Issue #3 The Miscellaneous Adventures Digest

On doorstep adventures, creativity and change.

Again, it feels like we have to seize every short window of opportunity to explore that the weather allows. A bright and breezy Sunday followed a grim Saturday so we headed out to the summit of a nearby crag. Right around the corner from our house on the way to Eskdale, Brantrake crag looks impressive from the roadside; not especially high but with near vertical faces, rocky outcrops and a smattering of birches on its shoulders it’s an aesthetically pleasing lump of rock that we have wanted to get up for a while. In fact, we tried to get to the top in Summer but were defeated by impenetrable bracken. Despite the apparent steepness, there is a good path that zig zags up and around the side of the crag to the summit so we knew it would an easy win for Benji, offering glorious views for relatively little effort.

I like crags and hills with at least a few trees here and there. This walk took us through a sparse mix of birch, oak and hazel on the lower slopes with some lovely old trees creeping over and seemingly out of boulders. After a hiatus of about a year, maybe more, I’ve started drawing in my sketchbook again, these interactions between stone and wood have given me something new to explore creatively, which is a bit of a relief because I was beginning to think I’d lost the urge to draw and make things for good. A couple of sketches are posted here; don’t judge me too hard, I’m still finding my feet.

We made it to the summit cairn, buffeted and energised by strong winds. A buzzard soared gleefully just above us, racing at colossal speed. Sheltering behind one of the huge boulders we put on a few extra layers and ate snacks of leftover pancakes from breakfast with Nutella and drank warming coffee. These small (miscellaneous?) adventures are the kind of adventures we hoped we would have lots of when we moved up here; we’re lucky to have so many mountains, crags, rivers and woods to explore locally and are happy to have found what we were seeking, despite still missing the woods from time to time.

It’s been a big week here with change on the horizon, but more on that to follow. For now, we wish you brightness as we head into the darkest, shortest days of the year.

Andrew, Emma and Benji