First Snow
Snow! There is snow! How exciting. Was a ‘big kid moment’ looking at the snow on the mountains on Monday morning.
I just hope it doesn’t all melt before I can get out in the hills. It would also be good if the wind dropped a little. I was nearly blown away today simply filling my car with petrol in Morecambe. I wasn’t even on the coast road. Though driving along this morning was pretty impressive. The tide was in, the waves were high and there was definitely spray blowing over the road.
But would this be good on the mountains? Not at all sure. Brings me neatly to what I had planned for today. A continuation to the Where to Walk blog, and Planning. I have talked about books and mentioned Ordinance Survey maps. Any good book will tell you to take one of our great OS maps along as well. I am probably preaching to the converted here, but better to state the 
obvious. I, as also mentioned, went on a Mountain Navigation Course, in April, which refreshed my very rusty map reading skills and also gave lots of useful information. A long with what to pack in your backpack and the wonderful Mountain Weather Information service. MWIS. This is a brilliant site which gives detailed information on what the weather is like at the top of the mountains. Including how it will affect you. Let’s face it 8 knots is fine, but ‘it will blow you off the top’ is infinitely more useful. A useful link for this time of year is here Winter Essentials for Hillwalkers and Mountaineers. I can honestly say that I do not set out now without looking at MWIS. And as for the back pack, what to pack apart from the camera? Mine gets ever heavier. A few things in mine are:
- Wet weather stuff (if I am not wearing it)
- Hat
- Torch
- Map
What else is in your back pack? Share please!.
