Today was a day when we decided that we would get up and away in good time (to avoid the road closure between Bassenthwaite and Keswick).
So we got away in good time and parked up near Ormathwaite to climb Longscale Fell. We set off up the main path to the top of Skiddaw from Keswick. The weather was absolutely glorious, a real sunny, dry, clear, spring morning. We had a little chat with a man who was going to the top with a quad bike and some fence posts. As always the path seemed as steep as ever and we stopped for a few little breathers.
We were supposed to be looking for a smaller footpath off to the right but completely missed it. Before we knew it we were at Jenkin Hill on the way to Skiddaw Little Man. We cut across right here and saw the man building his fence, bless him he must have been lonely as he wanted to stop and talk to us for ages. He even offered us a job for £80 a day, he said he just couldn’t get anybody to work for him for any prolonged period of time. Anyway we set off in the direction of Longscale and soon made it to the summit. Not a very impressive summit I must admit, a few loose stones thrown together to make a cairn and that was about it.
We headed back down (on the right path this time) and got back to the car. We then headed in the car over to Mosedale to climb Carrock Fell. After a pretty little drive we made it there and got ready for our next adventure of the day.
We followed a cart track that was supposed to take us to the top but it seemed to be going in the wrong direction. Niki picked out a path on the ground that she could see snaking up to the top so we decided to ditch the cart track and take this route instead. It was a very long, hard climb up, very draining on the legs. Every time I thought we were nearly at the top another bit would appear out of nowhere. After a while we reached a craggier bit and we could see the cairn at the top. When we got there I was very impressed by the summit, one of the best so far, very craggy, a fantastic cairn and fantastic views all around.
So we got away in good time and parked up near Ormathwaite to climb Longscale Fell. We set off up the main path to the top of Skiddaw from Keswick. The weather was absolutely glorious, a real sunny, dry, clear, spring morning. We had a little chat with a man who was going to the top with a quad bike and some fence posts. As always the path seemed as steep as ever and we stopped for a few little breathers.
We were supposed to be looking for a smaller footpath off to the right but completely missed it. Before we knew it we were at Jenkin Hill on the way to Skiddaw Little Man. We cut across right here and saw the man building his fence, bless him he must have been lonely as he wanted to stop and talk to us for ages. He even offered us a job for £80 a day, he said he just couldn’t get anybody to work for him for any prolonged period of time. Anyway we set off in the direction of Longscale and soon made it to the summit. Not a very impressive summit I must admit, a few loose stones thrown together to make a cairn and that was about it.
We headed back down (on the right path this time) and got back to the car. We then headed in the car over to Mosedale to climb Carrock Fell. After a pretty little drive we made it there and got ready for our next adventure of the day.
We followed a cart track that was supposed to take us to the top but it seemed to be going in the wrong direction. Niki picked out a path on the ground that she could see snaking up to the top so we decided to ditch the cart track and take this route instead. It was a very long, hard climb up, very draining on the legs. Every time I thought we were nearly at the top another bit would appear out of nowhere. After a while we reached a craggier bit and we could see the cairn at the top. When we got there I was very impressed by the summit, one of the best so far, very craggy, a fantastic cairn and fantastic views all around.
We then headed over to High Pike, this wasn’t too hard at all, not any real ascent or descent just quite boggy and marshy. On our way over we spotted the main path that we should have come up to Carrock Fell on and decided we would take this route down. We soon got to High Pike and on the summit we stopped for a packet of Mini Cheddars and Molly had half a Jumbone for her lunch.
We then headed down the main path to make our way back to the car. On our way down we decided that it would also be nice to finish the day off by visiting Binsey which is a very small fell that was pretty much on our way home.
So we jumped back in the car and drove down some more very quiet, pretty roads until we reached Binsey. It probably only took us about 20 minutes to get to the top and when we got there we were rewarded with beautiful views of the Skiddaw group. Unfortunately the sky was quite hazy so we couldn’t really make out much else in the mountain ranges further south but you could just make out the large shapes in the haze. After catching our breath, we had a leisurely walk back down to the car. Fab day !!!!
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