Bright sunshine accompanied me for much of this walk but despite the good weather I wouldn't rate it as the highlight of the holiday. The night before I was trying to come up with an interesting walk but nothing seemed to work so in the end I had to settle for my original plan: Scafell Pike. So it was that in glorious weather I began a four mile trudge along the road beside Wastwater to Wasdale Head: great views, but what a waste of a glorious morning when I could have been up high. My plan, formulated the night before, was to head up to Sty Head along the bridle path that runs up the lower slopes of Great Gable. I did a walk up this way the year before, but stayed at the bottom of the valley beside the river, which turned out to be a rather difficult route to find as the path pretty much disappears at the head of the valley and leaves you with a steep climb in order to get up to Sty Head (I must try it again). This time I took the main path up to Sty Head from Wasdale Head and naturally I found it to be a very easy path.
The main reason for my going through Sty Head to get to Scafell Pike (besides avoiding the crowds on Brown Tongue) was so I could take the Corridor Route to the Lingmell Col. This superb path hugs the side of the hill below Great End, weaving around the crags and across the top of gullies as it climbs from Sty Head to join the tourist path at the col with Lingmell; it is never boring. I had lunch at the col with my back to the crowds that were passing up the tourist path while I gazed out on Great Gable and the surrounding scenery, which looked amazing on this sunny day. With relatively little effort I quickly dashed up the tourist path after lunch to the crowded summit. The path was full of families with young children who had all climbed up to the highest hill in England; I felt sorry for them, there are far more interesting hills in the Lake District. Clouds were beginning to cover the Pike while I was there but I was still able to see the views almost all around the summit, such as they are. I don't think the view from Scafell Pike is particularly noteworthy compared with others in the Lakes. There are far better viewpoints.
Quickly beating a retreat I headed across to Broad Stand and with a quick glance at the start of Lord's Rake I made a careful descent down the scree towards the Foxes Tarn route to Sca Fell. Let's face it, there is no easy route from Scafell Pike to Sca Fell; the Foxes Tarn route may be the only recommended route given the poor state of Lord's Rake these days, but it's still not easy. There is a very steep scree slope to descend and then a lengthy scramble up a gully to Foxes Tarn, which is made trickier by the stream coming down. Once at the small tarn you have yet another scree slope to walk up before you finally reach the summit. It took me an hour to get from one summit to the other, but as the eagle flies it's just 900 metres! It may not be easy, but it's quite fun nevertheless. By now the day had turned colder with cloud descending everywhere; Sca Fell was completely covered in cloud, but that didn't dampen my enthusiasm as unlike the Pike this summit was almost bare of people. What a difference fourteen metres makes! Ahead of me now was a slow descent over Slight Side into Eskdale. As one looks out from Slight Side the route ahead appears to be over a rather depressing, boggy landscape, but I didn't let that dampen my spirits and I quite enjoyed myself as I made the descent. I climbed this way on my first visit to the Lake District and it is far better as a descent. The path was clear for most of the way and rather enjoyable once I got down to Catcove Beck where I started weaving around the bogs and crags which made for a very pleasant, relaxing descent into Eskdale.
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