Day 3

 What can I say about today, is it June or November? 

I went out like a light last night, but was woken at 1am and tossed and turned for a while. I must have gone back to sleep because I woke up at 4am, freezing cold! I wrapped up but only slept fitfully until 7am, when I got up. 

After packing away, I set off at 8:40 and almost immediately had my first shower. 

I had a long walk up the mossy banks of Langstrothdale

It was quite slow going, because the path twisted and turned and it was quite boggy. 

After an hour or so, I climbed up to the point where the Dales Way met the Pennine Way. To greet me, the heavens opened and the wind picked up, so I ducked down behind a stone cairn to miss the worst of it. 

I’ll be honest, my stint on the Pennine Way, put me off it for life! It was bloody cold up there (about 515m or 1700ft) and the showers came lashing down, one after the other. Some were hailstones, driven by a gusty wind straight into my face! 

I reached the point where you should get a lovely view of the Ribblehead Viaduct, but just as I got my phone out to take a picture, down came the rain again! 

At this point I was glad of the isolation because I had a complete hissy fit and was shouting and swearing at the top of my voice at the firkin weather! It was so cold my fingers couldn’t operate my camera and I had to put gloves and a woolly hat on, to warm up! 

Fortunately, a bit further on, the weather cleared for a few minutes, so I was able to capture this shot of the viaduct. 

I had to walk down to the farm in the foreground and then take a right, back up onto the moors. 

It was slow going and I was struggling to walk 2 miles an hour. I honestly began to think that I wasn’t going to make it to my intended destination of Dent, because that was still 9 miles away.

Thankfully, by the time I dropped down off the moors towards Dent Head viaduct, the weather began to brighten up. 

Down in Dent Dale, I was out of the wind and all of a sudden, started to feel hot, so shedded a few layers! 

There was also quite a lot of road walking to be done, which although tough on the feet, meant that I could make a bit of progress. 

Dent Dale was quite pretty and the path followed the course of the River Dee. 

I started to get tired and my backpack was causing a muscle spasm in my right shoulder/neck, which meant I had to stop several times, take the pack off and stretch the neck/shoulder! 

Eventually, I reached the village of Dent, which is very quaint. It has cobbled streets and a chocolate box look! 

I am staying in a campsite at the edge of the village, which has its own museum and cafe. I was starving when I arrived, so had a bacon butty, which apparently I had to share! 

As I write this, I am having Cumberland sausage and mash, with real proper onion gravy at the George & Dragon pub. It’s delicious! 

My feet are still ok. I’ve got one small blister on the edge of my left ball of my foot, but other than that they only ache mildly! 

The forecast for tomorrow is another washout, so I will just play it by ear as to how far I go!