...nothing but footprints

The North York Moors boasts the largest uninterrupted expanse of heather moorland in England.  That's approximately 192 square miles of purple flowering loveliness.  Of the three varieties of heather which grow on the North York Moors the most widespread is Ling Heather, which flowers extensively from mid to late August.  The other two, less common varieties are Bell Heather (which flowers in mid July) and Cross-leaved Heather (which thrives around boggy areas).   I like to visit the moors at least once during the heather flowering season, and so one sunny Sunday morning towards the end of August I plotted a circular walk across the moors from the village of Rosedale Abbey.  I especially wanted to photograph a particular moorland cross which I knew was surrounded by heather.  On a lovely summer day this area of the moors can be rather crowded with walkers and sightseers and so we had an early start and arrived in Rosedale in time to get a good parkin...

I think walking in the Lakeland fells must be addictive.  Somehow, after a week of altitude, even my favourite stomping ground, the North York Moors, just didn't seem quite the same.  The Lake District had left me with an almost overwhelming urge to climb and the moors were quite simply not high enough.  I'm certain a great many other people share this hankering for hills.  It's why Lakeland is so popular all year round.  And it's why any proposed trip there has to be booked well in advance of a weather forecast with any kind of accuracy.  And this, in turn, is how we came to spend a weekend in Coniston at the same time as the tail end of Hurricane Bertha was predicted to lash across the UK. It was less than a month after our week in Keswick and I was missing the mountains.  I desperately wanted to climb again.  To feel the pull in my leg muscles, to experience the heat and the breathlessness and to push on, ever upwards, ignoring the fatigue, c...