Sorry that we (with MW0JLA) didn’t complete our usual swapping of summits on GW/SW-009 and 015 (Mynydd Troed and Llangorse) yesterday but the weather was a bit worse than forecast.and all did not go well (but could have been massively worse). The cloud was touching to the top of Troed as we drove up to the parking spot between the 2 hills. As expected the SW wind was fierce and blustery so I was expecting an almost free ride up the steep ascent of Troed - which was true and I was making good time. Rod was more into the wind going up the smaller hill but kept out of the way until he got nearly up to the summit. Intermittent drizzle meant I clambered into the overtrousers at the top of the first lot of ‘troeds’ (footsteps) and then veered to the left as I didn’t trust the steeper steps in the sodden conditions. A brief ascent of a steep heather clad (useful for hand holds!) hillside brought me to the diagonal track just below the top of those footsteps where there is a widening of the path. As I moved to the right to step on some grass which looked perfectly safe I executed a sliding manouevre which gave me a good view of my nose about to impact the grass in a slightly uncontrolled manner. Luckily nothing broken but a bit of a thwack. After some (prone) thought, I reached for my 2 sticks which had not skated far, did a short backwards slide (welll I wasn’t going to get any muddier, was I?) and then carefully became upright and realised that my brown coat was browner and also my face but basically I was OK… so I toddled on up the path but avoiding any short grass or mud (perhaps I should have continued straight up the nose of the hill but I have never used that route and trying it out in those wind conditions seemed to be a ‘no no’) and being extremely careful. A careful noseblow a bit later produced mud (!) and not blood so I knew I had been very lucky.
I soon found ;a deep hole beside the trig point and decided that the telscopic RH770 was the answer for a brief activation starting with a s2s with M0JLA who could only get the very local 2W0LPU (tx Lee) and me on 2m with only a short aerial and failing battery (again). Getting out HF in the wind and rain wasn’t a good idea. My extra height and the RH770 gained 5 on 2m and 3 on 70cm (grateful thanks to all chasers) but I didn’t hang about for the missing 70cm and slowly descended.
At the car we decided enough was enough - had a brief photo session and made for Talgarth public conveniences with some warm water (!) to remove my inadvertent mudpack (saved quite a bit of money!!) and a local checked I was ‘clean’ as there was no mirror!
with Troed in the background
my beanie saved me muddy hair but I don’t usually have that many freckles!
Moral: stay upright and stay safe - and don’t get covered in mud as it is a devil to try and clean off your clothes!!
73 Viki M6BWA
