River

The river dilemma is first on the cards today. We are following a valley for the start of the day. Do we try to navigate through the trees, keeping safely above the river on one side, do we take a straight line crossing the river multiple times or do we just assume the river will hold our weight and take the extra distance hit of the meanders whilst taking the flatness advantage?

We started off on one side, then a nervous crossing, then another, then settled in to following the river where it was straight in our direction. After a few kms we are gradually heading up anyway. We take a rest in a shelter, investigate some tracks (fuller story in Longshanks entry) and find ourselves in worsening weather conditions with the cloud coming down and some nasty cold wind blasting us.

We swap nav tasks (the compass holder and shouter, and the lead person who gets shouted at). At one point there was some shouting from the back but that was told to stop confusing things - one shouter, one route.

And then it steepens down, and we drop below the clouds, and we can navigate by sight down a gully, and eventually to the railway line and down to the hut.

A long but great day.