Pendle Hill conquered in aid of mental health and well-being

Why you ask, would we brave bumping into any remaining witches, so close to Halloween?

Well… we conquered the 360m ascent to help us reflect on the daily up-hill mountain that our services users often face and to raise money for us to extend our advocacy services to vulnerable individuals in the local community.

So, after a quick morning cup of coffee and with our friends from BNI Diamond Chapter, Preston, a team of 25 set off from the carpark in high spirits.

The going was fairly easy (at first) and we stopped to admire the view at Lower Ogden Reservoir.

At the impressive dam wall, we headed up the right hand side on a rough path to reach the Upper Ogden Reservoir.  We followed this higher path through the valley and even crossed over the Boar Clough stream!

Following the marker stones for the route of the Pendle Way, after crossing the stream we turned right and ascended steeply north on the rough path up the shoulder of Boar Clough.

After a quick pit stop, our thoughts tuned to our ultimate end goal, ‘the summit of Pendle Hill’ known as Beacon End or Big End. We continued on (through the mud!) and reached the summit where we found an OS trig point pillar sat on an impressive circular stone cairn.

We were at a height of 557m above sea level and took in the spectacular view where apparently on clear day you can see the Peak District, Yorkshire Dales, Morecambe Bay, the Forest of Bowland and of course the sprawling Lancashire mill towns.

After congratulating ourselves on our achievement of reaching the top, we then realised that we were only in fact halfway!  It was time for our rocky descent and headed for the picturesque village of Barley which was a great place to finish the walk.

Overall a brilliant experience and every one of us experienced highs and lows and then ultimately a great sense of achievement.

We thank everyone for their sponsorship.  See you there next year???