In our early trips, when the "children" were younger, we would spend our time visiting the more commercial "attractions", but on this occasion we mostly stayed away from from the towns. The family do not all share my passion for the fells, but we did still manage a few of the smaller summits (including a couple that I did on my own). Our first climbs were Bonscale Pike and Arthur's Pike in the Far Eastern Fells, which we reached by one of the Ullswater steamers from Glenridding Pier:
They are only small fells, but the climb from Howtown is fairly steep, causing us to think that we should probably have started with something easier.
In the next few days we climbed Great Mell Fell and Holme Fell, the latter in the pouring rain, much to my 15 year old son's angst.
My wife was due to meet an old school friend in Ambleside on Saturday, and as it was raining, the younger members of the party elected to stay in bed. I decided that I would pop up Low Pike whilst the others drank coffee and ate lunch. It was drizzling when I set off, but by the time I reached High Sweden Bridge the rain had become quite heavy. Not being one to give up, I pressed on although the rain worsened relentlessly. By the time I reached the summit I was drenched and opted not to take the obligatory photograph of the summit cairn.
On my return to Ambleside I dived into Gaynors to buy some bottles of waterproofing for my boots and goretex - neither of which had afforded any protection against the horizontal rain, nay MONSOON which had been waiting at the top of the climb.
In order to earn a few brownie points for later in the week, I also went foraging for dinner (pizza) and tracked down some nice beer (Loweswater Gold).
As I said earlier, we've been going to Patterdale for years and have climbed most of the local fells, apart from Glenridding Dodd. The two adults chose an early start (it was late morning actually) for our ascent on Tuesday and we were both amazed at the views:
On the way back from Glenridding Dodd we had to stop at the Travellers Rest for a quick half (well the wife had a half anyway).
Out next target was Walla Crag on the Eastern shore of Derwentwater. Teenage son elected to sit this one out, leaving three of us to set off without him. We had researched the routes using our trusty "Wainwright" and wanted to make the climb South of the wooded area. Unfortunately we lost the path, and despite my best "Indiana Jones" efforts which resulted in shocking lacerations from bracken and brambles (well I got some scratches anyway) we switched to the wooded path. It turned out to be lovely, with most of the climb being alongside a small beck.
The weather forecast for Thursday was excellent and I decided to use up my remaining brownie points from earlier in the week. I persuaded everyone that our final target should be Haystacks. The compromise was that we would ascend from Honister rather than Buttermere. The weather was indeed great, and some of the views were simply stunning.
The Buttermere Valley.
This was clearly the most popular walk of our holiday ...... not only with us! There was a steady stream of other walkers who were (mostly) really friendly. There was one strange chap wearing a suit, but my son declared he was just an "indie" which apparently means he likes to be different. He certainly was.
There were two summit cairns on Haystacks and it wasn't clear which the "real" one was. We went to both, but this was the most picturesque:
It is easy to see why this was Wainwright's favourite fell. There was such a variety of rock formations, a number of tarns, and the most spectacular views across to Great Gable, the Scafells, Pillar and of course The Ennerdale and Buttermere valleys.
I wanted to take in Fleetwith Pike on the way back to Honister. I knew I was likely to end up doing this on my own, and decided to offer the others a rest at Drum House. They were quite keen to get back to Honister, and the loo at the shop! I persuaded them that I could make it to the summit and back in "half an hour". I was making great time, and reached the top in ten minutes ...... except it wasn't the top at all. The real summit was about another half mile away!! As I said earlier, I'm not one to give in, so I pressed on and was not disappointed:
I didn't have as long as I would have liked on the summit ..... I only had so many brownie points after all .... and decided that I needed to "run" back to Drum House. In all, a round trip of 42 minutes, which I thought was pretty good!
That was the end of our walks for this holiday, but I did manage a total of nine small Wainwrights (a little under 15k feet in all). This brings my total Wainwrights climbed in 2014 to sixteen, and forty five in all.
Now when is October half term??
