adventure making

These ‘fitness’ posts keep getting crazier and crazier!  Thought I’d share a wee bit about the fun I had ‘canyoning’ in the Lakes today.  Not exactly your typical outdoor fitness activity, but my arms hurt a little the day after so we’ll go with that.  My afternoon with Adventure Makers around the Coniston area consisted of well, scrambling through a river and getting very wet.  And abseiling down waterfalls and slipping down ‘slides’ and jumping into plunge pools.  Standard stuff. :)  For somebody who wasn’t madly keen on an indoor climbing wall the first (and only) time they tried it, this was certainly a step and a half out of the comfort zone!  Well, it was unlike anything I’ve done before but I bloody loved it.  The canyoning route that I did was the ‘easiest of the extreme activities’ – apparently requiring some competence (check me out being all ‘competent’ and that) but wasn’t all day strenuous like the Extreme Canyoning or others.

Confidence definitely builds as you go along with this kind of thing.  Not gonna lie, I kinda pansied out of the first jump and hopped in from a lower ledge like a total wimp.  I wanted to test the waters, literally!  Plus, the gap we were jumping into was a tiny bit narrow for my liking, but whatever.  As we progressed down the river over the 2.5 hours or so, I really got into it and was kinda disappointed when told we’d finished!  I wanted to carry on jumping and swimming and scrambling.  He wasn’t wrong in saying that you WILL fall and get knocked about as you abseil over the edge of the waterfall, but I escaped with only mildly grazed hands and slightly bruised elbows so we’re good.  Apparently nobody’s ever actually injured themselves here, which surprised me haha!  I guess with ropes, harnesses, helmets and somebody who knows what they’re doing, you’re fine.

Adventure Makers offer a bunch of different activities for any group at any level too.  Dave (the owner) told me about all the canoeing and kayaking and ghyll scrambling on offer, and how every experience is catered to the group.  I want to try them all basically.  Except caving, that is.  Caving does not appeal to me one bit.  Claustrophobic much.  Oh and other helpful little things – Dave’s wife Eileen had brought along extra wetsuits and wellies to have just the perfect size, as well as a flask of hot chocolate and biscuits for afterwards.  Can’t really complain!

Oh and the photos are a batch from my dad’s phone that surprisingly turned out OK!  I have plenty of footage from the GoPro you can see fastened on to my head that should be with ya shortly.  Dave luckily happened to have a GoPro helmet mount in his car – I’d foolishly taken only the chest harness assuming it’d be the best option, without realising how much I/it would get bashed.  Also, I promise I’m not just exaggerating about the jumps and slides, if you’re thinking these hardly look like raging torrents.  These shots don’t show the more ‘extreme’ parts!  Those involved much higher, steeper, inaccessible banks and my dad had given up and gone off for a wander by then.  Therefore no photos.

So yeah, told you I like the rugged stuff as much as the glam.  Big thank you to Adventure Makers for having me!

P.S. since I promised I’d keep you posted, I woke up at 5:55 this morning to see AAAA for my AS level results!  Woop woop 😀 😀 😀

lily kate x

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