Ilkley Skyline – Winter Edition

Author – Steve Worthington (Richard Cartwright’s account follows below)

I felt like I had unfinished business with the Ilkley Skyline round. My first attempt in June ended with me stuck in a field after trying to detour around some cows – I was in such a moo-d (sorry) by the end I decided to skip the pub and catch the train home. This weekend I mentioned the skyline to Richard knowing he was always game for long muddy stuff – and that the cows would be securely locked away for winter. We agreed on a 7am start – mainly with the idea of finishing and getting to the pub earlier. This meant we could start the run by head-torch which felt adventurous, but resulted in getting lost twice in the first 5 minutes.

With fresh legs and jelly babies, the miles along ilkley moor flew by. Nothing interesting to report, except a few jumpy grouse and an adorable Herdie in a field as we made our way down to Addingham.

For some reason in Addingham, we decided to swap gels and jelly babies for something savoury – and both took on board one of Tesco’s finest scotch eggs. We found these to be performance-diminishing – not an ideal snack to eat on the move. Up towards Beamsley, I was glad to see the field next to the river cow free. Although a theme of the run seemed to be me mistaking bulky sheep for cows. Potentially scotch egg induced hallucinations. We didn’t move with much pace up Beamsley and a gang of red kite circled curiously above.

Continuing on with our theme of picky bits. On Askwith Moor we took on a pork pie – again nothing for maurten to be worried about, we were reduced to a trot to get it down.

Full of pie, we made our way down to the burley stepping stones. Hearing the barking of a Guinea fowl in the distance. We’d been worried about whether the stepping stones would be above the waterline all week. Richard had checked them out in the morning – and despite them being submerged he was stubborn about attempting them and avoiding a detour and more miles. Less miles sounded good to me. Although I said he should go first…With phones in dry bags we began the crossing. After treading on a few submerged steps and almost being swept away, Richard discovered a new strategy – of stepping between the stepping stones – and holding on for dear life to the stepping stones. This worked well – mud claws became river claws gripping on to the greasy concrete. Although we did attract a bit of an audience from some locals.

With our mudclaws looking cleaner than ever and our legs numb from the cold water – we began a wet-footed run up through burley-in-wharfedale. There was some talk here about pushing the pace to get under a certain time frame – which ended as soon as we got onto the final hill up to the Hermit. Ilkley Skyline complete! Next challenge was to secure an outside table near the heaters – where we enjoyed more pies – and wore matching HPH tees – not planned – honestly!

Richards thoughts:

As Steve said I’m always up for a Challenge and this was definitely up there. After monitoring river levels for 3 day I was disappointed to see they had only gone down 2cm overnight so I decided to do a recce before the run. They looked a bit high but I was sure they were doable!!!

During the run the mud and bog were draining so the snacks were frequent and diverse. Jelly babies, deconstructed scotch eggs and pork pies.

The snacks did the trick and got us to the Stepping stones at Burley in Wharfedale. Steve looked nervous so I went first. I quickly realised walking across wasn’t an option so decided to get wet and crawl across.

After a successful crossing with the promise of more pie and a pint at the Hermit I marched up the last hill.