Rodney's Pillar Good Friday

I've wanted to go for a walk up here for a couple of years so, looking at the weather forecast for the Easter weekend, Chris and I decided that today was probably the best day for a day out. I quickly downloaded a pdf from the internet about the walk, Dad joined us and we put Google maps into the phone to get us to the car park.
After missing the turn twice, we got onto the right road and continued to listen to the lady on Google maps telling us where to go. We ended up in the middle of nowhere when she announced that we'd reached our destination! We eventually parked somewhere that we thought was the car park (after asking a local) (no signposts or other cars) and, armed with the pdf on my phone, headed off.
The start of the walk can only be described as 'wet'! It was like walking through a bog for quite a long time. I nearly lost my walking boot at one point as I sunk deep into the mud. We walked through a forest and up hills, not really sure where we were going, and nearly giving up due to the terrible conditions under foot. A beautiful deer ran across the path in front of us and several pheasants scared the life out of me by flying out of the undergrowth and squawking loudly.
Eventually the conditions improved and we spotted Rodney's Pillar in the distance.
The views from the top were beautiful and well worth the walk. We chose a different way down and it was much easier underfoot. All in all an interesting day out and a good bit of exercise to get rid of those naughty calories from chocolate munching.