Am I becoming less tolerant in my 80th year? I think of myself as relaxed but how do I know that? Only rarely do I flare up, as it were. Ann I and I ran over to Castleton, that quite amazing mining village. I leave it to Ann to suggest running further and she did that, so we carried on around to Winnats Pass. We met a group of walkers and Ann’s party piece is, ‘are you okay with where you are going?’ One man said, ‘Barbados‘. Ann pursued the point and, sure enough, he preferred to be in the Caribbean, not here. The blood rushing to our heads, we had to respond. We related the fact that the Caribbean is grossly overated, lots of crime. He responded, ‘have you been there’, ‘yes’, we replied. Oh, irritating people!

The danger

We recounted how, out walking there we had been told to return to our ship, that it was too dangerous. We hesitated to say that it was too hot there or that there were no gorgeous pubs to visit. Oddly enough, one of his party then said that it was too hot here, right now, on their walk. The temperature was about 20 degrees! We declined to say that this was because she was fat and unfit. So, there you have it. Here we are, running along feeling that there is nowhere else in the world that we would rather be. Then, you meet a spoiler. It was a beautiful day, a wonderful running or walking route, and you meet ingratitude.

Irritating people

What is wrong with the British these days? Always wanting to be somewhere else. It’s those bloody selfies, the need to post something exotic. All those holidays costing a fortune and destroying the environment on planes. The sheer hell of air travel, treated like cattle, what is the appeal? If I am honest, I see lots of people at Castleton. So many of them look lost, as if the potential of Mam Tor simply overwhelms them. It does, of course, they see the steepness and are aware they cannot handle the climb. Firstly, they are psyched out. Secondly, they prefer an exotic holiday, to lie about most of the day and eat, and eat, and eat.