Coniston to Ulverston

Saturday 2nd April 2016

The day before this walk I had gone from Eskdale to Coniston with rain falling on my head almost all day. Despite the rain I actually quite enjoyed the walk and maybe part of the reason was because I was walking through the fabulous landscape of the Lake District. The next day it rained all day again, but this time I was walking out of Lakeland into scenery that is softer, less interesting to walk through and more unpleasant to walk upon. Apart from Thursday, the weather during my holiday in the Lakes was not very good. I endured everything during the week with gale force winds over the Easter weekend, snow on the high fells and even at times all the way down to the valley floor, and now persistent rain. That rain had started the previous morning and was still falling when I left the Coniston Coppermines Youth Hostel and made my way down the track all the way into the village of Coniston. The one advantage with the rain was that the rivers and becks were swollen impressively so that Church Beck was a tremendous sight roaring mightily down the valley.

It occurred to me that all the times I had been to the Coppermines Youth Hostel I had never walked up to the hostel from Coniston or down to the village from the hostel. I had always walked down to the hostel from the fells and left the hostel heading back onto the fells. Now I was in the village of Coniston where I joined the Cumbria Way to follow this long distance trail south all the way out of the Lake District. A good path took me through Coniston Hall Park until I reached the shore of Coniston Water where an interesting, rugged path follows the edge of the lake under the trees of Torver Common Wood. This was an entertaining walk with many ups and downs around trees and over rocks. It was thoroughly Lakeland as the Swallows and Amazons-inspired lake of Coniston Water slowly passed me by. Later the trees were replaced by the gorse and bracken of Torver Back Common and eventually I veered away from Coniston Water and headed into the Blawith Fells. I had been looking forward to exploring these outlying fells where I’d never been before, but my visit was marred by the poor weather and a need to press on towards Ulverston.

In order to make the most of my visit to the Blawith Fells, I came off the route of the Coniston Way and took a thin path through the bracken up a rocky gully to the craggy summit of Beacon Fell. Wainwright ranked this amongst the most delectable of the lesser heights of Lakeland, but with rain and low cloud spoiling the view I was unable to fully appreciate it. Coming back down the hill I reached Beacon Tarn and rejoined the Coniston Way at the southern end of the lake soon coming off the fells at a delightful stream where I had my lunch sheltered under some trees. Later in the year I’m sure this point is covered in wildflowers, but unfortunately I was too early in the year, and it was chucking it down with rain. The walk really deteriorated after this point as the Lakes were left behind and I passed into a more agricultural landscape that was correspondingly muddier. It is astonishing that I kept going along the Cumbria Way as long as I did.

I eventually had enough when I passed through a particularly muddy field just outside the hamlet of Broughton Beck, so when I reached the road over Eller Riggs Brow I left the Cumbria Way and stayed on the road following it south towards Ulverston. The Cumbria Way takes to footpaths that pass through fields running parallel to this road, so it made sense for me to take the easier option after all the muddy fields that I’d already endured. When I came up with this plan to walk from Coniston all the way out of the Lake District to the railway station at Ulverston, I thought it would be a good way to end the holiday, and if it hadn’t been raining all day, and all winter, it would have been a soothing way to finish. But not through fields that were as wet and muddy as these were. It wasn’t long before the houses of Ulverston appeared in the distance, but by then I had noticed a good route on the map that heads into the town beside a stream and there I found a glorious route.

A small, muddy field brought me to the Gill, which was a delight after my travails of the previous couple of hours. Daffodils and celandines were in flower, but the valley was teaming with wild plants all poised to unleash their colourful delights in the coming weeks. The valley floor was bathed with wild garlic that would put on a fantastic display that I was disappointed to be not seeing, but I still had a grand entry into Ulverston and for the end of my holiday. The weather may not have been great, but I still had some fabulous walks over some great fells, even if they weren’t the walks that I had originally planned.

Eskdale to the Coppermines

Friday 1st April 2016

After the fantastic weather I enjoyed the day before this walk, I now had a complete reversal back to typical weather for the Lake District in that it rained almost all day. I wasn’t very lucky with the weather on this holiday, but after the amazing week that I had in the Lake District the year before at Easter, when it didn't rain all week, I guess this was the Lake District correcting itself. My original plan for this walk was to get over the Harter Fell pass as quickly as possible and spend most of the day enjoying myself in the Coniston Fells. However, the weather forecast was for worsening conditions so in order to make the most of the better weather earlier in the day I decided that I would first go up one of the fells that overlooks Eskdale. Harter Fell, the iconic fell whose pointed peak dominates the views up Eskdale, would be an obvious choice, but I have been up there many times and even slept at the summit. Instead I turned my attention to Green Crag, which is not far from Harter Fell and lies at the Lakeland end of the long, broad ridge that extends all the way to Black Combe before dropping steeply down to the sea.

On my only previous visit to Green Crag I had descended from Harter Fell and into Eskdale down an excellent peat road that I had enjoyed immensely, so I decided that I would take that route up onto the broad, peaty heights above. Crossing the goddess of Lakeland valleys I climbed past Low Birker Farm and out of Eskdale on the wonderfully graded, zigzagging peat road that climbs up onto the boggy fell. Despite the rain that had already started to fall, I had a surprisingly enjoyable time trying to make my way across the complex terrain past Low Birker Tarn and around Crook Crag with Green Crag in the distance looking like an upside down pudding bowl and reminiscent of Great Gable, in miniature. Eventually I reached the foot of the crag where I followed a clear path that takes a circuitous route around the defending crags and up an easy scramble to the lofty summit cairn. The weather was already deteriorating by this point, so I came back down from the windswept summit and attempted to cross the peaty moor between the crags and the edge of Dunnerdale Forest.

At first a relatively clear path led my way through the bogs, but this soon vanished and I was left with a tricky crossing through the boggy, grough-filled peat until I eventually, and with a great deal of relief, reached the clear path that goes over the pass beside Harter Fell. The only time that I have ever taken this path before was on my very first visit to the Lake District on my way to Eskdale, and now I reversed that direction as I headed to Coniston in much worse weather. Initially I had the pleasure of walking along a manufactured cyclepath, but this soon ended in a boggy morass as the path dropped down to Grassguards Gill through a felled area of the Dunnerdale Forest that looked particularly bleak and bare in the poor weather. Beyond Grassguards the path improved slightly as it passed through more mature, semi-natural woodland and around Fickle Crag until eventually I reached the River Duddon at the Fickle Steps. I was wary of planning to use these stepping stones as they were likely to be impassable if the river was high, but fortunately they were easily crossed.

In 2002 I had crossed the Duddon valley on footpaths through fields, but in view of the weather I decided to keep to roads through delightful woodland down to Tarn Beck and up to the start of the Walna Scar Road. This famous mountain road goes from Dunnerdale over the high pass beside Walna Scar and along the southern edge of the Coniston Fells all the way into the village of Coniston. Although I have walked parts of the road before, sometimes joining the road at the top of the pass, or leaving it at that point, this was the first time that I walked all the way over the pass along the road. It was just a pity it was raining. After eating my lunch I girded my loins and headed off up the road into the wind and rain coming over the pass, and down the zigzags on the other side as I headed towards Coniston. At the fell wall, beside a large, empty car park, I turned left onto the path that is the start of the main, tourist route up to the top of the Old Man of Coniston. At a junction of paths where the tourist path turns left I went straight ahead onto an old quarry road that gave me tremendous views of the Coppermines Valley.

Even in the wet, this is a magical place with paths crisscrossing the valley past many derelicts of the copper mining that used to go on in this valley. Having spent time here before I knew of a good route through the valley that I wanted to take. When I reached the Pudding Stone at the bottom of Boulder Valley I took a narrow path on the other side of Low Water Beck that passes below Grey Crag while looking out over the Coppermines Valley to the thunderous cataract that pours through bare desolation from the Levers Water reservoir above. With a mass of concrete and heavy doors reminiscent of a nuclear bunker in the valley below, I skirted the end of the Black Sails ridge and followed mill-races round to the Coniston Coppermines Youth Hostel. The end of this walk was exciting and interesting as the Coppermines valley is in any weather, but for most of the walk all I could do was keep my head down and keep walking. Nevertheless I felt curiously quite content throughout the day and enjoyed the walk, totally oblivious to the weather that was happening around me. This was a peaceful and relaxing walk in the Lake District, despite the rain.