Yesterday was our second trip into the Lake District in order to climb mountains since the end of Lockdown 3.0 the fine Spring weather was forecast to continue so it all looked good!
We often find ourselves in conversation with folk on the subject of a "Quality Mountain Day" and try as often as possible to make our days in the mountains fit the criteria of such. Mountain Training suggest a number of key features that a QMD should possess and some of those that we think are particularly relevant in our planning as a provider of this sort of day out are:
- the need to plan / design a day rather than simply copy what others have already put out there
- to journey / navigate away from well trod paths
- to create opportunities for ourselves or others to increase knowledge / practise skills
- to ensure safety
- to spend more than five hours on the journey
- to climb a substantial mountain
Yesterday's journey, in our opinion, fitted the bill quite well.
Our trips down to the Langdale are fewer & further between than those to the more northerly Lake District Fells simply because of the travel time involved. However, a good weather forecast; the opportunity for a relatively early start from home and the knowledge that mid-week in April would surely offer a less crowded space than what is likely to come in the summer holidays all contrived to motivate us!
The plan was to do a round taking in: Pike o Blisco; Cold Pike and Crinkle Crags with a bit of "off-piste" navigation and maybe a little steep ground work. As such we arrived at Sticklebarn at 09:30 and were on our way about ten minutes later. There was a bit of a road walk down to the gate of Stool End and then a sharp left up the lane; uphill before leaving tarmac and following the path alongside Redacre Gill, it was a steady ascent crossing the gill before the ground gradually levelled out for a while and Pike of Blisco summit came into view. There were a few rocky steps to negotiate before finally gaining the summit at around 11:30, an hour and threequarters after setting off.
Despite the high cloud not having cleared to the extent that either the Met Office or mwis had forecast the summit views were excellent and the protection offered from full sun exposure welcome. We plotted a slightly off the beaten track route to Cold Pike by descending over a series of rocky steps to Red Tarn, this worked really well with the navigation being easy in these conditions and what would undoubtedly have been boggy ground being quite firm after the dry early Spring weather. Eventually the main path from the Wrynose Pass was intercepted and the summit of Cold Pike gained shortly afterwards.
Next up was the obvious route to Crinkle Crags, I've only been once before and they didn't disappoint on a second visit: high, rocky and with superb views. The traverse across them was the highlight of the day, even on this popular section the number of folk we saw only reached a total of ten! Viewed from the vantage point of Crinkle Crags Bowfell was an outstanding spectacle (see photo at beginning of this post). A brief stop at Three Tarns reminded me of a wild camp here some sixteen years ago when doing Mountain Leader Training, a great night with temperatures down to minus eleven degrees and a night navigation exercise on Bowfell and Esk Pike!
Our descent from Three Tarns was via "The Band" in ever clearing skies and brightening sunshine. It was good to be able to view everything we'd done through the day from this perspective. With only having done one previous day out in the high fells since the end of lockdown we were feeling pretty fatigued and flat ground for the last fifteen minutes or so back to the van was welcome.
We were out for just about eight hours and the total distance covered on this route was a little over 10 miles.
Mal
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