Northern Ireland Outdoors Forum - Hiking, camping and more
General => Meets, places, trips and reviews => Topic started by: KyleL on April 15, 2013
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I am currently lying in bed with my electric blanket heating up nicely, listening to the wind and the rain beating on the side of my house. My thoughts turn to bailing. Cancelling, that is, tomorrows' trip.
This will not do! Of course. So I have decided to share my planning with the NI Wild crew, so you can all call me a wimp if I decide not to go.
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Ah Slieve Bernagh. She has spanked me once before - so this time, I go prepared.
So the plan is to park at Meelmore Lodge, buy two tickets and leave the car there overnight. I will set off from there at 1330 and trek along the brandy pad and Trassy track to hares gap.
(http://img.tapatalk.com/d/13/04/16/aha6ubap.jpg)
Reaching HG at just after 3 o'clock, I'll look around for a suitable 'Plan B' camp site (in case conditions further up are too hairy). Once I've found I decent spot, I'll press on up Bernagh. Upon reaching the top, I will asses the conditions and decide if a search down the far side would be safe. A pair of trusty binoculars are already packed, and hopefully with them I will be lucky enough to spot the prize from the top.
And what is the prize? My old sleeping bag, which has been up there under rain, sleet and about 20ft of snow for probably around a month now. I'm very curious to see how it performs when I finally get it dried out.
Here is a 3D view of the route;
(http://img.tapatalk.com/d/13/04/16/ha7umu7e.jpg)
I like this function as it allows you to judge steepness quite well in an area you haven't been to before. Point A is the start at Meelmore Lodge, B is the fallback position, C is where I intend to camp and D is the search area.
As always, a big factor of this whole outdoors thing is the weather, for that I choose myweather2.com.
(http://img.tapatalk.com/d/13/04/16/a3upygab.jpg)
The left circle is the weather I can expect while trekking the low levels, and then around the time I begin reaching the summit I become more interested in the second circle which shows weather at the highest levels. Temperature, for once, is not a big concern. However I will have to pick a good sheltered spot to camp for that massive wind on the way - and if I cant find a good spot I'll have no choice but to fallback to hares gap, or risk visiting the north coast during the night.
As far as gear goes, I will be slightly heavy. It will be cold enough so I have a few layers with me, and some wood for a fire. I'm also deliberating over wether or not to bring my gas heater. We shall see.
So there it is! Expect a write up on Wednesday night, and if not - feel free to give me a bit of a slaggin!
Cheers!
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Spoke to folk coming down from Donard today on the Glen River path.
Although it was a lovely day they said it was hard to walk to the top due to the wind, also there's still a lot of snow at the wall so they couldn't use it for shelter. Good luck and stay safe!
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I wouldn't underestimate the situation with snow up there. Not just from the safety point of view, but also the likelihood of finding your sleeping bag may be remote.
If you have a wee hobo stove it would be ideal, wild camping spots high up in the mountains are largely free of the signs of fires, in my opinion it's best to try to keep it that way.
Have a good one :)
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Its to be very very windy tomorrow, met office forecast for summit of slieve bearnagh at 4pm is giving a mean wind speed of 42mph gusting to 71 mph :o it does drop down to 33 gusting 54 by 7pm but thats still very bad. The highest wind speed i've measured in the Mournes is 59mph and i was hiding behind the wall at the time as i couldn't stand in it. BEWARE!
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I was running on Sunday and we didn't go near any summits. Crossing the Donard stile was enough of a challenge in the wind... it was hard to breathe crossing down onto the Brandy Pad off the saddle, and there was water blowing upwards at one part (we agreed we needed to get a GoPro after seeing this)!
Although there has been a significant melt already, there is still plenty of snow obscuring the ground. A lot of it is quite icy/crusty and it's getting thin over covered streams. We had to traverse sections of the Brandy Pad that were blanketed out, and forded quite a few rivers running over knee high across paths in the Annalong valley.
We had a lot of fun and that's a good enough reason to go, but don't expect to be able to search for anything due to snow, or get camping on a summit if that wind keeps up.
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If it was me I'd be leaving it till the weekend when its too be a lot quieter and even a wee bit sunny just put the lecy blanket back on nothin like home comfort and let it all die down. Lol. ;)
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The wind was pretty rough on Sunday in Donegal and I'd to crawl up the summit as the wind was knocking me down. If Liam said that it plans to get worse then leave it.. The sleeping bag can wait..
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Its to be very very windy tomorrow, met office forecast for summit of slieve bearnagh at 4pm is giving a mean wind speed of 42mph gusting to 71 mph :o it does drop down to 33 gusting 54 by 7pm but thats still very bad. The highest wind speed i've measured in the Mournes is 59mph and i was hiding behind the wall at the time as i couldn't stand in it. BEWARE!
I didn't know the met office did specific summit forecasts, very good.
I assumed from the savoy webcam that the snow had cleared off by now. Oh well.
Time to wimp out!
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If it was me I'd be leaving it till the weekend when its too be a lot quieter and even a wee bit sunny just put the lecy blanket back on nothin like home comfort and let it all die down. Lol. ;)
*click* back on. ;)
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I didn't know the met office did specific summit forecasts, very good.
I assumed from the savoy webcam that the snow had cleared off by now. Oh well.
Time to wimp out!
good call, wind is fierce at the moment, imagine what its like up there now.
to get the summit forecast visit www.metoffice.com,
then click on "weather",
then from the drop down box click "leisure forecast" (and NOT mountain are forecsat strangely ??? ),
then a map appears and you click on the "summits" button to your right
then click on the number 12 above the mournes on the map
then select your summit, easy peasy ::)
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Cheers Liam - would never have found that handy resource! 8)
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That's a weird one - but it's great once you find it. Cheers Liam!
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Give it up, that sleeping bag is well gone. I am sure it has been well moved by the melting snow. Even if you find it, it will be in a horrendous condition. I doubt many of us would be out in those conditions for a bag.
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Where's that sort of attitude going to get you? Never leave a team member behind! He's been stranded up there for weeks.
Also, leave no trace and all that.
The bag is replaced, but finding the old one is a fun challenge. Also, I've already decided not to go, also, that was 3 days ago.
Just need to wait for the sun.
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I'm definitely up for having another go at it, and i have a secret weapon, my dog loves footballs, so hoping she will think a rolled up sleeping bag looks a bit like a ball and seek it out :)
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Good idea :P I wouldn't be surprised if it was in your original search area now.
Just save yourself some time and don't search more than 50-70metres from the wall - I really doubt it's any further than that, though I've no idea what level it's at.