Another walk up Great Hill

Drinkwaters farm (ruin) en route to Great Hill. West Pennine Moors.

The track to the cricket field at White Coppice is a mess. Heavy Covid traffic has left it with deep potholes. The little blue car would not have made it without beaching. It’s a good job we came in the little black one. The last time I was here, in November, the car-park at the cricket field was full by eight in the morning, and the whole length of the track was parked nose to tail. Today, it’s nearly lunch-time and the place is all but deserted. We have a choice of spaces, so we park facing the lovely green sward of the cricket field, the shaggy moors rising beyond. Are things are drifting back to normal after all?

We’re forecast a gloomy one today, promise of light rain from midday. It has a steamy, sticky feel to it down here, but it’ll be cooler on the moor. The plan is a short hike to the top of Great Hill and back, eight hundred feet of ascent, and about four miles round. There’s a guy in a camo poncho, peeling off his boots. He’s beaten us to it with an early start. He’s had the worst of the rain, too, which was heavy first thing, and he looks drenched. Sweat or rain, it’s hard to tell. He wears camo pants and a camo jacket underneath – oh, and a camo hat.

It’s interesting, this creeping militarization of the Zeitgeist. Then there’s this word “tactical” infiltrating the marketing of the gear we use, like we’re all on special operations, and war – or the preparations for it – are the most natural and desired state for human beings. We miss so much of the world when all we’re seeing are potential enemies, and states of alarm.

Ignore me. I’m grumpy. It was hard to get going this morning. I fussed about with the big camera, and lenses, then left them all behind in favour of the smaller Lumix. It’s less hassle, and half the weight. It also seems to like these conditions, meaning a flat light, and not much of it. With the Lumix, you can set a fairly small aperture for depth of field, and still achieve a decent shutter speed. We get around the flat light by shooting bracketed exposures and superimposing them, which brings out textures in the gloomiest of skies. I’ve been experimenting with the method all year, and it’s added a lot of interest to my outdoor photography. It doesn’t always work, sometimes looks overblown and silly, but that’s part of the fun, and we should never stop learning, no matter how old we are.

So, we wander first up through the long abandoned quarries, looking for fresh shots. But we’ve shot this place to death, over half a century, and not much appeals today, not even the waterfalls, which can manage barely a dribble after such a long period of dry. We climb onto the moor, intersect with the main route to the hill from White Coppice, and it’s here we encounter an elderly lady, from behind, squatting in the middle of the path, performing her ablutions. I have to blink and work out exactly what it is I’m looking at, then look away and try to unsee it.

I think it’s safe to say most walkers will have answered calls of nature in the outdoors. Also, none of our posteriors are getting any better for keeping, but perhaps I am too shy in seeking at least a modicum of cover for my modesty – a tree say, well off the path, or a wall – and, actually, it matters nothing if we disturb the horses. Still, I prefer to think there are certain standards to be upheld, and the lady certainly put me off my lunch.

Great Hill from Drinkwaters farm

Anyway, it’s one of those days when the muscles are slow to warm, and the spring in the heels is lacking. Half an hour to Drinkwaters’ farm, and – yes – lunch. I try to clear the image of the lady’s bottom from my head, but to no avail. Indeed, I think I am damaged by it. Anyway, third sycamore tree from the left, and a view of the moor from Spitlers’ to the Round Loaf, then down to the plain. This is one of my favourite spots on the moor, even today when the weather is brisk and broody.

Another tell-tale of a year of heavy Covid footfall on the hill is how tame the sheep have become – well, not tame exactly – sheep are untamable, but they are intelligent creatures and not above begging scraps from one’s ruck-sack, nor indeed helping themselves, if they think they can get away with it. I’ve had this in the Lakes and the Howgills – the sheep shoving their heads in your sack before you’ve even sat down. Here, the Swaledales, several stout ewes and their lambs, at least have the manners to wait until I am comfortable. Then they approach with stealth, inch by inch, until I am surrounded. I watch them, bemused, unused to seeing them so close up. I have only a thermos of soup which does not interest them, so they settle around almost within petting distance, which is eerie. I suppose they are waiting to see if anything else appears from the sack. It doesn’t. We have a chat, and leave it at that. They were very decent about it, and good company.

Sycamore, Great Hill Farm (ruin), West Pennine Moors

On top, there is no one. It’s cooler here, and the sky, though not exactly breaking, is rippling into interesting textures. Though it’s a grey sort of day, visibility is stunning. Westwards we have a view across the Lancashire plain, down to the sea, from the Mersey to the Ribble, out as far as the wind farm and the gas field. Then, over the Fylde coast we have Blackpool, the Lake district mountains beyond that. North, we have Bowland, Pendle, the Dales. East, and closer to home is Darwen Moor. South, beyond the undulating ridge of Spitlers’ and Redmond’s edge, we have the porcupine back of Winter Hill with its array of transmitters. At just1252 feet above the sea, and like all hills, Great Hill makes a difference in lifting one’s perspective, both internally and externally. We retrace our steps to White Coppice, refreshed.

Back at the cricket field there is more camo, this time accompanied by gun-dogs and green wellies – a mixture of “tactical” and “shooting gentry”, I suppose. I leave the West Pennines to them for the day, and make a “tactical” retreat home. There I soak my feet, and peruse my photographs, see what came out and what did not.