'where water fell in love with sunshine, this is where they kissed'
So today starts out around 17 degrees and a nice little decent towards Ennerdale waters. Noice, really noice. My feet really took a hammering yesterday, and at just 2 miles in I can feel a new hotspot on my left foot. What's going on? I'm wearing my tried and tested Ininji socks with the best hiking boots I've ever owned and ones that have never given me blisters! Ohhh well, more compeed applied... And I trudge on. The track along the water is uneven - but the gradients mostly flat - sooooooo yay! It's a big lake - so this takes me some time to get around it. Not many walkers out either - and that's kinda cool too.
As soon as I get around the lake the gradient starts to go up and up.... I now have to choose between the high road and the low road. My origional plan of course was to always take the high road - especially in the Lakes district... But my feet are telling me something different... So I take the low road and feel good about it... for now...
The moderate incline starts to pay out on my heels and I can feel the blisters breaking under their numerous coverings. Bum. There's nowhere to stop to get more dressings... I'll just have to wing it. I finally reach Black Sails YHA and stop for a bit and chat with some more C2Cers. They all look set to just hang out there.... Weird. And then I realise why... the next part sees a massive incline straight up and over the saddle. It's nuts, think 1000 steps X 5. Low Road my ar*e!
Anyway - I do it of course - and the track evens out for a bit - following the cairns - lucky for these actually, to date there's been little to no signage - I'm following some hand drawn maps in abook I have - I kid you not.
I get past all of these and the path descends and desends! Yippee! And it's not long until I hit Rosthwaite. 5:30pm in fact - I left at 8:15am - it's taken me 2 extra hours than I thought it would..... And then I really discover why... Taking off my boots and my socks I realise I've also taken off my heels. Ouchy wowow. I'll need to get these sorted for tomorrow and the following 13 days! Night all - I need to rock myself to sleep before I cry.
