The early bird catches the worm (snow)

I've have been eagerly waiting for the snow to arrive in the Lakes along with everyone else. On Friday there was lots of Internet chatter about the great conditions, and with a good weather forecast finally winter was here.

Start of the walk in with Stuart

Toby's selfie

Looking back down to Glenridding

Originally I thought about getting up at 5am, and trying to get on the tops with my ski's for sunrise, but when Rachael could suddenly come out to play too she persuaded me that this was too early and instead we aimed to get to Patterdale at 8am ish (perfect).

Toby coming up

Looking to Ullswater

We weren't the first out by a long shot, and as we were sorting out the gear at Rachael's van a fellow skier walked past also heading up the Greenside Road in the vague direction of Raise/Helvellyn. I recognised him even though we had never met, it was Toby who used to live in Finland and I'd stumbled upon his blog a few years back (what are the chances)! He's driven up for the day from Sheffield with his nordic ski's - now that's an early start.

Back to work!

Heading to Stybarrow Dodd

We joined forces and all headed off together along with Alfie the dog. Almost immediately we got stopped on the track and kindly bundled into the back of Stu's 4x4 camper van to get a lift to the mines and end of the road - saving us a 30 min trudge.

Here comes Toby

Toby telemarking

Stu helps to operate/run the ski run/lift on Raise. I've always wanted to go up and see what its like. From the mines, end of the road we had to carry ski's for 30-40mins, before we could get them on and skin over to Glencoyne Head. Have I said it was amazing weather, and even though we could see a few people around we had the whole of White Stones and Stybarrow Dodd to ourselves on our way up.

Rachael showing how its done

chit chat on the way up to Raise

We toured across and down to Sticks Pass, then skinned up to the top of Raise. It started to get busier with people here (lots of skiers and walkers). The walkers were struggling with the deep drifts of snow. Toby continued on to the top of Helvellyn, and Rachael went part way with him.

Top of the button tow (just to prove it exists) 

I wanted to check out the Lake District Ski Club, so dropped down to this. A ski tow and small hut that's a 60-90 minute walk to, quirky but brilliant - ?only in the UK. The snow on its 'runs/pistes' was variable, but consistent on President Run, so I joined the club and had 7-8 runs on this whilst waiting for Rachael and Alfie to show up.

think its this way....

Made it (nearly)!

The weather was deteriorating when Rachael arrived, flat light and snow starting to fall, so Rachael quickly had a run on the piste and we scrambled to put the skins back on and headed back up to Raise. From the top we skied South and started to drop in to Keppel Cove. Here we bumped into Toby again and all headed out together. It was a challenging end to the day, with poor light, a blizzard starting and poor heavy/crusty snow. With me falling lots we survival skied our way down eventually taking the ski's off for the final 1km walk back to the mines. What an amazing day out in the Lakes!