Day 4 - Grasmere to Patterdale - 9 miles

Nine miles doesn't sound too bad and we start off this morning walking along the main road out of town. Eventually we turn right onto a narrow stony path which will take us up to Great Tongue Fell. 

Great Tongue Fell

It's cloudy but humid and we're both sweating. Up above is cloud and we've already decided to abandon all hope of climbing the high fells today - we'd hoped to do Helvellyn, a very famous peak, and Striding Edge which, in good weather, is a brilliant high level walk across the peaks but it's not to be this time around. 

Going up

And up

And up some more

It seems like we're never going to reach the top and it gets windier and a bit drizzly so we put on our pack covers and raincoats and forge ahead. At one point the path is very indistinct as it makes its way up through crushed rocks and boulders but Jen is able to pick it out and we make it to the top and the broken stone wall we were heading for.

Now we are heading straight down the valley past Grisedale Tarn which is shrouded in mist, we don't see the water until we are almost next to it. We can hear someone whistling for someone, a dog maybe. We can't see them and it's a little eerie. We cross over the end of the tarn on stones and then it's down a boulder strewn path - to our left somewhere is Helvellyn and to our right St. Sunday's Crag, both hidden from view.

Studying the map

on Grisedale Pass

Lunch with a view

We slowly wend our way down the valley to flat ground and a wide path that turns into a country lane and before you know it we're standing outside of our home for the night.

The White Lion, Patterdale

Tomorrow we are heading from Patterdale to Shap, 15.5 miles and the highest peak we will climb on the walk at 2,560 feet. Oh dear.

Day off - Grasmere

We are staying at Howfoot Lodge which is next to Dove Cottage in Grasmere. This is where William Wordsworth, most famous of the Lakeland poets, lived. We don't go to visit because….well, we just don't!

Howfoot Lodge, Grasmere

Jen wasn't idle during her time off but scouted out places to eat, drink and shop. We went out for dinner at Tweedie's Bar, Jen had a wonderful chicken dish and I had shoulder of lamb and wine and it was all very tasty.

After a very good night's sleep, and an excellent breakfast we get ready and go catch a bus to Ambleside, a village about 15 minutes away. We're looking for outdoor clothing shops and we've come to the right place as they're tons of them. Jen buys red and blue hiking pants and I buy a lime green pair - we're not going to get lost on the fells wearing them!

We have lunch at the Royal Oak pub and then get the bus back to Grasmere. We laze around for a few hours and then it's time to eat again, this time we go to a restaurant called The Jumble Room. The food was absolutely delicious and I had a wonderful cocktail made from gin, cassis and Prosecco.

Cassis Gin Sparkler

The Lake District is a totally dog friendly place and everyone has a dog or two in tow. Lots of dogs walking the trails - it's great.

We've thoroughly enjoyed our time in Grasmere but now it's time to get moving again!

Day 3 - Rosthwaite to Grasmere via Packhorse van - 25 miles!

As Linda mentioned In a previous post I have had a bit of an issue with my knee. The descent down Dent Hill played havoc with my right knee. 

Great Gams!

After extensive research on the interweb I have self diagnosed myself to have illiotibial band syndrome! Nasty pain on the lateral side of the knee particularly aggravated by going downhill. With hopes of being able to rejoin Linda on day 4 I decided it would be best for me to skip Rosthwaite to Grasmere. 

After shedding a few tears and seeing Linda off I settled in to wait for the Packhorse driver. He arrived around 11am and we set off for Grasmere.  The driver was a pleasant fellow who spoke ad nauseum about the various floods they had had in the area for the last year or so...…


After a 30 minute drive I was dropped at How Foot Lodge with the luggage. 


At that point I was unable to get into our room so I headed off to see the sights of Grasmere. Luckily for me the local Sport show was well underway so I bought a ticket and went through the gates to have a look. There were hundreds and hundreds of folks milling about and almost as many dogs! I watched dogs herding geese, fell running, wrestling, running races, best rescue dog competition and dog scenting competitions
. 


All in all it was good fun and It helped pass the time as I waited for Linda. I also had a bit of a look through the town and sorted out where we would have supper that night. Late afternoon I headed back to the inn to await Linda who was expected sometime between 4-6.  About 5pm Linda came through the door much to my relief. It was great to see her back safe and sound! 

Day 3 - Rosthwaite to Grasmere - 9 miles

Jen has wisely decided to rest her knee and will travel to Grasmere with the Packhorse van. I head out on foot after Jen shows me how to use the GPS. I  leave by the main road but end up looping back to Nook Farm somehow…yikes, so much for my navigational skills. I finally get on the right road out of the village and soon turn off on to the road to Stonethwaite where I cross over the River Derwent  and head alongside it, talking to the sheep as I walk.

Gorgeous Herdwick Sheep - I want some

River Derwent

Gate along the path

First of many streams I have to ford

Now the path starts to go up, a slow steady descent. Beside me is the river with beautiful waterfalls and I see  a number of walkers in front and behind me.

Looking back to Borrowdale. 

Poor Gordon

The scenery is so beautiful that I don't have time to think much about the walk ahead. I just drink it all in, take my time and rest when I need to.

Eagle Crag lost in the clouds

So far, so good

The terrain is getting steeper and steeper and it's hard work.

On the way up

Eventually I come out on to a bowl of land full of little drumlins. 

Drumlins

 I decide to take a breather here as I can see my next climb, Lining Crag, off to my left looking pretty straight up from here. OMG!!!

Lining Crag

As I contemplate the climb a number of other walkers appear and I chat to a group of scout leaders who are following their Venture Scouts up to the top. I also meet two other Coast to Coast walkers, a father and son who are carrying everything, including tents, on their backs. I follow them slowly up the path and lose them in the clouds. Now I'm on my own. I follow the book and GPS along the line of cairns and decide to stop for lunch and so do a swarm of gnats. I meet a man from near my home town who is looking for a bunch of students doing their Duke of Edinburgh award programme. He has the most beautiful sheep dog called Buster.  It's busy up here, and next I meet two more Coast to Coasters, Jill and Nick from Oxfordshire. Time for me to move on.  I've decided to go up even higher on the fells and walk along the tops from Calf Crag to Helm Crag. That's the theory anyway. I have a bit of a fall and though I'm okay I've buggered the GPS and can't find the route again.

On top of the world


I make it to the top of what I think is Helm Crag and look down on what I think is Grasmere. I see two people appear over the lip of the fell and scramble down to speak to them. Yes, they've come from Grasmere but no this is not Helm Crag, it's called Sergeant Mann. I've overshot my way down by quite a bit but they show me the route on the map. She tells me with typical British understatement that it's a bit of a scramble down. He says it shouldn't be a problem and it isn't in the sense that I did get down but it wasn't easy that's for sure and I was on my bum a lot of the time.

Part of the climb down - it took me 2 hours to make it from the top into Grasmere

I was very,very happy to see Jenipher, I can tell you that. Now what has she been up to...

Day 2 - Ennerdale Bridge to Rosthwaite - 15 miles

Breakfast is unremarkable but we have a nice chat to Deborah and Margie and wish them luck on their walk. We're out on the road by 9am and walk through the village towards Ennerdale Water. It's a beautiful day, we are so lucky as the weather in the Lakes can be rainy and cloudy even in the summer.

St. Mary's Church, Ennerdale Bridge

Gates to St. Mary's Cemetery

We start walking along the side of the lake and the views are amazing. I  just happened to look down at the right time to see the picture below. What the????

Linda and Jen


Jen figures it out, Kate and Harti did part of this hike yesterday after they left us. How lovely!
The walk along the lake isn't hard but the path is rocky and you have to watch where you're going. I hear Jen say something and suddenly there was a woman right behind us - running. A fell runner, a sport for lunatics if you ask me. She bounded by us and was soon out of sight.
 

This is the smooth part of the walk. The crag you can see is called Robin Hood's Chair

The walk around the lake finally came to an end and we were soon on a logging road going into the forest with great stacks of really big logs everywhere. This was a boring part of the walk apart from the fact that we had to watch out for fell runners at every turn as there was a race from Borrowdale to St. Bee's - 20 miles or so up and over mountains etc. Not all of the runners were youngsters either! Maybe we'll take that up next.

We finally made it to Black Sail Hut, the most remote youth hostel in England. This was our lunch stop so we peeled off our boots and socks and enjoyed sitting on a real bench for lunch.

Black Sail Hut chimney and the fells behind

Food? Yes please.

Jeff, Sue and Jen enjoying lunch in the sun

We read the maps and book very carefully as apparently it's easy to take the wrong path at this junction. This is going to be our first real climb. And it is really, really hard especially since we started on the wrong side scrabbling up the mountain sometimes on hands and knees. Finally we seemed to have run out of path and had to cross the beck and lo and behold there were the steps that the book had talked about - a bit easier to navigate!

Leaving Black Sail Hut

Starting up Loft Beck

Yes, I Can!

We did it.

The view looking back over Ennerdale Water made that brutal climb worth it!

We make our way along the tops following the stone cairns that mark the beginning of our long slow descent into Honnister Pass and the working slate mine. Soon the path becomes steeper and Jen's knee (which unbeknownst to me has been bothering her since Dent Hill) starts to cause her a lot of pain. It's a difficult climb down for her but she's a trooper. Once we're on level ground the pain seems to dissipate  but we still have a long way down. She toughs it out but I know it's really bothering her. This spells trouble.

We take it as slowly as possible and finally make it to our B&B, Nook Farm in Rosthwaite. Sarah, the daughter of the house, shows us to our room.

View from our room - Nook Farm, Rosthwaite

We get settled in, have a glass of wine and decide to treat ourselves to a nice meal at the local hotel. We talk about tomorrow and Jen has decided not to walk but to take the van to Grasmere and rest up - she'll be able to rest her knee for two days as we have a scheduled day off there. I am going to do the walk from Rosthwaite to Grasmere alone - well not totally alone as I'll have the GPS!

Day 1 - St. Bee's to Ennerdale Bridge - 14 miles

Ok, so that was hard…and I'm not even talking about the walk yet. Just getting to St. Bee's was an adventure in itself, it took us 8 hours as the traffic was bumper to bumper in spots going through Birmingham and Manchester. But, we made it. Kudos to Harti and Kate for driving us up here.

We stayed at Stonehouse Farm B&B in St. Bee's in a little cottage with 2 bedrooms and a bath which we were very happy about! We slept well.

Breakfast in the house with a group of 9 fathers and sons who were biking the Coast to Coast in 3 days. It was nice to see these men with their young teenagers, having a great time together.

We set out a little after nine to meet up with Kate and Harti at their B&B. We followed tradition and dipped our toes in the waters of the Irish Sea and posed by the statue.

Jen and her pebble

Start of the walk

Ok, so now we're  really starting - up the first hill to the top of the cliff. It's heart-poundingly steep and the pack on my back is very heavy and it feels  like I'm about to fall over backwards. Can we stop now and go for a drink!!

Everyone else keeps walking so I guess I have to get a grip. We head along the cliffs for a couple of miles and it's stunning with views of the Isle of Man to our left and ahead to Dumfrieshire in Scotland where the Ritchie Clan invaded last year.

As we turn inland we say goodbye to Kate and Harti who are returning by a circular route to St. Bee's.  Jen sheds s few tears as she won't see them for a long time. 

Harti, Linda, Kate and Jen

We pass a quarry and then we're on to narrow roads through Sandwith. We can see Dent Hill in the distance and even from here it looks big.

Hill, what hill?

It's a slow climb along a forest road until we come out on the grassy part. Here it gets steeper and windier. There's a white haired man in the distance and we never get any closer to him. Later we find out from Jeff and Sue, C2C walkers we meet, that he's 89 and often does this walk! We make it to the top, huffing and puffing. We can see the Lake District ahead of us and it looks beautiful and very hilly.

Giant stile at summit of Dent Hill

In all the books we've read it says the descent of Dent Hill is very steep - it is. At times we have to wend our way back and forth from side to side and it seems to take forever but finally we're down and start walking by the lovely Nannycatch Beck.

Along the beck

The path is fairly straightforward here but we have to ford a couple of streams. Eventually we come out on the road into Ennerdale Bridge. I reach into my pocket to get my phone to take a photo and it's gone!! Arghh, I figure out I must have dropped it in the water as I jumped across. Leaving Jen to guard the backpacks I make my way back and after a few minutes run into the other C2C'ers Jeff and Sue. They have my phone, Sue had found it in the beck. Amazingly it still worked. I thanked them and promised to buy them a drink later on.

We finally made our way into Ennerdale Bridge and to our home for the night - the Fox and Hounds.

We made it, sore feet and all

We had drinks and food and met a couple of other C2C'ers, Deborah and Margie from Colorado and Texas. We'd seen them going up the first hill in St. Bee's and wondered if they'd make it. They told us they were 67 and that their respective kids were married to each other. They hadn't realized how hard the walk was going to be and Margie, the Texan, had prepared for the walk by walking in her local shopping mall as it's too hot to walk outside in Texas. They are sweet ladies, let's hope for the best. Later we went over to The Shepherd's Arms and bought drinks for Jeff and Sue, we chatted with them for a while and then home to bed. 

Linda - August 22nd - 24th - Cornwall

Left Jen boarding the Gatwick Express into London and boarded the train for Reading. There's a nose picker sitting across from me. He cannot keep his fingers away, they keep furtively sidling up his nose as if without his knowledge. I stare at him but he's still rummaging away. He's a middle aged man F.G.S. and should have a bit more self control.

I change to the Penzance train at Reading. There's an old lady sitting opposite me glued to her phone - she can text much faster than me, even with shaky hands. A proper addict.

The train is packed with rowdy holidaymakers and their sticky little children - we're like sardines in a tin and it's hot and slightly smelly. An announcement over the loud speaker pages Lord Bradshaw, apparently his table is ready in the first class dining car. Upper class twit. 

I think I must be tired as it's not like me to be so rude and intolerant of other people. 

Finally I'm in St. Austell, get the rental car (DRIVE ON THE LEFT!!!) and I'm off to Aunt Vera's - my favourite aunt of all time. She'll be 90 in December but she has more marbles than most people plus she's funny.

Beautiful Aunt Vee

We have two great days together talking about family, friends, those still here and those long gone. She tells me hilarious stories about people in the neighbourhood and family stories I've never heard before. None that I can repeat.

 I eat massive amounts of food - we have pork chops, roast potatoes, parsnips, green beans and cauliflower not to mention gravy and apple sauce followed by homemade meringues with strawberries and Cornish clotted cream. Jan, Jen and Janet all know what it's like to be fed by Vera!

Next day we drive down narrow, narrow roads to Pentewan and the Ship Inn for a lunch of crab sandwiches and white wine. We go to the farm shop at Heligan and I buy Cornish Yarg cheese wrapped in nettles. Are you starting to see a recurring theme? Lamb shanks for dinner.

One car wide- you have to toot your horn as you go around corners…a bit nerve wracking

I remember what's ahead so I get up at 6am on Wednesday and drive down to Charlestown to walk part of the 630 mile South West Coast Path. I walk to Trevarren and back, about 5 miles - it's a beautiful walk along the cliff edge and an excellent work out as there is a lot of up and down hill.

This beach can only be reached via boat.

175 steps

Later in the day we drive inland for a glass of wine at the Polgooth Inn then it's home to cook whole trout with lemon butter, peas and small new potatoes. Clotted cream is on the menu again. And more stories.

It's hard to say goodbye to Vera but with a bit of luck I'll see her again next year.

Now, I'm on the train back to Reading…and the next part of the adventure is about to begin. And of course the train is late….