This summit was activated by myself and Richard G3CWI, accompanied by Jimmy and Liam, and Richard's son Lewis, on 22nd January, 2005.   

Alarm at 6am, warmed up the soup for the flask (carrot & ginger for the increasing band of you that follow this particular detail), rucsacs in the car, and nipped across town to collect Richard and Lewis.  I took the longer, but personally favoured route of M6 / M54 into Shropshire, and as we joined the A5 we were in 2m contact with Ian G7ADF who was also doing the same trio of summits.  Ian was slightly ahead and reported the non-existence of a McDonalds a short distance north of the A5 / A49 junction (I have checked the McDonalds website, and it still claims it exists...), so instead we liaised in the Little Chef on the said junction.  I braced myself for an expensive experience with three mouths to feed, but I needn't have worried since there was a selection of more basic breakfasts - mushrooms on toast, pancakes and syrup etc - priced not dissimilarly to the Golden Arches early fayre.  So it looks like a monopoly has been broken, and expect more mentions of a vertically challenged cook in my future reports.

We stayed on the A5 until we turned down the A488 through Pontesbury.  After passing the turning for Stiperstones, we watched ahead as our first objective - Corndon Hill GW/MW-013 - appeared before us.  It was fairly clear, so Jimmy and myself were able to point out the line of the trees along which we would be ascending, to Richard, Lewis and Liam, none of whom had conquered this summit before.

We turned right, signpost Montgomery and headed a short distance along the windy road to the sharp double bend where the track commences.  As usual, I parked on the track very close to the road, rather than driving a good distance along it to shorten the walk.  This tactic would appear to be legitimate, or at least tolerated judging by the number of cars parked up here, and is indeed what Ian would do later on.  As we reached the first concessionary path to the summit, Liam announced that he didn't fancy the steep ascent, so we parted from Richard, Lewis and Jimmy to continue up the track to the next path.  This encircles the wooded area and takes a longer, more graded route to the top.

   

On arrival at the summit, Richard was sitting on the new bench trying to operate on 40m CW, and Liam insisted he wanted the other half of the bench to admire the view.  This he did, and enthusiastically told Richard every detail of what he could see.  I set up on the corner of the wood, which provided both shelter from the gentle north-westerly breeze, and a good fence which meant I could set up guy-less.  It appeared Richard was straining to hear the CW underneath the QRM of Liam explaining the zigzag pattern of the hedges on the hillside, so I announced that soup was to be served, which resulted in a hasty relocation of my youngest to my side.

   

All three of my activations on this summit have been in varying degrees of snow, and here it was very light, although it was to increase as the day wore on.  The activation was most satisfactory, with 15 contacts - 12 on 2m FM and 3 on 2m SSB - and included six summit-to-summits, courtesy of GW4BVE/P on Moel y Gamelin GW/NW-042, G0OXV/P on Pendle Hill G/SP-005, MW0IDX/P on Foel Goch GW/NW-039, G6DDQ/P on St Sunday Crag G/LD-010, G7ADF/P on Stiperstones G/WB-003 and GW7RTO/P on Moel Famau GW/NW-044.  Richard still needed two contacts to qualify the hill, and unlike the stubborn performance on Rhialgwm GW/NW-046 where the offer was declined and a failure was accepted, he took the microphone of my FT-817, and rattled off the required contacts.  We all descended on the steep side, and once on the track I realised the benefit of parking down at the road, with the opportunity to now loosen up and stretch the legs.

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