Early morning start.

The weather forecast for my part of the woods was for a very cold night, increasing wind speed and a dull day. I wondered if the very cold night would result in a very cold morning and give a nice sunrise.
I was hopeful and went to check the batteries on the camera, got the warm gear out and set my mind to getting out early in time to get up my local hills and see what was happening.

Sheila was up as usual, pre the dawn of man. I think she goes and wakes up the lamp dousers. We still have gas lamps up 'ere. I got up at 6.30 and checked to see what time sunrise was. 8.03 am.

From home to the top would take me about 40 minutes walking and so timed my exit to correspond. It was bitterly cold but still. Glad i had my PHD Minimus on as well as a fleece and Marino wool baselayer.
Passing through the farms and greeting the guys setting up the cows in the milking parlour, they were a bit surprised to see me so early.

The sky was a dull pink and i was hoping that i wasn't going to miss the best of the colour. I sped up the pace and the legs were complaining. Beads of sweat left from under my hat, down my brow and ran down my face. Sweating is not good i thought as standing around in the cold is no fun but i needed to set the tripod and camera up.

Reaching the trig point and the monument to the fallen men of Royton the sun was still below the horizon. The sky unfortunately was getting no redder. The outlying towns of Manchester, Rochdale and Oldham were vaguely visible in the gloom and all around the periphery the cloud was growing.

Frost covered everything but it wasn't a hard frost by any means. A bit disappointing. I got the coffee out and felt the warm glow inside. My hands were soon feeling tingly and the gloves soon went back on. I pulled the balaclava over my nose.

The first sign of the sun came as a red line to the edge of the cloud at 8.05. It wasn't going to be a good sunrise. I moved around the summit to see if i could get a better location for the camera but the trees to the east were preventing a clear view. I was a bit disappointed as the two previous days had produced a reasonable sunrise. Typical.

Still, i was out and it was beautiful. There will be other days and the light is never the same as the sun  rises. I enjoyed my 10k and here are a few photos i took.

A short walk on the Cumbria coast path.

We had a brief walk walk along a couple of sections of the Cumbria coast path. One at Foxfield and one at Silecroft. The weather was chilly and extremely windy but wonderful all the same.
I just took a few photographs to remember the day by and show them below.

 No words, just images.

 Foxfield

 View towards Coniston fells.

 View across the Duddon Estuary, due to be engulfed in huge pylons. Shame on National Grid.

Into the sun at Silecroft. Wonderful sense of wide open space, sounds and smells of the sea.

 Huge wind turbines on the horizon. Acceptable i think.

 Silecroft

 Black Combe.

Music to my ears.

Not just music though. Basically any media that transfers from your phone via Bluetooth pairing.
Wires, informally described by me as coloured various, are the bane of my life and probably yours too. So Bluetooth is my way to go.

How often have you walked with ear phones to find them snagged on a plethora of things or got the tent up and then can't find them, or, fell asleep in your sleeping bag to find wires wrapped around your neck or stuck in the zip.

Not any more for me. I now have a Bluetooth beanie.

The beanie has fitted within its rim 2 small speakers, around the size of a 2 pence piece, (25mm approx). One has a set of switches for on, off, advance or reverse media the other is a solo speaker. All very lightweight, connected together by a 1mm diameter wire, running around the rim and undetectable when you are wearing it.

I doubt the speakers are waterproof but I have no data either way to support that statement and I am not purposely going to prove it deliberately. If it fails in the rain at some point in the future I will report back.

A charging cable is supplied along with a user guide. Charging takes about 2 hours and will continuously play for around 3.5hrs with 60 hours on standby. The battery is a 3.7v/100mA Li-ion type, small and lightweight otherwise it would become to heavy to wear. The data sheet says it can be charged 1000 times.

The hats rim allows the speakers to be removed from the hat for washing which also means that the kit could be transposed into your favourite hat as long as that has a sown rim.

Bluetooth connectivity, V3.0+EDR, is quick and easy.
A built in microphone transmits a spoken number to you when your phone rings, hands free answering.

These hats are available on many web sites and prices vary between £5 and £20. Here's one to check out. Click HERE or paste the link below into your browser.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Winter-Sports/ZenNutt-Bluetooth-Wireless-Speaker-Headphone/B01LYY4WI0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1483711224&sr=8-1&keywords=bluetooth+beanie+hats

And for the summertime there is always this:- Click here.