Grizedale Hause and Nab Scar

Monday 9th April 2012

It rained all day. There’s not much you can do when you’re in the Lake District and it decides it’s going to rain all day. I’d have stayed indoors if I’d had a choice, but I was booked into a hostel near Grasmere and I was in Patterdale. Even by road this would involve going over a mountain pass in the rain, so on foot I was left with little choice. I just had to make the best of what the weather had dealt me, which is always the best approach to take when walking in an area with high rainfall like the Lake District. If the weather is good, great, make the most of it, enjoy yourself. But if it’s raining you don’t just sit inside, you get some good waterproofs and do whatever walk you can. Bad weather is an excuse to do walks along paths that you ordinarily wouldn’t have done. Low-level walks take on a life of their own when the weather is bad, and you can bet there’ll be a lot less people out there so you’ll have the fell to yourself.

I still had to get to Grasmere so I set off from Patterdale back along the route that I’d taken the previous day and walked into Grizedale. From there I decided to take the path on the northern side of the valley along the foot of Birkhouse Moor. I’d never taken this rugged, rock-strewn path before all the way up to Grizedale Tarn and it was really quite fun, despite the rain and the wind. Just beyond the top of the pass I reached a junction of paths where a sign said the bridge was out at the foot of Tongue Gill and recommended that I take the bridlepath down Little Tongue instead. Since I’d already decided to take the bridlepath that was the route I took. I had taken this path the first time I climbed up to Grizedale Hause but all subsequent times I have followed Wainwright's advice and taken the footpath beside Tongue Gill. I felt like a change now, but I was also attracted by the terraced route that the bridlepath takes across the southern slopes of Seat Sandal and above Hause Rigg. The descent down Little Tongue, though, was as boggy as I remembered. Incidentally when I reached the bottom I found that the bridge over Tongue Gill had been replaced so the sign at the top of the path is out of date.

On reaching Grasmere I walked along the main road to a bus shelter where I had lunch under its cover. Since the rain seemed to be easing (slightly!) I decided to prolong the agony by taking the path near the Swan Hotel that climbs beside Greenhead Gill. I had come down this way in 2006 from Stone Arthur in diminishing light and so failed to see the delightful lane with the stream running beside it. After the final gate I climbed up to an aqueduct over Greenhead Gill (the pipe from Thirlmere Reservoir) and from there steeply up the southern slopes of the fellside to Alcock Tarn. I had never been to this lake before but it lies on a shelf on the side of fell with stunning views across Grasmere. There is little attraction in the lake itself but the ridge above it proved too tempting for me. Rather than dropping straight down into the valley I crossed the small earth dam and following a faint path up for an easy climb onto the top of the ridge at a point just south of Lord Crag. A short distance along the ridge took me to the cairn at the top of Nab Scar. I have only once been to Nab Scar before and that was on my first visit to the Lakes in 2002 during a descent from Fairfield, so you could say I have now climbed Nab Scar for the first time.

A steep descent down the front of Nab Scar on a well-made path eventually brought me to Rydal where I crossed the main road and started to follow the route that I had taken on my very first day in the Lake District. On that occasion I had walked from Ambleside to Rydal and then climbed Loughrigg (and in the process lost my glasses). I’m not sure what my exact route up the maze-like fell had been ten years ago but I had a good guess at following it. After visiting Loughrigg Cave (fenced off and flooded but that hadn’t stopped the family I saw playing around inside it) I climbed above the cave to try and remember my route of ten years ago. I think I was quite successful while negotiating the undulating terrain and myriad tops, and even passed the point where I believe I probably lost my glasses (still no sign of them!) before eventually reaching the summit of Loughrigg. Wainwright said it would be really embarrassing to get lost on Loughrigg, which is a small family-friendly fell, but the fell is so complex that is a real possibility. Loughrigg is a good fell where finding an interesting route to the top is a nice challenge. I just kept climbing in the general direction towards the top and thankfully I found it.

After taking a previously used route to reach the top of Loughrigg I wanted to use a route down that I’d never taken before so I took a path that drops steeply down the western slopes of the fell to reach a narrow road not far from the Langdale Youth Hostel that I was going to be staying at. This was not a bad walk and was saved by the diversion that I took in the afternoon from Grasmere. Climbing over the Grizedale Pass was not the most enjoyable thing I’ve ever done, but the path up to Grizedale Tarn is terrifically rugged. Instead of just spending the afternoon in Grasmere I climbed up to Nab Scar via Alcock Tarn and then up Loughrigg, which shows that rain doesn’t have to mean that you can’t have a good walk. This was a great walk despite the rain.