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Walking The Snowdonia Way
Snowdonia, or Eryri as the national park is known in Welsh, had long been on my list of places to visit more thoroughly. Aside from a scramble up Tryfan after The Gravel Rally , a couple of road rides, and a breif holiday near Blaenau Ffestiniog a couple of years before, I’d not given much
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Thoughts From The Hills – A Brecon Beacons Wild Camp
I’m often trying to ram as much as possible into my weekends, usually involving making plans with others. Last weekend I was craving a bit of introspective me time, to take some time away from the internet and spend time in my own thoughts, something that I’d enjoyed a lot of last year but had
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Mates, a Munro, and Scotlands Poshest Bothy
Nearly 10 hours is a long drive to visit a friend for the weekend, but it’s made a lot more palatable when that friend lives in one of your favourite places. Since spending so much of last year in remote parts of Scotland I had been itching to get back up north and soak up
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More Than Cake
It’s 4:30am. I’m led on the floor of Sofie’s living room, and have just been awoken by the alarm of her housemate, who has kindly agreed to drive us to the airport. The alarm is a jarring and horrible sound, one of those Samsung stock tones, it’s really nasty, and considering it managed to wake
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Shifting The Baseline
Sometimes pushing your boundaries can take the form of huge significant events. Often though, it’s a shifting of comfort zones that happens so gradually and incrementally that we don’t really notice it, and can easily take it for granted. This sounds like I’m about to start talking about something really profound, but actually, I’m thinking
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Cape Wrath Trail Update #5
Day 13 – Inchnadamph to Achfary The stop off at the lovely Inchnadamph Explorers Lodge left us totally charged up, with full bellies, clean bodies and clothes, and having had a proper night’s sleep on an actual bed. Despite not leaving the hostel until 9:30am we made light work of the day and made it
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Cape Wrath Trail Update #4
Day 9 – Kinlochewe to Corry Hallie Today flew by, and generally it feels like days on the trail are going more quickly as we get well into the swing of things. Churning out the miles and doing all of the smiles! After a slow, foggy start to the day we bumped into Rebecca, the
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Cape Wrath Trail Update #3
Day 5 continued… I’m sat in my tent, pitched on uneven ground, and beside the suitibly epic sounding ‘Falls Of Glomach’. The climb up here was intense in the heat wave we’ve been having, and there was no breeze even up high, which meant we were hounded by midges and cleggs. It’s hard to believe
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Cape Wrath Trail update #2
Day #4 Continued: After taking on board the cafe staff advice we climbed up into the mountains again in blazing hot sunshine, and found a sweet camp spot by the river Allt à Choire Heidh, near a small stalkers hut. This is the most perfect camp spot, perfectly flat, right beside the river, and with
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Cape Wrath Trail update #1
Day 1 – Fort William to Cona Glen Today was a perfect start to the trail, after leaving Bristol bright and early and driving for over 8 hours we parked up in Fort William and made it to the Camusnagual ferry with about 3 minutes to spare. Talk about perfect timing. There was something very
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Final thoughts pre Cape Wrath Trail
I’m currently sitting with my kit sprawled out across the floor, checking, double checking, and triple checking my pack list, portioning my food into little bags, and generally feeling apprehensive. I get this feeling before every single challenging thing that I ever do, regardless of my level of skill, competency, and preparation, I still get
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The Cheese Pilgrimage part #1 – Becoming a Modest Donkey
Around 5 years ago my friend and ex-colleague David moved to live in Paris. I told him I would go and visit, as I’m sure lots of people do when friends move abroad. Time ticked by, I had other plans with my annual leave, and there was a global pandemic, but finally, I managed to
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Seal Spotting on the South West Coastpath
Sometimes my cousin Sofie and I go on walks. As the one person she knows with a tent and an abundance of free time, I was invited to gatecrash her four days on the South West Coastpath in exchange for providing a shelter for the night. It’s a long time since I’ve been to Cornwall.
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Ramblings on The West Highland Way
Prior to setting out on the West Highland Way I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect – Some label it the UK’s finest long distance hiking trail. Others would say It’s too busy and not remote enough. Having spent time up as far as Torridon the week before where the landscape is more rugged I
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Scotland photo dump #2
I wasn’t sure how to write about my summer holidays, or if to write at all. Currently, I’m writing my daily journal in an actual physical notebook, which is an experience in itself and an exercise in attempting to turn my handwriting into something beautiful rather than something a child has scribbled. For now, I
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Scotland photo dump #1
A few snaps from the first few days of my first Scottish holiday of the summer. We’ve had beautiful weather for a camp beside Loch Lomond, a long walk up Ben Nevis via Carn Mor Dearg, and a chill day with a boat trip around Loch Linnhe and visit to Glenfinnan. It’s still not quite
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Spoons and Spontaneity
Those reading this from the beginning will know that in the run-up to Christmas 2021 there was a chance I may have gotten covid and had to isolate over that period, cue buying some carving knives for something to take the edge off of spending all of Christmas isolating. Anyway, I enjoyed carving a few
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Boreks On Tour – Round Two
Two different Boreks, two weeks in a row, in two different places. This week it was the turn of my sister Helen to join the fun and keep me company on the five hour drive to the Lake District We had visited the Lakes together last year on what was to be Helen’s first time
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Boreks On Tour
The last few weeks have absolutely flown by, but I’ve finally found the time to sit down and reflect a bit on a couple of cracking weekends spending some time in beautiful places with a few of the family. First up was a hike in the area formerly known as the Brecon Beacons, recently rebranded
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Leaving Some Trace
Considering how near it is to Bristol I don’t know why I’ve not spent more time on Dartmoor. With a view to changing this Gabe and I decided to head down for the weekend. I put together a route with a mix of well-travelled paths and a few more off-piste sections, a couple of squelchy
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Wellingtons, Running, and Track Bikes
Last weekend I took a hike out into the western side of the Brecon Beacons and stumbled upon the wreckage of a 1944 Vickers Wellington bomber which crashed there due to an engine freezing up on a training exercise, killing all six of the crew. This was a pretty chilling place to be, and I
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Why Why Why Delilah
It’s 6:00am on Saturday morning, and my alarm goes off. This is fine. I have my kit all packed and my clothing laid out on the table, folded in a little pile in my usual slightly obsessive and organized manner. I drag myself out of bed, put David Crosby on the stereo(RIP), get dressed, and
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Helvellyn Winter Hike
Last weekend I had been roped in to help out in the pits of a cyclocross race with Andrew and Sam. For those who don’t know what that involves, it’s basically standing in a cold, wet, and muddy field frantically jetwashing bikes and trying to ensure they continue to run as smoothly as possible. I
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Lake District Nov ’22
Last weekend I took a trip up to the Lake District for a couple of days of hiking and relaxation. It came up in coversation that my sister had never been, so I felt like that was as good a reason as any to jump on the motorway on friday evening and get up there
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Bikes and Hikes Gallery – Cairngorms National Park
A selection of images from hikes and rides in the Aviemore area. Including Burma Road, Ben Macdui, and the square sausage I had for breakfast every day. The riding in this area really is incredible, though I’m sure if you’ve stumbled upon this post you already know that. In our few days in Aviemore it
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Llyn Y Fan Fach
The latest episode in Rob vs walking. Helen and I headed out towards Llyn Y Fan Fach in search of veiws and sheep. We followed this 21km loop, heading out over the top of the ridge and back along its lower slopes past the two lakes. I’ve really embraced walking lately, and it’s gone from
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Lake District May ’22
In our usual fashion we tried to bite off exactly as much as we could chew in last weekends two day hike around some of Englands finest landscape. Andrew was tasked with route planning and prepared a tough but just about acheivable 24 miles with over 7000ft of elevation. We’d allowed two days to complete
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Peak District May ’22
Meg and I spent last week on holiday with my family near the village of Wetton in the south of the Peak District. We were fortunate enough to have beautiful weather, and enjoyed a few long walks and chilled XC mountainbike rides. The routes were reasonably short and well documented so I’l save rambling on
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Moelwyn Mawr from Cwmorthin Quarry
Meg and I have been aiming to fit in a few more short breaks this year. Its easy to underestimate how beneficial it is to spend two or three days away from home exploring a new area, even if the weather is grim. Last weekend we headed up to Tan-y-grisiau in the south of Snowdonia
Rob Borek
borekthepencil.com 