Stoodley Pike

Flickr album with a few more images here. I actually had a small amount of water on the lens, so a lot of my pictures didn't come out as nice as I would have liked.

I met up with Sadie this morning in the Pennines for a hike from Hepden Bridge to the top of Stoodley Pike. It was a wonderful walk through/past fields of sheep and cows, with stunning views, and a lot of wind and rain! Fortunately, the weather improved considerably by midday (though I assume the top is always windy anyway). We also climbed up the monument (originally built to commemorate the defeat of Napoleon, rebuilt a bit later after a lightning strike destroyed the original). 

We started our descent, but quickly realised how hungry we were so sat near the top and ate our lunches. We were talking about the coolest place anyone has ever eaten a meal deal, and we weren't sure, but we did know that that was definitely the best place I've ever had one. Sadie is an experienced hiker and has eaten meal deals at higher altitudes (we decided that planes don't count). On the way back down, we also saw some tiny frogs that I managed to get a couple of decent shots of (see the Flickr album at the top). 

We then explored Hepden Bridge a bit, had coffee and cake, saw some people getting pigeons to land on their arms (some not intentionally; one person coming to regret it when a pigeon did it's business...), looked at a couple of shops, and walked along the canal. There was also a Vintage Weekend event on with lots of classic cars and trucks, and some people dressed in Steampunk. They were charging extortionate rates for entry, but we managed to see some of the cars/people in passing and outside the event. And then parted ways shortly before 5pm.

My legs are pretty tired as you can imagine. The hike was 6.92 miles and a total elevation gain of 1,104 feet. In total today, I've done 23,000 steps. So I think I ought to sleep well tonight!