Bowscale Fell and Blencathra

The Lakes 2003, part 8
Monday 21st July 2003

This was rather a disastrous day in one respect: I lost my wallet, including my YHA card, debit card and £30. I have no idea where it was. I looked all around and asked at the hostel and the bank, but there was no sign of it. I don’t even know where I lost it; all I know is that I had it at the start of the day and I didn’t have it when I got back to the hostel. The walk started from Mungrisdale on the eastern edge of the Northern Fells so I caught a bus from Keswick that took me to that small idyllic village. Out of the four routes of ascent to Bowscale Fell that Wainwright listed I took ‘Route 4’, which Wainwright described as being the best of all. I can’t have known this at the time so why did I take this route? In later years I always based my routes on what I’d found in the Wainwrights, but this can’t have been the case on my earliest walks in the Lakes, so what was driving my decisions? I can’t remember, aside from a desire to climb the highest fells.

However I came up with the route, I climbed up onto the east ridge through gorse and bracken from the northern tip of the village of Mungrisdale to the top of the ridge where I had a pleasant walk across the heather moor to the top of Bowscale Fell. I remember stopping for a while crouched down behind the stone shelter at the summit, sheltering from the strong wind and I have always wondered whether that was the place where I’d lost my wallet, but, wherever it was, I proceeded from there south-south-west towards Blencathra. I wouldn’t have visited Bannerdale Crags on the way since I wasn’t aiming at visiting all the Wainwrights at that time and wouldn’t have considered it worth visiting as it does not have a noticeable rise. The notes I made at the time make no mention of it, but I would have thought I’d have at least walked over to the edge of the crags to have a look down into Bannerdale, but I can’t remember. I also have no idea whether I walked up to the edge of Tarn Crags overlooking Bowscale Tarn. I have never gotten a closer look at the tarn than from the top of these crags, but I doubt I even got that close on this occasion.

My next target was Blencathra for which I was heading straight towards, avoiding the perilous Sharp Edge while making excuses to myself that it was damp and very windy, but ultimately it was because I was a coward. When I eventually did climb Sharp Edge it was just before Christmas 2006 when the weather was no better, if not worse. Instead I climbed the northern slopes of the fell over Blue Screes to the top of Atkinson Pike. This took me above the cloud line and so with no views I walked past the white crosses that lie on the ground between Atkinson Pike and Blencathra before climbing up the fellside to Hallsfell Top and the summit of Blencathra. Unfortunately there was no view to see but I was sure that it would have been spectacular, as subsequent visits to the top of Blencathra have shown; the view down St John’s in the Vale is superb.

From the top of Blencathra I passed along the top of the ridge to the western end and steeply descended the long grassy slopes of Blease Fell to the Blencathra Centre. I then took a clever little route through fields following footpath signs past Derwentfolds and Brundholme down to the Keswick Railway Footpath, but I have no idea how I knew about this route, though it may have been something I had read on the internet. The Keswick Railway Footpath is an excellent way to get back to Keswick through lovely woodland at the bottom of the Greta Valley along a magnificent old railway bed. I got back to the hostel at 2.15, which was very early, but as it turned out I needed the time. It was while I was on the walk that I discovered I didn’t have my wallet, so when I got back into the hostel I had a good look around for it, but I couldn’t find it, so I had to go to the bank and report my card lost and ironically get some money from the same branch that I had gotten money without any identification from the year before.

This was all really rather annoying, and I was beginning to think I was jinxed in the Lake District. The year before, the first time I had been to the Lake District, I left my wallet at home so I had to survive without it all fortnight. Now on my second visit I lost my wallet and would once again have to manage without. Thankfully I haven’t lost my wallet again since this occasion. Unfortunately this incident detracted from what should have been a great walk over one of the best fells in the Lake District. Blencathra is a stunning mountain that attracts the eye whenever you see it, and is the first fell seen when entering the Lake District from Penrith. I have climbed Blencathra many times since, often when the summit is covered in snow (as it was last Easter on my most recent visit), and each time it has been a delight and a joy.

High Spy and Cat Bells

The Lakes 2003, part 7
Sunday 20th July 2003

I was a little annoyed following my walk on this day. The weather forecast appeared to be for showers in the morning and heavy rain and thunder in the afternoon, so since the top of a hill is not the sort of place you want to be in the middle of a thunder storm I decided that I ought to get to Keswick as quickly as possible. I don’t know if I’d misinterpreted the weather forecast or if it was just plain wrong, but the weather was not like this, there was no thunder at all and in fact the weather cleared up in the afternoon leaving me stuck in Keswick when the weather was at its best. My plan for the day had involved climbing Dale Head, which I’d missed out on the year before when poor weather brought me down off the fells before I reached Dale Head, so instead I climbed beside Tongue Gill, past the disused Rigghead Quarries and up onto the fells. I remember that I started by walking alongside the River Derwent until I reached the mouth of Tongue Gill where I turned left to follow the stream up.

It is a shame that I didn’t use Wainwright’s recommended route from Rosthwaite that goes via the youth hostel through Johnny Wood and past Scaleclose Force. The route I took would have made sense from the village of Rosthwaite and the reason Wainwright didn’t recommend it is revealed in the original version of the guides where it is mentioned that new fences and fallen bridges had closed the direct path. This is no longer the case and Chris Jesty’s revised edition now mentions the direct route over New Bridge and up this path that I took in 2003 beside Tongue Gill. The upshot is that I have never taken the route through Johnny Wood or visited the waterfall of Scaleclose Force, which is a shame. Beyond the clear bridlepath between Seatoller and Grange a path is shown on maps and mentioned in the original editions of Wainwright’s as being a useful shortcut, but the revised edition doesn’t mention it so maybe it cannot now be found.

This is all the more reason for me to be keen on returning to this area to explore these unvisited paths. I think the only other occasion that I have been to this area was at the end of 2008 when it was very cold, but on that occasion I dodged large sheets of ice while coming down from Rigg Head before following the Quarry Road to Grange. On this occasion despite the poor weather I was able to explore the many ruined buildings of the Rigghead Quarries and even ventured a short distance into one of the levels, which proved a handy shelter from the rain, but it wouldn’t have been prudent to have ventured far. Once I reached Rigg Head I turned north and climbed up to the top of High Spy. On a couple of occasions I have climbed up to what Wainwright described as the Hinterland of Goat Crag, the wide upland area east of the summit of High Spy, but this is the only occasion when I actually reached the summit. It was raining quite heavily while I was at the top, but I had clear views despite the rain and the walk along the top of the ridge was very enjoyable.

The ridge narrows to the col and then broadens onto Maiden Moor, and I dutifully visited the summit before descending the elegant, broad ridge to Hause Gate. By the time I got to Cat Bells the sun had come out and stayed out for the rest of the afternoon affording me with tremendous views across Derwent Water and over Keswick to the great bulk of Skiddaw. By this time I was beginning to feel rather cheated by the weather forecast. Not only had I failed to walk up Dale Head two years running, but I now felt that I had been left to spend the afternoon wandering around the streets of Keswick. The route I took to get to Keswick was one I have used countless times since, through Fawe Park and the village of Portinscale, and this was the first time that I had the pleasure, but I wasn’t enjoying the experience. I spent some of the afternoon listening to the British Grand Prix on the radio, which had been an enjoyable experience the year before on the Hopegill Head ridge, but I had problems with reception while walking at the bottom of the valley towards Keswick. 

This was now the third day running on my holiday where the weather had started poor only for it to be sunny after lunchtime, but for the third day running I hadn’t taken advantage of this improvement in the weather. My poor planning was leaving me feeling both annoyed and disappointed. Interpreting the weather, including the forecast, is a skill when hill-walking and at this early stage in my experience I was still not very good at interpreting the signs properly. I was still wary of bad weather as I lacked the experience and confidence to know that I would be okay even if I was at the top of a mountain when the weather was bad. Unfortunately that would not change on this holiday.