This summit was activated on Thursday 31st July 2003, by myself, accompanied as usual by Jimmy & Liam.   

The day turned out to be a bit of a nightmare, but the walk and activation of Caer Caradoc Hill itself was delightful.  The plan for today was a couple of Church Stretton's satellite summits in the Shropshire Hills - Caer Caradoc WB-006 and Heath Mynd WB-007, thus completing my full set of the Shropshire Hills, a subsection of the WB series in the RHB book.

  

We arrived on the narrow lane to the north face of Caer Caradoc around 11am BST, and searched for somewhere to leave the car. There was a large opening to 3 properties and a farm track on a bend at SO 472 959, and we left the car here without any problems. We walked the few hundred yards back up the narrow lane to Lower Botvyle Farm and followed the path from here that winds it's way up the foothills before reaching a well-defined green path gently climbing up around the side of Caer Caradoc. I was originally going to continue climbing gently around the hill - the longer but more graded way round, but when we looked at the steep ascent up the north face, it didn't look too bad at all. In fact it was quite easy, as they were sorts of carved out steps to climb up, so your feet were horizontal on the ground and hence no strain on the ankles and less on the knees. Liam christened them as "Footprint Steps"!

On the summit, we set up the SOTA Beam and made the contacts, no problem at all. I usually switch to SSB after a bit on FM, but not if it is raining! It was raining, so back down we went, and down the road to The Lazy Trout transport cafe on the A49 at Marshbrook, a little south of Church Stretton for lunch - liver & onions for me and egg & chips twice for the boys! Caer Caradoc was a very pleasant summit and nice walk. I look forward to doing it again next year in more favourable weather. It would be gorgeous up there on a nice day - serves us right for picking July!

From Marshbrook, we took the B4370 and the A488 and headed to Heath Mynd WB-007. However, the car began to seriously overheat and it was clear I had to stop it quickly and hope that I hadn't blown the cylinder head gasket. My breakdown organisation was called at 3pm, and arrived just about within the hour. The mechanic feared the worst - gasket blown - which would have taken my motor into write-off zone with other work that is due to be done on it anyway. My breakdown organisation then started to quibble that I only had roadside assistance and 10 mile recovery, and not the full UK relay and recovery I pay an extra premium for every year. And 65 miles from home! The mechanic suggested that he tow us back to the garage where they could do a pressure test. We ended up here for nearly four hours wondering what was going on, after this my car was fixed! Gasket fine, dodgy thermostat, fixed, but a difficult and tricky job apparently, hence the time taken. Just as I was bracing myself for a hefty bill including the hourly rate, I was asked for £43.01 and given an apology for the time taken for the work! To me this was a superb result, and I was pretty grateful that the garage staff had worked 'til 7pm to put me and the kids back on the road. The mechanic who had picked us up and grafted on my car ever since was handed a beer voucher as we hit the road again. The car ran like a dream, we got home, and we're still going to White Hill SP-006 tomorrow!

Thanks to the following stations, all worked on 2m FM with 2.5 watts: