Woolly's Great Adventure: Part 1

Those who remember our Cumbria Way postings from last year, will recall that Woolly is no ordinary sheep. He was the first sheep to walk the Cumbria Way and while, like an average sheep, he does enjoy a good munch of grass, he does far, far more than spend his days grazing.

Even so, I don't think he quite envisaged what was in store for him when he set out with us one fine, sunny morning, to climb the Old Man of Coniston. This is a true story by the way, and it was a genuine accident.

Part way up the Copper Mines valley we stopped for a breather and for our minders to put on some sun tan lotion. Woolly, with his fine woollen coat, had no need of sun cream, so wandered over to a big rock to peer down at the beck tumbling down from the hills on its way to Lake Coniston.


We shouted at him to pause there, while we took his photo, as beck and Lakeland sheep made quite a scenic picture. The next thing we knew was that there was a gust of wind and suddenly Woolly was flying off he rocky perch and bouncing down the steep banks towards the foaming white water.

We rushed forward but it was a very steep drop and Woolly was tumbling too fast for us to reach him. There was a splash as he hit the water (quite an impressive dive it was!).

The water was racing down the hillside so fast that we thought he'd be travelling downstream faster than we could run. Chelmer, being the fastest, set off to see if he could attempt an interception.


As it happened this wasn't necessary as Woolly had landed in the whirlpool, shown in our 'after the event' photo, (not surprisingly Woolly wasn't too keen to reconstruct his fall for the benefit of the camera). As we peered down we saw him going round and round in circles, getting increasingly wetter. We climbed down to water level as fast as we could as we wanted to reach him before his coat got too waterlogged and he sank. As we stood at the edge of the whirlpool, Woolly kept passing just out of our reach. We had to think quickly what to do to save him. Fortunately, Yorkie remembered the trekking poles and shouted for one to be sent down. We were able to use the pole to flick Woolly into our waiting paws, not a moment too soon though, as he was getting very chilled.


We gave his coat a good squeeze then put him on a sunny rock (away from the river) where he could drip dry in the sun. Can you see the water he's shedding running down the rock?

Trauma number one was thankfully over, but it wasn't the end of the day's adventures, as you'll soon find out.

Lots of love from Woolly & the rescue party xxx