison?" and Matt said, "Yeah, my grandad took rat poison before he died" Rob and I stopped what we were doing for a second and then burst out laughing, Matt hadn't meant it the way it sounded, but it was a bloody funny moment, I guess you had to be there.
Steve got caught trying to take his pint from the Yewdale to the Crown, We didn't get to play darts, so we sat at the big table in the corner and all talked over each other, Robin ran to the Jukebox and put on some truly dreadful tunes so we left him and Matt there and went to sit outside, upon returning to the bar for another coke, I heard a local telling his mate that "the two gay boys over there", (Robin and Matt)"Have just put on the jukebox, Simply Red, Pet Shop Boys and some other shite" I got my drink and went back outside laughing my bollocks off.
We walked home at about midnight and went to bed soon after, I was knackered so I fell asleep easily, although I must have slept in a funny position because halfway through the night I woke up and couldn't feel my entire arm, it was dead, I swung my torso and my arm just swung around as if it was on a rag doll, I was a bit disturbed because I didn't know what to do, eventually I managed to get some feeling back into it and went back to sleep, I had to pack all my gear up the next day and I wan't looking forward to it, I prayed it wouldn't rain, the weather man had been so wrong so far that his forcast of Monday being nice was exactly the opposite of what I expected.
Monday
I got up just after 8am a few people were about it was a lovely morning, I couldn't be bothered buggering about too much so after I returned from the loos, I set to work packing up, I soon realised that I couldn't be bothered, but I eventually got everything packed away and in Robs car (where Matt was already having a nap), Steve wanted to prove how big his tent was and so he drove his car inside it.
Everyone took their sweet ass time to take their tents down, but I wasn't in a rush, I love it in Coniston, I was hungry though and we had decided to go try a café that we found on our walk on Saturday that's in Coniston but out of the way of where we usually venture.
The full english breakfast was very good and cheaper than Daisy's plus I could get a free refill of tea, but the sausage sandwich and bacon butties were rather expensive, so I don't know if we weill be going there again, I think we should though when you consider going to Ambleside takes up time and money (petrol and car parking fees) the price is about the same.
We left Coniston at 11am and said our goodbyes to Steve and had a steady drive back home (Matt napped most of the way), We got home just after 1pm and I was grateful to spend a long time on the toilet before having a blistering hot bath. ahh the life!
We are thinking of going back for the August bank holiday as some of the guys want to do the helvellyn walk (not me I hasten to add), so if you fancy coming (Jof and Jen, Dave and Han, (and any others who fancy it) then let me know and I'll let you know the details, you don't have to do the walking if you don't fancy it, because I certainly won't be.
Woggzeh.
# posted by Woggzeh @ 1:52 pm 
