LD-046 report. long

A quick report on yesterdays(Sunday)activity. We arrived at the start point for Great Shunner Fell to find rain and cloud with a strong wind. Waited for over an hour for the forecast improvement, no sign, so we decided to do the much smaller Lambrigg Fell instead.
A warning for anyone using the A684 between Sedbergh and the M6. The narrow single track bridge just out of Sedbergh closed this morning (Monday 3rd) for six weeks. There is a diversion route which is very narrow. Heavy vehicles are not banned from using it but may have problems. The authorities reckon that none will use it because they have had a small notice on the bridge for some time, so heavies will all have found an alternative route!! The question where, springs to mind.
Meanwhile we made our way to Lambrigg and set up for business. 5Mhz was dire and of course we were very late by now. CQ calls produced nothing so eventually a call with the handheld on 2M produced Charlie PZO on a Welsh summit and Jordan M3TMX who kindly spotted the new situation for us. A few contacts now on 5Mhz but the skip was long and even Paul HNW usually a big signal was down at S1 and couldn’t copy his report from us. So to 7Mhz cw and 13 stations worked. I gather from the spots that there was some confusion as to our summit but it all seems to have ended happily. Some of it was probably my fault. After 30+ years of a straight key and a mechanical bug, the conversion to an electronic paddle is a leap of some size. All runs along FB then suddenly I demand a dash and get a few too many! This throws the whole show off the rails while I try to correct things and results in bursts of rubbish. The proverb of old dogs and new tricks springs to mind. Senior Citizens and new keys in this case but I will master it in the end. In the mean time please forgive the rubbish, it should get better.
A few 2m contacts rounded of a nice activation among the heather, shame about the windmills.
Thanks and 73
Rob and Audrey.