Important consumer advice this week as we try to answer the big questions relating to the outdoors and the approaching winter season. Which shop should we go to for our pork pie to take out for lunch?! We also had a lovely day out together (with a pork pie lunch) and headed up to Rhylstone Cross and the Cracoe War Memorial.
To enjoy a walk in colder weather, it is really important to match calorie intake with activity. Hungry Little Chaps (and, let's face it, hungry Mummy and Daddy) can really take the edge off the day so refuelling becomes ever more important. We work on the theory that if you are well fed and well dressed then you can handle pretty much anything that the outdoors can throw
at you. Pic: Little Chaps + Mummy at Rhylstone Cross
We have touched on the well-dressed topic previously so this week we have been doing some proper science and taste testing pork pies.
Why pork pies? It's a food item that has become one of our winter staple hill foods. They have a number of the key benefits of any hill food - tasty, high energy for relatively little weight and, also, they don't fall apart too badly in your rucksack. More importantly, we all like them and Little Chap #2, in particular, finds them really easy to eat when it is cold and windy (unlike a sandwich which for some reason seems to take an age to eat). Quick lunches are good lunches when it's cold!
Now, ideally we would visit a butcher/deli and get some homemade pies. It is highly likely these would score more highly than the supermarkets (on the occasion that Mummy forgot the lunch, and the Little Chaps never let her forget this, the butcher counter at the Spar in Threshfield, Grassington did provide amazing pies). However, let's face it, that means being more organised than a quick Friday night supermarket visit to make sure we have lunch for the weekend adventure. Pies don't freeze well, as a rule (although if you know a butcher who makes good freezer pies, let us know in the comments - maybe we can visit and stock up), so the local shops generally provide for us. The question is, which of the nearest supermarkets
should we go to?
Pics: the contenders; Little Chaps getting stuck into the taste testing
We lined up pies from Morrisons, Sainsbury's and Coop. Other supermarkets are available but our choice was based on the fact that they are our nearest and therefore easiest to visit ahead of a day or weekend out in the hills.
We carefully tasted each one in a blind test so that no one could pre-empt the result. Little Chap#2 was convinced Coop would win and had decided his winner before tasting (!). He was surprised at the result!
We liked them all and agreed that we would take any on the hill and be quite happy. It was also proposed that Pork Pie #2 (Coop as it turned out) had the best pastry and this was unanimously agreed. However, we all decided that the Sainsbury's Pork Pie was best overall and so Daddy will be dispatched to Little Sainsbury's (properly Sainsbury's Local) when we next head out.
So, with the question of what to take for lunch solved, we'll tell you about the walk that we fuelled. This week we went to Wharfedale and up to the moors above Cracoe. This is a lovely loop that walks along the edge of the moor and has some great views in all directions. We picked this (relatively) short walk because the Little Chaps are pretty tired at two weeks into the new school term and we figured the ground would be seriously muddy, slowing our progress. A nice day out should give us all our outdoor fix and a chance to chat over the events of the year/term so far...
Pics: moments of reflection (with a view) near the War Memorial
The full route can be viewed here. It is a nice and easy walk to navigate if you haven't been up here before. Nice linear features for most of the route so it is easy to follow (technical term = handrail) your way around. In fact Little Chap #1 designated himself map reader for the day and led the way.
Setting off from home under misty, murky skies had us doubting the wisdom of our route choice (or possibly even activity choice!) but these cleared as we neared Skipton and the sun came out. The skies stayed clear as we made our way up to the War Memorial and we were treated to a great view over Cracoe Quarry (plenty to look at and to talk about - diggers that we couldn't see and the train that we could) and over towards Ingleborough. And at the top, the view turned amazing as we looked over an enormous cloud inversion from Ilkley all the way over the Vale of York with only the North York Moors visible in the distance. We definitely made the right choice as home was clearly under the blanket of cloud!
Pics: view of lower Wharfedale (under the cloud), view back to the War Memorial, Dropping back into the valley under interesting cloud formations
The path along the edge was muddy but not as bad as feared and we made good progress along to Rhylstone Cross before returning to the gravelled bridleway that drops back down to Rhylstone and the car. We got back to the car refreshed, rather than tired, from a great day out that had given us all a chance to escape into our thoughts and also talk through everything that had been going on. This is exactly what the outdoors is about - space, fresh air and great family time and we can't wait to get back out again.
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