Summer Solstice Kinder Dozen

After a bit of a quiet week and a ride to work and back on Friday, P and I went down to the Peak for the weekend. Main reason was to pick up my new mountain bike! But also to visit friends. It was a pretty showery day on Saturday so P and I headed to Rubicon to the all weather climbing venue. It was reasonably busy. I wasn't in the mood to flailing on routes so acted as belay bunny for P on an 8a, and in between got some bouldering in. I didn't think I'd actually done much but by the end of the day I couldn't pull on the biggest of jugs and was pretty stiff the next morning!

Sunday a mate and I set out to do the Kinder Dozen (listed as 24 miles, 10,000+ feet ascent). Despite mutterings by him in the pub the night before about possible bail points, we trotted around in 7 hours 12 minutes. We made it to be 22.52 miles and about 9860 feet ascent. It was fairly good conditions, although on the south side of the plateau we were out the wind and it was very muggy and hot there. We set off just after 10am from the Nags Head in Edale and went clockwise round. The hardest parts were in the bracken. I would suggest to others that a better time to do this would be earlier or later in the year when the bracken is lower, as it makes a couple of the legs much tougher.

I didn't carry enough water with me and by the time I'd thought about it I was already a bit too dehydrated. Luckily we found a good supply near Upper Ashop and refilled both bodies and bottles. Without this I'd have seriously struggled. It is a good tough outing and I really enjoyed it, despite not being used to the terrain any more - where are the rocks! and doing it on sight was a good challenge. I'd like to go back and do it again in cooler conditions and I'm pretty sure I could take up to 1/2 hour off. One of the reasons it's a tough outing is that you do very little flat running - it is either up or down and almost all the ups and downs are steep! and rough too.

A great way to spend the summer solstice.