The Durham Denes

Crimdon Beach

A text came in, 'Theres a walk in the Durham Denes do you fancy it'

Hadn't seem Mikey, a fellow munrist, in a while, me'n'Mikey had been even stevens not so long back BUT now he had inched in front, he had 40 left to do I had 50 something.

'I have a bit of a problem with the Skye hills', a hired ventriloquist said 'I do' before I knew it I was signed up to do another Inn Pin trip.

We talked and walked on an old railway track down to the sea, a faded info notice told a tale of a now forgotten past of once famous Crimden Dene.

Once a popular holiday resort for miners and their families from nearby towns and villages, on account of its affordability for low-income workers, there are rumours even Hitler visited the area. During the 1960s Butlins took an interest in buying the Crimdon Dene Holiday Park there BUT Easington District Council derailed the sale while Beeching finished the job by removing the tracks.
Onto the beach, the walk was timed to allow access to some spectacular tidal sea caves, we had a lunch break to see off the rest of the tide and found a distressed seal pup, sitting out low tide, theres no social service for wild things.

The extensive caves were well worth visiting, I made a mental note to return with my DSLR and tripod, all to soon we left the beach and headed inland via a storm drain cave.

A walk of continuous interest.....

 Into the Sea Caves

 Waiting for the tide

Hawnby Bumps

In one direction superb Misty conditions


Stuck my nose out of the door first thing, another superb misty morning so we skipped breakfast and hit the road.
Once on the moors past Osmotherley we rose above the inversion and by the time we started walking the mist had started to clear.

BUT

Tripping the light fantastic I just love this time of the year, the colors, the mist, the sun casting long shadows even at midday and best of all, its so quiet.

Looking the other direction

One of the few summit cairns in the North Yorkshire Moors

Doing the Dales

Barns near Thwaite

As a walker/climber I alway thought I knew the Yorkshire Dales well BUT when we came across a Landscape book of the said area, in a charity shop.

It made me think again.

Several walking/photo trips followed as we searched in vain for the locations of the photo's in our cut price volume.

BUT

On the upside we came across many alternative scenes that were well worth snapping.

 

Grassington

 Burbeck and Whitsundale Becks

East Gill Falls

Barns near Muker

Barns near Muker

Deep Powder in Torridon

Ben Alligin summits

After the difficult plod in deep powder snow on Beinn a' Chreachain 1081m, (never eard of it I hear you say) I travelled north to the Torridon area, my objective was Slioch but one look  told me it was not a goer in current conditions without skies or snowshoes.

As I have done the other Torridon Munros several times so I decided to take some sunrise photos, walk into the stunning Coire Mhic Fhearchair middayish which would allow me to get back for some sunset shots.

Back at the car I had problems so I had to shelve next days plans and make a daylight dash back an auto electrics shop in Fort Bill.

The stunningly impressive Coire Mhic Fhearchair

Liathach 

Liathach Pinnacles 

The dark side of Liathach

 Peering into the Fisherfield Forest 

Frozen Trees on the drive south