Two blokes, two dogs, one hill

Edale rocks. So called because they are rocks. And they are near Edale

Geoff on Kinder

A couple of weeks back I decided that I would go over to Hayfield in the Derbyshire Peak District for a few days to potter around with Mossy dog to get rid of some of his Hyperdogish energies now that my legs appear to be better. The poor dog has suffered along with me over recent months as my lack of ability has meant he has had a lack of long walks.  Anyways, the week we chose to go had the best weather of the year so far, with lovely warm spring days. Unfortunately, a long awaited hospital appointment to prod at said legs and various other bits of my anatomy that control them was then offered in the very week we were to go away.

‘No problemo.’ Mossy Boy, says I. ‘We can go the week after.’ To which he replied with silence, but his tail did twitch a bit and I took this for agreement. So that is what we did. Which meant that we went to Hayfield just as the temperatures dropped by about 10 degrees centigrade in new money, and snow and hail showers blew in from the far north-east with gusto, north-east  being the new south-west.  But as we weren’t camping but were in the motorhome it didn’t matter too much.

Now being in Hayfield I took the opportunity to meet up with Geoff and Chrissie Crowther who live in this neck of the woods and who (or is it whom?) I know from Twitter. They kindly invited Moss and I round for tea and cake. I ate this as best I could with one hand, whilst using another hand to protect Moss from a very playful Pebbles who was hurling her not inconsiderable Boxer weight at my delicate flower, so putting him off his stride. Now his stride happened to be trying to demonstrate to the gorgeous puppy Islay what teenage boys do given the slightest chance with any lovely young female they happen to meet.  Well if you are numerate and have been counting how many hands I was having to use in the aforementioned activities you will be aware that despite me having the full complement of hands, I was still one short of the number necessary to protect Islay’s virtue, although I have to say that the lovely little floozy appeared less concerned about this than Geoff and Chrissie.

Despite Moss shaming me, Geoff was still kind (or foolish) enough to suggest that we went for a walk up Kinder Scout on the morrow (for my younger readers, ie anyone born after the 16^th Century, that means the day after). Chrissie had more sense and decided she would do some domestics and possibly walk up to meet us in the afternoon with Pebbles.

I distracted Islay so that Moss could steal her lunch whilst Geoff looked on oblivious to the crime

And that is what we did. Geoff knows the area like the back of his proverbial and was a fount (that is short for fountain pen) of wisdom and informative information. Moss and Islay had a marvellous time racing around after each other as only young racing around things can do. They certainly  covered rather more ground than their owners. Moss managed to control his baser instincts until the homeward leg when he had to go on a lead in disgrace after a rather stern lecture from me on gentlemanly behaviour.

Kinder Low: Geoff sulks as Islay sings  "I'm the Queen of the Castle and you're the dirty rascal"

Moss eyeing up a pile of sheep shit and wondering when I will move away so that he can eat it

The walk was absolutely splendid. It was good to be back on the grit stone. The ever changing weather, with short snow and hail showers intermingled with longer sunnier periods, meant that the views were spectacular and the opportunities for a skilled photographer to capture memorable moments were myriad. Unfortunately, I am not a skilled photographer and, worse, when I got down I realised that I did not even have the camera set on “intelligent auto” mode but portrait mode. Despite this the landscape shots on this post do not appear any worse than my normal offering so who cares? And the final plus of the day was we finished the walk  and were drinking tea just before torrential rain arrived. For some reason puppy Islay had now slowed down and Moss completely crashed out and hardly blinked when Chrissie arrived with Pebbles. Pebbles is clearly jealous of Moss’ infatuation with Islay and so had dressed in a very flattering yellow rain coat, no doubt to attract his attention. Sadly for her Moss was unmoved, worn out by his younger and fitter new friend.

Moss whispering sweet nothings, but Islay only has eyes for one man

You can't beat an interesting smell

Thanks to Chrissie, Geoff, Islay and Pebbles for a fun couple of days.

Thank you Benny et al