Lake District

The South West.

The study and exploration of the landscape by James Anderson

Introduction

I had been thinking a lot recently about the Lake District National Park, since finishing off discovering Snowdonia National Park, now I need a  new place in my journeys of exploring the  British isles, so I had planned a one week summer holiday in the lakes.  Using a borrowed book, The Best of Wainwright Walks and a couple of OS maps, and I and a friend Chris Fox were off for our first visit to the lakes.

This turned out a great weather week also; we arrived in Coniston and climbed the Old Man of Coniston, then moved onto Great Langdale and climbed Crinkle Crags.  And then onto the Borrowdale valley and climbed Scafell Pike, Great Gable and Castle Crag all with top views.

And I was sold, so over the next few months, I did my research and planning of how to tackle the Lake District. what guidebooks should I use out of the numerous books there is on the Lake District, Mark Richards is an author I knew very well for his three volumes of the Peak Districts walks, and it was through him I discovered Alfred Wainwright and his seven volumes on the Lake District fells. 
My main interest was to use the Wainwright books in my discovery of the fells, but my other interests in such things like natural history and prehistory that would change the way I would explore the Wainwright fells over the coming months. and open up the rest of Cumbria to explore.

So this blog is taken from my notes and diaries I made while exploring the Southern Fells in the early days, it was and still is a journey of discovery, I wanted to share the way I look and how I explore the countryside  but having a background of poor education, I struggled with grammar but I enjoy my love of writing. But we will see how this project will develop over time, as I work my way through the first of the seven books. 

Wainwright's southern fells 

The Coniston Fells.

December 24^th, 2009. Months earlier, I had booked a camping barn for Christmas, for me and my friend Chris Fox, so when it came to going, the snow had come early this winter, the main roads were open, so when I took the car up the motorway and turned off the main roads for the small country roads for the camping barn are troubles had started, snow and ice, slow going but we made it to the last mile and had to park up, the track up to the farm was deep in snow, so we had to carry most things, the farmer and his tractor took everything else.

info@lakelandcampingbarns.co.uk

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Fell End camping barn

At the camping barn, we used the rest of the day setting up a home, getting the wood burner stove working to warm the place up so we could have our first night in some comfort and do some cooking. And plan what to do tomorrow.

View from the camping barn.

Dow Crag:        alt 2555 (ft), alt 779 (m) 

8-mile circular walk.

Christmas day and our first mission planned Dow Crag from Torver. Stepping outside the barn this morning to a beautiful cold, sunny morning with the view of Dow Crag from the barn. So we packed up for a day's walk and set off from the barn back to the farm and down to the car.

I found the car and de-iced it and set off slowly till we got to the A road for Coniston, once on the A road it was easy going. We found a parking spot in Torver village and set off out into the countryside into a winter wonderland.

The snow was not bad where others have walked before, but deep in others parts, with clear blue skies and the view of where Coniston Water should be in the valley, but was now filled with mist making a lovely view,  we stopped for a coffee break at Cove Bridge with views of Dow Crag now in view.

View from the Walna Scar road.

Back on the walk with a steady climb, with sections of deep snow on the Walna Scar path, low cloud was coming in also by the time we got to Brown Pike the views were getting worse, the higher up we went, we passed over Buck Pike into the cloud with a brief glimpse of Goat’s Water from Easy Gully and Great Gully, we made it to the summit with no views. It was a steady climb down to Goats Hause where we stopped for a lunch break with a nice view down to Goats Water.

Goat's Water from Goat's Hause

It was down to Goat’s Water and onto the Walna Scar track, looking at the bare rock cliff face of Dow Crag, remembering the last time I came this way in summer after coming down from the summit of the Old Man of Coniston, then I stood there watching the climbers on that cliff face of Dow Crag on a nice sunny afternoon. From the Walna Scar path, we retraced our route back to Torver and the end to a good walk

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Swirl How;    alt 2630 (ft) alt 802 (m)

6.49 miles

26/12/09,  Boxing day and for the next walk we took the car to Coniston a lovely village and parked up for the day and set out on another cold crisp sunny morning, with a three and a half mile walk to the summit.

Swirl How is part of the Coniston Fells and geographical is the centre of the group and it’s the only one of the group that sheds water into the Duddon Valley.  

Out of the village we went walking along the Levers Water Beck upstream with all signs of industrial activity from copper mines such as spoil heaps, we passed the Youth Hostel and a steady climb up through the snow to Levers Water, the snow was deep in places as we made our way up to Swirl Hause, it was tough going through the snow, but it improved once we arrived at Swirl Hause, and now the climb up the section called the Prison Band to the summit, on the way up the weather had started to close in so we lost all visibility by the time we reached the summit. 
And it was at this point also I had a big dispute with my friend, but I will go into this, but this is where this walk ended. 

Swinside Stone Circle.

6 miles.

27/12/09, After a night of sorting out, are problems and putting things to one side, we was back out again and it was a nice dry, crisp winters day. This walk is different from the others because it was not one of AW fells, but it was to do with prehistory,  so I put this together myself so to visit a stone circle of interest. I can not visit an area without showing my other interests in other things.

So we took the car to Duddon Furnace and parked up in the lay-by and started the walk passing Duddon Furnace and heading up into woodlands and then out into the fields, we met up with a family out walking, but soon left them behind, passed an interesting cave, must look into these, because these are not natural caves but man made.

We made our way around Swinside Fell and came to Swinside Farm and then to the circle.Swinside Stone Circle must rank as one of Cumbria’s most magnificent monuments, besides Castlerigg, what I visited on my first trip to the lakes in the summer. Swinside is an almost perfect circle, with a diameter of 87 feet, 51 stones.

Swinside stone circle

We stayed a good hour here soaking up the ambience of the stones, standing proudly in the snow. Even the sun came out briefly and shone on the stones.

It was time to move on towards Knot Hill, We went along the farm track to the main road and across the fields and back into the woods and the end to a good day of walking.

Hodbarrow Nature Reserve.

28/12/09, The last day of the holiday, and another interest I have is natural history, so I and my friend went to the small town called Millom to visit this nature reserve; we had a couple of hours here at the RSPB Hodbarrow Nature Reserve, a former industrial site of iron workings.

View of the Coniston fells from Hodbarrow

A nice walk around the site on this cold winters day with the fells looking pretty in the distance. Hodbarrow has a lagoon and it is the largest coastal lagoon in north-west England and is managed by the RSPB. We walked the outer wall of the lagoon checking what bird species to be seen, there were only the odd gull and some oystercatchers to be seen, and we then took a steady stroll back to the car, checking the shrubs for birds on the way.

And that’s it for being the first adventure in the lakes, looking forward to the next one, this first mission has given more question than answers, so next time I will be more prepared, some research into the archaeology of the area, the geology and the natural history will help next time as I have discovered on this trip there is much more to this area than Wainwright's fells.