Category: Cumbria
Stark warnings
9th February 2009 While out on a trot from Langdale to Ambleside on Saturday, I spotted a stark notice on a gate. It was on a path leading towards the Langdale Pikes and issuing a strong message that ice axe and crampons were needed above 300 metres in height; I was staying low with plenty of hillside bereft of snow while the white stuff made itself plain to see at higher altitudes. Of course, there have been fatalities on the "Pikes" so the strong wording was not without good cause. It was also a reminder of similar unfortunate outcomes in Wales and Scotland. I can't say that I have heard of anything like this from Ireland, but something tells that full winter conditions must be blanketing those hills too.
The trouble with official warnings is that we have seen so many that could be termed an overreaction that heretical thoughts begin to percolate into your consciousness not long after you have seen the warnings. There are those who issue shrill warnings without they being truly needed, acting in a manner akin to the shepherd boy who cried "Wolf!" in the Aesop's fable. This time around, I am inclined to think that the "wolf" is real and have got to moderating my usual questioning. This is for a number of reasons. First, the warnings were coming from mountain rescue folk, and they didn't overreact to events around the time of the OMM in Cumbria when a deluge came from the heavens and caused raging roads to turn into rivers. The other chastening observation supporting that suspension is that there have been those serious accidents and fatalities.
Another factor in all of this is that we have been spoilt with the milder winters of late. Apart from the shorter days, the occasional spell of snow and ice or a storm, winter walking became perhaps no less accessible than at any other time of year. In contrast, this winter is a sharp reminder that what we have enjoyed of late isn't always the case and preparedness for winter walking can be another matter entirely. The whiteness is attractive, but there's a certain "here be dragons" element lurking too, particularly with inexperienced folk being drawn out to enjoy the prettiness. That could be the reason behind the advice given by the head of the Lake District National Park last weekend, particularly with the school half-term holidays and their bringing more folk with many perhaps without the requisite equipment, knowledge, skills and experience (the LDNP is between a rock and a hard place: in these trying times, they need the visitors, yet safety remains vital too).
Speaking of experience, assessment of conditions is a big part of it, and any disparity between those on high and those in the lowlands makes it tricky unless you have some experience of being up high in the first place. For instance, snow coverings among the hill country lining the Cheshire-Derbyshire boundary are measured in feet while those on the Cheshire plain are inches in thickness if they lie at all. Increasing the height differential can only exacerbate that sort of difference and entrap the unwary. Saying that, it doesn't take much to realise that any whitened hills look very different to the green valley bottoms with their icy patches due to paths having turned into stream beds; that was very typical of the Langdale that I encountered on Saturday. Mountains and hills do make their own weather, and it seems that winter conditions bring that into sharp relief.
The warnings and the fatalities can make one feel that they are on the outside of a different world, looking into it. They certainly challenge any perception of readiness for winter conditions and set you to thinking, particularly about those who have been left behind by those deaths. That certainly is the case for me, but barriers should be overcome carefully rather than allowed to stop you in your tracks. Even so, the mountains won't melt away overnight, even if the snow does.
Update 2009-02-10: It now appears that winter conditions have gripped some of Ireland's hills too. In fact, the Irish public service broadcaster RTÉ has a report on two men lost on Lugnaquila, Wicklow's highest mountain with a height of above 3000 feet, after dropping their map in foggy conditions. They have been out all night and mountain rescue teams are searching for them, but there is a glimmer of good news: mobile phone contact has been maintained throughout. Let's hope it all ends well.
Lakeland Roadworks
8th February 2009 Yesterday, I was up in Cumbria enjoying a walk from Old Dungeon Ghyll to Ambleside and two sets of roadworks made an attempt on derailing my plans rather than the expectation of snow and ice that had given me pause for thought. The first was at Troutbeck Bridge on the main Windermere to Ambleside road. The result was that lengthy tailbacks ensued, delaying local buses and other traffic. They may not have caused me to reconsider what I had in mind, but they are the sort of thing that could shorten a day among the hills and perhaps take away from the relaxation that such an outing usually involves. After all, we do not have extensive hours of daylight at this time of year.
The second was at Clappersgate (think of the road from Ambleside to Coniston, Hawkshead or Langdale) where deep excavations on the carriageway reduced traffic to single line with traffic signal and convoy control. Whenever I have heard before of this being done, it involved using a tipping truck, but this set up had a workman driving a quad bike ahead of traffic and up and down the affected area while work was being undertaken, a slightly peculiar slight to my eyes. It might have been that the truck was the appropriate tool to use in the circumstances; that may need wider roads.
While I am sure that both of these workings are needed, their being there does cause one to double-check the BBC's travel news page for Cumbria. Also, if they were carried out during the high season, chaos would be the result, and it certainly doesn't bode well for the forthcoming half-term school break, particularly with all that attractive white stuff in the hills. Travel news like this may not be the usual sort of thing that I'd put up on here, but these workings could have an impact on enjoyment of fine hill country, especially if everyone makes a beeline for the same area.
A look back at 2008 Part 3: Beyond Midsummer
17th January 2009 Midsummer in 2008 might have been a time when I felt that the year had peaked, and the encroachment of unsettled weather may have had something to do with that view. Certainly, the year will not be remembered for having a sunny summer and many were disappointed, even if it did have its better interludes.
Personally, I reckon that it's best to try and enjoy what is visited upon us at any time of year, and seem to have come to the conclusion that the traditional summer holiday season is overrated. There may be more hours of daylight but, if the days get too hot, it may be worth sticking to the cooler parts of the day and that reduces the amount of time available for wandering through the countryside anyway, perhaps restricting the time available until it is not that much different from spring or autumn anyway.
Even with the feeling that the second half of a year feels like an anticlimax after the first, I continued to get out into attractive countryside. I found hot sunny weather in July, was extremely lucky with my visits to Scotland in August, had an easier September and October before taking advantage of numerous wonderful opportunities in November and December. There was much to behold, so here are a few recollections of it all.
July
In walking terms, July was another fallow month, with a sun scorched saunter along the Offa's Dyke Path near Welshpool at the end of the month being the main trip of note. Otherwise, time limited by other activities ensure that most of my major outdoor activity was to be cycling rather than walking. The month's mixture of weather contributed too, but I was feeling that the best of the year had passed by this time anyway, and began to wonder if the timing of the school holidays was more than a little nonsensical. I also got to mull over island wandering as a possibility for my now habitual longer Scottish walking break. My few hours on Kerrera in May may have had something to do with this inspiration coming upon me, and I felt the need for a longer break anyhow.
August
The main even in August was that island hopping trip to Skye and the Western Isles. Though, anyone surveying the weather and the weather forecast on the eve of the trip might have questioned my sanity for even considering what I was about to undertake. In the event, I struck the jackpot: while other parts of the U.K. and Ireland were getting a soaking, I managed to find wonderful sunshine and avoid those downpours. That was thanks to the belt of rain getting stuck across the north of England and the south of Scotland. Harris was to prove the highlight of the week, without Skye failing to satisfy or the peace of the Uists being forgettable. However, it does need to be said that South Uist felt a little like an anti-climax after Harris, so it might be best to journey in the northbound direction on any future visit. A social visit to Edinburgh followed, but I still got in a few hours among the Pentland Hills, an area that I surprisingly ignored when I lived up there in that city.
September & October
September and October turned out to be pivotal months for many reasons, the economic situation in the wider world being one of them. For me, it was a period lacking in longer walking excursions, but shortening days meant that walks at lunchtimes started to take over from evening cycles.
Another trip to Ireland in September allowed me to spend a few sunny hours around Gougane Barra. Even though I felt unable to add a fuller narrative for that trip, the photos found their way into the photo gallery very quickly.
Alongside this, the realities of writing a longer trip away were made plain to me as producing reports for my Hebridean trip began to take eat up their share of time. It wasn't just the writing that slowed progress, since choosing and processing the photos to be included as part of the descriptions nearly were more rate limiting than the actual writing itself. That experience had been happening throughout the year, but it really came to a head with the larger block of writing.
Staying with the subject of lessons learned, I started to cast more of a critical eye on the focus of the blog and came to the conclusion that much of the musings on public transport really belonged elsewhere. In time, another blog was spawned for that, but travel matters relevant to the exploring of wonderful countryside will continue to make their appearance here. In time, any old posting falling outside of this might get moved elsewhere as part of continued content reshaping, yet I'll leave things as they are for now.
November
November saw me re-emerge into areas well populated by hills again. The first of two trips to Cumbria saw me embark on an out and back trek from Windermere's train station to Yoke. I had gone north with a few ideas in mind, and this proved to be just as well when public transport and the available daylight constrained my ambitions a little. Neither did anything to spoil my enjoyment of the day.
A miscalculation on the following weekend had me walking from Ardlui to Butterbridge a day too early for good weather to do its magic on the landscape. In some respects, the hike echoed my February outing to the area in that showers got going to make things feel unpleasant as I descended towards the end of my walk. I may not have seen the countryside in its best light, but plans for potential excursions came to mind, and they may compensate for this at some suitable juncture in the future.
Dullness of a drier variety was set to dominate my walk from Ambleside to the top of Red Screes and back the next weekend. Some sunshine managed to escape from its cloudy prison towards the end of the walk, yet the intense cold remains in mind, particularly since the turning on of Ambleside's Christmas lights delayed my journey home.
December
December may be considered by meteorologists to be the start of winter, but my walking was not about to go into hibernation, especially with the possibility of sampling some snow. So, the first Saturday of the month saw me return to the Howgill Fells after the briefest of visits a few years earlier. The snow that I met got me wondering about winter skills and such like, but the experience was one not to be missed. The day after had me out exploring Macclesfield's hills with an out and back hike from my own doorstep. I might have been trampling familiar ground, but there were some new sides to be seen too.
A trip to Ireland for Christmas and New didn't stop my walking either, even if road walking took up the most of what I was doing. Nevertheless, I got to get off-road to explore around Springfield Castle near Broadford in County Limerick and even got to sample a little piece of the Dingle peninsula around Camp and Castlegregory in Kerry.
Sunshine enlivened both walks, but that part of Kerry was frequented by a biting wind while we were there; nevertheless, it didn't stop me wandering a little way along a track (used by a tractor to get winter feeding to livestock by appearance of things) through the dunes at Maherabeg (Machaire Beag in Irish) in the late evening sunshine, at least shadowing the Dingle Way if not actually following it. That brought a year packed full of walking trips and opportunities to a delightful close. 2009 awaits.
Sampling some snow among the Howgill Fells
19th December 2008 As promised earlier, here's that trip report for a brief visit to the Howgills at the start of the month. The idea of visiting these parts crossed my mind while happening to perusal a bus timetable during some dead time awaiting a train to take me to Windermere in Windermere. At any other time of year, Saturday bus connections to Sedbergh (pronounced "Sedberr", I believe) wouldn't seem quite so appealing, but the idea of a 15:50 departure on a winter's day didn't seem like leaving too early at all, even if that meant that my time was limited to little more than a few hours. Services on other weekdays allow a longer stay, but there's no service on Sundays, which constrains the idea of a weekend trip using public transport to get there and away.
For the perhaps overambitious, the time that I was allotted might have been enough time for an out and back romp to The Calf from Sedbergh but rushing things like this really is not my style. I go out to sample, to savour and to enjoy; good hill country deserves no less. Snow and ice abounded once a certain not so intimidating height was reached anyway, so rushing about would have been the epitome of foolishness. It may not have lain everywhere, but there was far more about than remained around Macclesfield by the time that I left it that morning. On arrival in Oxenholme, there was no hope of missing the white stuff, and the presence of ice meant that extra care was needed when getting on the bus to Sedbergh.
That bus journey was to mean that more whiteness was to be savoured, particularly between Oxenholme and the M6. A collection of wind turbines that were passed took on an unusually ghostly aspect but continuing past the M6 meant entering countryside where a thaw was in evidence. Higher places still had the snow, even if much green could be seen too. Whatever thaw that there had been didn't extend to many of the footways about the town of Sedbergh, so gingerly progress along roads was in order as I made my way to open country. That didn't take long, and braved a path going by noisy tied up dogs in a farmyard and icy stretches that acted as a reminder of the need for crampons to get to higher slopes where deeper snow underfoot gave my boots something with which they could engage.
As I continued up the side of Winder, I began to meet deeper snow than any that I had ever encountered before. Across the gash cut by Settleback Gill and on the slopes of Crook, there were children playing in the winter sunshine. Beyond any green lands to the south, Whernside and its surrounding humps and bumps packed up the view. Gazing to the east led the eye towards Baugh Fell, Wild Boar Fell and Swarth Fell and all around them. In the west lay the snow-covered Lakeland fells, though I couldn't see them until I emerged from the trough along which I was hiking, and the same could be said for the sights that lay to the north of me.
The saddle between Winder and Arant Haw held a good thick covering of snow over its grassy tussocks, enough to slow progress and make me conscious of the time. If I had ever pondered getting to The Calf, that was put out of my mind as I ventured in the direction of Arant Haw. Though that hill lay within range, I decided in the end to leave it for another time to allow plenty of time for my descent. Instead, I continued to the top of Winder itself and lingered to take in the panoramic views. What it lacks in height, it possesses thanks in no small part to its location, so a spot of photographic activity ensued beside one of those viewpoint installations that are there to tell you what's surrounding you (hills in this case). The sights couldn't be more irresistible with that dusting of the white stuff.
The descent from Winder meant a return to greener ground, especially since I used its western slopes. Like a winter walk that I undertook from Ribblehead to Ingleton via Ingleborough, I saw more of a thaw on western slopes than I did on eastern ones; it must have something to do with catching the warmth of the sun. It must have been the time of day, but I was seeing more folk emerging from the hills, but there was no intrusion on any reverie as I enjoyed views towards the Lune gorge and its viaduct and along the western slopes of other Howgill hills.
I returned to the tarmac in safety, and misgivings about making the most of the day erupted. That caused me to divert onto a public footpath that took me to Marthwaite. From there, it was road tramping to Birks before I plied along a short section of the Dales Way by the River Rawthey. Some more public footpath traversal took me into the heart of Sedbergh, passing by its famous school as I went to await my bus. Daylight was turning to dusk as the bus plied its way through snowy surroundings, and there seemed to be a certain reminder of alpenglow to be witnessed. After an uneventful train journey, I was home again and with some extra time remaining in the day too because of the early finish.
In hindsight, I didn't waste the opportunity that I was offered, and the taste of what the Howgills have to offer has whetted my appetite. It was about time that I set foot among these hills after passing them on train and coach so many times. Apart from that, the only other time that I sampled this countryside was when I reached Sedbergh after spending a hot July day walking from Ribblehead train station a few years back. More return trips beckon, so long as there are windows of opportunity for my continuing to explore the area.
Travel Arrangements:
Return train trip to Oxenholme and a return bus journey using Stagecoach's service 564 between Kendal and Kirkby Stephen.
Another day, another fell
26th November 2008 Last Saturday saw me venture out into hill country again with a trip to explore the fells near Ambleside. The last time that I was up around those parts, it struck me that I hadn't been around Ambleside for a few years, so the seeds were sown for a future outing. Being that time of year when shorter days are visited upon us, I was after a hike that I could complete in the available hours of daylight and ended up ascending Red Screes before descending to Scandale Pass and then down Scandale itself while returning to Ambleside.
My visits to Ambleside seem to alternative between grey days and those with an altogether more sunny aspect. Last Saturday was to prove to be one of those grey days, as was the one when I first went to Ambleside. Then, I plied a short circular route around by High Sweden Bridge and then Low Sweden Bridge. Next time, the sunshine of a crisp clear cold February really showed the landscape at its best as I made my way up Scandale, over Scandale Pass and then back to Ambleside by way of the Kirkstone Pass and down The Struggle; I was enjoying good moonlight on the final stretch of the stroll. A mixture of greyness and sunny breaks were what greeted me while on a round of the Fairfield horseshoe with a start at Rydal to ascend Heron Pike and Great Rigg to continue to Fairfield (the summit was deserted when I reached it so it isn't always crowded) before dropping down to Ambleside again. When a trip to North Wales proved unworkable after a train cancellation, I found my way back to Ambleside and was consoled by the delights of a sunny day and a fabulous evening as I went over and around Loughrigg Fell on a circular hike.
The sun did peep out near the end of the day last Saturday but it was frigid, breezy and bracing greyness for most of the time. There were signs of blue skies in the distance as I left Ambleside to go up the narrow Kirkstone Road. Sufficient cars were passing the way to make me appreciate the off-road travel when at last I started up a public footpath traversing the often soft ground.
Eventually, that softness began to the hardness of well frozen terrain, but there was a fair amount of ascent among stone walls before that transition was encountered. Apart from a momentary spot of confusion due to an overestimation of progress near Snarker Pike, navigation was a straightforward affair. On the lower reaches, I was sheltered from the cold biting breeze from which there was no escape once headier heights were reached and especially as the gradients eased between Snarker Pike and the summit of Red Screes. It was no day to linger on that summit and, very appropriately, it was bedecked with frozen tarns. This was hardly the time and place for conversation but I was asked by a lady where the path that I had following started out; it went too near to Ambleside for her and those with her (there is another possible way down, but even Wainwright suggested that to be too steep for a descent; that might have been how they made their way up).
With the inhospitable conditions on the top of Red Screes, it should come as little surprise that I started my descent with no delay. The greyness was one limitation of photographic exploits but it was the cold that capped it all. Production of anything worthwhile was to await another day and I picked out my path down the slopes to Scandale Pass. A wall provided a useful navigational handrail and Scandale Tarn was in view too. Eventually, I was to lose that biting breeze on the return to more familiar surroundings.
The way down from Scandale Pass was easy walking and softer ground was met as I plied the banks of Scandale Beck until I reached High Sweden Bridge. It was then that the sun escaped from its cloudy hideout and I got to acquire more pleasing results, to my eyes at least. That appearance of sunshine caused me to diverted around by Low Sweden Bridge but it was soon to disappear again. A goodly number were descending this way to Ambleside, including a sizeable group of students; I wonder if they were attached to the University of Cumbria, whose campus I passed as well.
I was easily back in Ambleside before daylight faded for the day. The town was chock-a-block with people, making any aspiration of having a look in outdoor gear shops utterly impractical. The mercury was really dropping by now as I made for the bus stop for my bus back to Windermere, retracing the journey made that morning by train to Windermere and bus to Ambleside. However, I was left waiting in the cold for up to an hour due to the turning on of Ambleside's Christmas lights and its concomitant disruption of any passing bus services (I wish that I knew about this beforehand so that I could have planned accordingly). I still managed to catch my intended train from Windermere to Oxenholme only to have an hour's delay in Oxenholme due to an incident on the line; being able to wait in the warmth of the indoors helped here. Even so, I was back home before 21:30 after a good day out that might yet be the progenitor of more like it.
