Southwest Lakeland part 1

Summer mission of the South-west  part 1

Over the past five years of exploration, using Alfred Wainwright’s book The Southern Fells and other books as my guides of exploration, I have explored south-west Cumbria, now has the Southern Fells come to a close I planned to revisit some of the areas again and to combine it with an exploration of alpine and bog plants and also to clear up some of the fells I did not get good views from.

June 27th, 2014

Scafell Backpack 9 miles.

So I and a friend took the car up to Wasdale Head and parked up and then we had just over an hour of eating and packing up for a planned wild camp near Lingmell Col. We set off in the late afternoon for Lingmell Beck and the climb to Styhead Pass on this sunny afternoon.

Cotton grass

From Styhead Pass we took the Corridor path and just before Lingmell Col was, we found a nice camping spot. We set up camp and watched the sun go down. I had a bit of an uncomfortable night and was awake at the crack of dawn, So I got up to watch the sun come up, feeling the chill of the morning I sat there with a coffee watching the clouds move over the mountains as my friend joined me.

Sunset

We decided after breakfast that it was time to pack up and get on the move for today's mission. so we set off for Lingmell Col with Scafell as the destination,  but before that, we were greeted with the top of Piers Gill, and an abundance of plant life. Alpine pine club moss, Fir clubmoss, Yellow saxifrage, Roseroot, Alpine lady’s mantle, and mountain sorrel just some I discovered.

        

The Lake District is a stronghold for Arctic-alpines - plants thriving in the cold and harsh conditions of high latitudes.  When the last ice age came to an end these plants dominated the Lake District vegetation, but now they are restricted to the highest ground, especially north- and east-facing coves and gullies. 

These species often flourish where the soils are rich in basic minerals which in the high fells generally equates to the gullies or flushes.
                    

We made it over Lingmell Co but low cloud covered the highest fell summits, but not deterred because they were on the move clearing again, maybe I can have the window of opportunity when I reach the summit of Scafell.

The next section of the walk was down to Hollow Stones and the rough path up the screes to Mickledore, once on Mickledore we had views into Eskdale and across to Crinkle Crags. It was at this point my friend opt out the next move, the path to the summit of Scafell. My friend would wait on Mickledore for my return. 

So I set out on the rough path to Scafell, this route is a classic accent of Scafell known as the Lord’s Rake, I have put it off twice before, but this time I was determined to succeed the climb.  I came to Deep Gill with the massive crags of Scafell surrounding me, I went into the steep wide scree gully rising into the mountain, it was tough going with the boots slipping on the sliding stones, I worked my way up the gully, and I had to stop at one point, another side gully came into view  and the gully was a profusion of one flower, this was Starry saxifrage, I managed to photograph some while sliding on the scree not easy to do. I pushed on to the top of the gully; it should be easier on the return route. Ahead was another decent and then a climb. I made it to the stony summit of Scafell and the view was poor but better than last time, that time we could not find the summit, but had walked past it in the thick fog.

Deep Gully and Starry saxifrage

Now the return route was a repeat of Lords Rake back to Mickledore and meet up with my friend. The decent from Mickledore back to Wasdale was a long and hard going are leg muscles were feeling it with the extra  weight of camping equipment, and now the heat of the day, we passed Hollow Stone and carried on  into Lingmell Beck on this hot sunny afternoon to the finish at the car park I and my friend were so tried and the backs of our legs aching after it.

We left Wasdale behind and went to Eskdale and had a nice evening and camped at Hardknott fort. Next morning we woke up to low cloud and drizzle, we had planned no high-level walks today, we were still aching after yesterday mission, so we decided on an easy low-level walk today.  

Stanley Ghyll, 29th 2014

A revisit on this damp morning to Stanley Ghyll, at least it has stopped raining; Stanley Ghyll is a deep stream-gorge cut into the granite. The gorge carries the Birker Beck through a series of waterfalls to meet the River Esk.

This wooded ghyll has a rich assemblage of mosses, lichens, liverworts and ferns.   

We followed the stream into the ghyll, the atmosphere getting damper, everywhere we looked there were ferns everywhere, even the sessile oaks had polypody ferns growing on them. We climb the path to the waterfalls and enjoyed the view of the falls, and then retraced the path back.

Stanley Ghyll

We left Eskdale and took the car to Coniston and picked up some food supplies and went to find a campsite. We had a relaxing afternoon at the campsite and then decided on a small evening walk.  

Bleaberry Haws

The weather now had improved to a nice dry evening so we set out from the village of Torver to do a small walk to discover the ancient sites of the Bronze Age. I tried to visit this site last summer, but the weather conditions got the better of me.

We reached the open ground with wide open views, with Coniston Old Man ‘Mother’ mountain in view, this mountain was the focal point of all the communities that lived between the mountains and the sea. And these burial cairns is where they laid there dead. 

We followed a track and the faint footpath to the old slate workings.It's at this point me and my friend split up to start looking for are first cairns, searching through the pathless grassland till we found Bleaberry Haws.  

Bleaberry Haws

The cairns were not easy to find because they were grassed over and we did not find the small stone circle what was mentioned in the book.

It was a nice place of solitude and got me thinking about what ceremonies that were held here with the mother mountain in view the Old Man Coniston.

We retraced our route back to the quarry and followed the path back to Torver.

Geology walk, 30th 2014

This next walk was a revisit to the Coniston Copper Mining area, we parked up in Coniston and set off following the deep gorge of Church Beck over the Miners Bridge and along the track up to the Youth Hostel passing through an industrial area of spoil heaps. After the Youth Hostel, we started to climb still on a track road, till we found a path that took us over a wooden footbridge and we followed this path at the side of the beck climbing steeply crossing the spoil heaps of Simon’s Nick and up to Levers Water.

Time for a rest and it was a nice sunny day, the last time I was here, was when I left my dad's ashes up here, now was the time to have a few moments thoughts about him.

We left Levers Water looking for a path that would take us into the Boulder Valley and it was while we were looking for this path we came across entrances to Simon Nick mine and started to look at the spoil heaps closely, the area had been picked-over by geologists, I was looking for green patches in the chunks of rock, it was just a matter of ‘getting my eye in’ it was here that I came across copper appears as malachite a form of the metal composed of copper carbonate.

We carried on down into the Boulder  Valley looking now at the rocks, these where the Borrowdale Volcanic rock, a rock that was formed from ash that had welded together in a treacle-like mass. The large rocks near the path had rippled surfaces; a clue that this ‘treacle’ must have flowed some distance before setting. 
The path led to a wooden footbridge across Low Water Beck, and once over we came to the Pudding Stone – the largest named-boulder in the Lake District after the Bowder Stone.
The path took us over Crowberry Haws and then descending on the path back to Miners Bridge and Church Beck we then retraced are the route back into Coniston.

Pudding Stone