Pendle Plod 5th October


Leader - Pete Lang

Number on Walk - 3

Weather - Awful!

NO PHOTO - Weather so poor!!

The original route was 19 miles starting at 9am from the main car park in Barley. The car park in Barley is now a pay and display on an ANPR camera but still a very reasonable £3 for the day. The road outside is still unrestricted with plenty of free parking. The walk was poorly attended with just three hardy walkers and my trusty two dogs Elsie and Stan. The weather forecast for the day was atrocious and did not disappoint with quite heavy rain right from the start. This did not dampen the spirits however, and we set off at a reasonable pace from the centre of Barley, along the surfaced road, uphill past both Ogden reservoirs, and up the stiff climb onto the summit of Pendle Hill. From there we took a roughly circular route over the Big End of Pendle and down onto Downham Moor where we started to get some decent views below the cloud. We then headed past Ravens Holme and onto Brownlow where we had a short break at the two hour mark. Once suitably refreshed we then continued uphill to Coolham and across Rimmington Moor before the stiff climb towards Wheathead Height. Up to this point the route had been quite hilly with several steep climbs and a decent amount of ascent, but it was then all downhill and a lovely section along the banks of the river into Blacko Foot. We then headed through open pasture land to Water Meetings on the outskirts of Blacko where we had lunch, in a pleasant spot by the river, at the four hour mark. The weather up to that point had been very wet but we had been treated to a slight lull of lighter rain for about an hour on the approach to Blacko. Just as we finished lunch however the heavens really opened and we got a real soaking on the climb upto Dimpenly Top.  Unfortunately the weather forecast for the day had been pretty accurate and forecast the torrential rain to continue for the rest of the afternoon. A quick discussion therefore took place and the decision was made to cut the walk short to avoid a complete drenching. The original route would have taken us along Dimpenly top and down into Sabden Fold before the stiff climb back up onto the ridge above the Ogden reservoirs and back down to Barley. Due to the atrocious weather, however, we cut the route short by taking a footpath down to the river in Roughlee which we followed along the river out of Roughlee and directly back to the car park in Barley. Three very hardy but soggy walkers and two very wet dogs made it safely back to the cars, a shortened distance of about 14 miles in about five and a half hours. Thank you to John C and Wendy H who kept morale high and the dogs suitably fuelled with treats and pork pie !