Shaun, Tetley, Grizzly,
were enjoying a mug of tea and chocolate biscuit, while idly
chatting the afternoon away.
"Well since we
reached 500 in the Birkett challenge, I suppose we could be said
to be on a mopping up operation, as there was just 40 to go",
mused Shaun.
It's hard to believe
that when Dad discovered the book, we had only done around 300",
replied Grizzly.
"That's a lot of
miles and many thousands of feet of climb, that Dad has had to do
to get us this far. What a lucky lot we are", said Tetley
with the utmost sincerity.
"We have
completed the Eastern area and we have just a few left in the
Southern and Northern areas, the bulk of the outstanding being in
the Western area", called out Grizzly, who was looking at
the list on Dad's laptop.
"Where's Allen?",
said Shaun. "It's not like him to miss out on his tea and
biscuits."
"Don't know",
replied Tetley.
But hardly were the
words out of his mouth, than Allen came striding in with Little
Eric, poking out of his rucksack, and with an excited look on his
face. "The forecast for the weekend is good, and Dad has
said he is definitely going to take us for a walk on Sunday, but
he wants us to come up with a suggestion of where."
"Well its got to
be ticking off some of the remaining Birketts", said Little
Eric.
"Dad has talked
about Skelgill Bank and King's How, near Keswick, but as he and
Uncle Brian, have only this afternoon returned from Armathwaite
Hall, we can hardly ask him to drive up there again on Sunday",
said Shaun.
Grizzly, who was
scrutinising the outstanding list again, said, "how about we
suggest doing Demming Crag and Horsehow Crags, as that would
complete all in the Southern area."
"Yes, and maybe
if I ask nicely, he will climb Harter Fell first too, so that I
can bag that Wainwright", added Little Eric. "It is a
logical way to do it anyway, from what I can see looking at the
map."
"That will be
starting from Birks Bridge near Seathwaite, where we started,
when we climbed it in 2005, although we actually climbed from the
west side, as Dad took us to bag Green Crag first that day",
said Tetley.
"So, if Dad
agrees with our suggestion, we will actually climb the east flank,
so ascending by a different route", added Allen.
"Well, what are
you doing still standing here Allen ", said Tetley. "Off
you go and ask Dad."
Not needing a second
asking, he dashed off, soon to return with a wide grin on his
face. "It's on. Dad thinks it is a great idea."
The Walk
Birks Bridge is just beyond
Seathwaite in Dunnerdale, and although we had not been here for
five years, much of the journey there was familiar to us. Dad had
decided not to set off too early for once so we were able to have
a bit of a lie in, but nevertheless we made sure that we were up
in good time to get the picnic ready and stowed in Allen's
rucksack. Dad loaded his gear, and when we heard the boot slam
shut on the car, we dashed out and settled on the front seat.
The route was along the A590,
Barrow road, to Greenodd, turning right here to climb up past
Gawthwaite, where the distant ridge, with from the left of Black
Combe to the fells above the Corney Fell Road, Whitfell and
Stickle Pike filled the skyline. All these had been climbed and
we chatted amongst ourselves, about those adventures. It was a
beautiful autumn day with cloudless blue skies, as we dropped
down to skirt Broughton in Furness, and come to Duddon Bridge,
where immediately before, we turned right up the Duddon Valley,
and after a few miles reach Ulpha Bridge.
As we neared here, Tetley said,
"that's The Pike with Hesk Fell behind, to the left."
We climbed those in February 2006."
"I remember it well, the cloud
was down and we could hardly see more that a few yards",
replied Shaun. "The top is flat, but since Wainwright wrote
his book a fence has been erected that crosses the summit, so
helping us find the highest point", he went on.
The road passes the church, and a
little way beyond we have usually turned left to cross Birker
Fell, either to walk to fells from the road, or continue down to
Eskdale, from where there have been a few adventures, and in fact
there will be more, as some of our outstanding tops are to be
reached from there.
Today we ignored this road, and
kept on ahead along Dunnerdale, the high ground to the right
forming the Coniston Fells. The road was narrow, extremely so in
places, and Dad's big car seemed to fill it completely.
Fortunately there was little traffic and when we did meet a
tractor coming the other way, there was just enough room to
squeeze past. We passed through the tiny village of Seathwaite
with its pub and church, then after about another two miles we
reached the parking area at Birks Bridge.
As Dad got ready, we noticed that
there were a group of Mountain Rescue people engaged in training
rescue dogs. We saw some of this, as we followed two gentlemen
with a dog, over the bridge and along the forest road. Suddenly
the dog veered off to the right and stopping by a tree, started
barking. He had found the man who had concealed himself up the
tree. Wonderful, and what an asset they must be, when searching
for walkers lost on the fells. We do hope, however that Dad never
needs their services.
The track led to a junction that
led to The Birks (Hostel) and then along a footpath east.
"I think we are going the
wrong way", called out Shaun, who was looking at the map.
Dad looked too, and said "you're
right. We are not on the path I thought we were. Silly me."
"Well it is not often you go
wrong", said Allen
Returning the short distance to the
junction, we walked left for a few yards to find the sign,
designed with bears and sheep in mind, pointing the direction to
Harter Fell.
To the left was this complex of
walls, once used as sheepfolds. The forest road, stretching away
in the background, was the one we had walked along from the car.
The path climbed steeply, passing
on the left Mart Crag, then reaching a gate in a fence, close to
the rocky outcrop of Maiden Castle.
"Which way are we going from
here", asked Little Eric with his paws crossed, as he was
hoping that Dad would continue up Harter Fell, so he could tick
it off.
"As we have come this far, on
up to the summit", replied Dad. "I doubt there will be
a proper path by the fence anyway, so I would only make the walk
harder."
"Thanks", replied Little
Eric with glee
So we continued along the clear
path, climbing steadily, to reach a junction marked by a cairn. A
group of our lovely Herdwicks were browsing the grass here, and
yes, you've guessed Dad had to get the camera out.
The marker cairn can be seen behind.
Here we went left below the crags. It then wound its way up
through them, to the summit area of Harter Fell. Here there are
in fact three rocky outcrops, the most southerly having the trig
point, where Dad later took our picture. For the majority of
walkers, this is considered the summit, but in fact the highest
point is the next rocky outcrop to the north. This shot is taken
from the trig point.
There are a number of routes that
can be used to scramble to the top, Dad choosing one to the rear.
The very highest point can be seen and the smallest ever cairn -
just one small stone had been balanced on the top. There was not
space for us to sit there, so we squeezed into the crevice just
to the right, for our picture.
While we were doing this and soon
after when Dad took our picture at the trig point, the summit was
deserted, apart from two gentlemen we had passed on the ascent.
But, suddenly there were walkers everywhere, individuals and what
we guessed was a guided party. We had just got back into the
rucksack in time.
Dad chatted to two gentlemen, who
told us they had climbed four summits in the Coniston Fells
yesterday, and had nearly been blown off Dow Crag. Dad recounted
an attempt in January 2005, when he had been forced to abandon
the ascent, such was the strength of the wind. One of the
gentlemen was an experienced walker, but the other man was just
starting out on the Wainwrights. Dad wished him well on his quest.
We are glad we are not just starting out! Time for lunch so we
sat on some rocks to eat our sandwiches and have a drink. By now
the gentlemen we had talked to were sitting on the summit rocks,
and Dad called his goodbyes to them as we headed off on the next
part of the walk.
"Which way is it now?",
asked Little Eric.
"We retrace our ascent route
as far as the cairned junction. There we take the path left,
heading north", said Shaun who had consulted the map.
The path north descended steadily.
Ahead to the left we could see a domed hill, that was Demming
Crag, our next objective. After a while the path levelled, and
here Dad struck of left across the rough grassy terrain to climb
to the summit of Demming Crag. No cairn marks the summit, but a
small rocky rise in the grass was clearly the highest point.
Despite the clear weather is was quite a breezy day, so we sat in
the lee of this for our picture.
From the top of all the fells today
we enjoyed quite magnificent views and we took a few minutes to
marvel at them, before continuing on. Descending the same way, to
then bear left down the bank of Castlehow Beck, we regained the
main path where it crossed a gill. Leaving it immediately, we
swept left to a great bog below the sheer craggy face of Demming
Crag. The bog was skirted on the right to a fence ahead. This was
crossed and then it was leftward over further bog and rough
grass to climb to the summit ridge of Horsehow Crags, its left
end being the highest point. Just before reaching the summit we
came across two more of our lovely Herdwicks, who looked
inquisitively as we passed by. You will see that their coats are
dark brown, indicating that they were born this year. They start
almost totally black, turning brown by about a year old. Then
finally in adulthood their fleece turns blue/grey.
We hopped out and settled for our
obligatory picture at the summit. As we have said, the views were
magnificent from all the summits and we just sat a while taking
them in. We could see the cars making there way along the steep
narrow road of Hardknott Pass, which, with Wrynose Pass, connects Eskdale with central
Lakeland (one of the most thrilling and challenging drives in
Lakeland, achieving at times a gradient of 1 in 3!). Above the
road we could see in amazing plan view, the remains of the Roman
fort.
Hard Knott Fort (known to the
Romans as MEDIOBOGDUM), was one of the loneliest outposts of the
Roman Empire, built between AD120 and AD138. As can be seen, it
is on a spectacular site overlooking, to the west Eskdale, and
south and east the pass which forms part of the Roman road from
Ravenglass to Ambleside. The walls surrounded granaries, barracks,
and a commandant's house. The baths, with a sequence of three
rooms can be seen outside the main walls. An area of flattened
ground is believed to be a parade area.
Over the summit of the pass stands
its namesake fell, but it was beyond that our eyes were drawn to
the mountains.
These are Lakeland's highest peaks,
from the left Scafell (3162ft), Scafell Pike (3210ft), Broad Crag
(3054ft) - tucked in behind, and to its right the double summit
of Ill Crag (3067ft). We will be climbing some of these next year
as Broad Crag, and the little pointed top of Pen on the ridge
running down from Scafell Pike, are amongst our outstanding tops.
"I could look at this scene
for ever", said Little Eric in wonder, "but we had
better be moving on."
"Yes", agreed Allen,
reluctantly.
As we crossed east over the ridge
of Horsehow Crags, clearly below we could see the gate in the
fence that we had to make for. It was not far, but the ground was
very rough grass, with hidden rocks, so it took a bit longer for
Dad to reach the gate. Here we joined the bridleway, through the
cleared forest area. This meandered, not losing much height, and
we began to think that this was not the right path, but Dad
reassured us that eventually it would descend. At one point the
remains of a felled tree trunk had been fashioned into a seat,
which we could not resist posing on.
Continuing, the path as Dad had
predicted soon began to descend steeply, and eventually brought
us to the forest road, we had walked along this morning. Turning
left we soon reached the car. Another super walk, and what
magnificent views we had been treated to. Just the perfect day to
do this walk.
It was mid afternoon, but as
quickly as was safely possible, Dad headed home and on the way,
went to Jane and Sam's, Hat Trick Cafe, at Low Newton. The good
thing too is that for once we get to go in as well. He had tea
and a large portion of delicious apple and blackberry crumble
with lots and lots of custard. They do spoil him!
