Yvan Seth's Hole in the Internet

Great Langdale from The Band

We awoke quite early on our final day of real trekking, getting packed up and out of the campsite before our interesting neighbours from the day before even left their tent. It was an overcast morning, and it had rained a little overnight but our 4 inches of rain never showed up. It didn't seem imminent either, good news for the upcoming crossing! We were on our way by 0900.

Continue reading Lakes Day 7 - Three Tarns.

River Brathay at Skelwith Bridge

We set out on day 6 with some intrepidation. I'd settled things with the farmer that morning, who was fine with us stopping there ("not to wurry!") He mentioned that the radio weather had put out a warning for the afternoon, expecting 2 to 4 inches of rain during the next 24 hours. That's a lot of rain! The most we'd had was an inch on our first night wild camping (we knew it was an inch because we left our mugs outside for the evening.) Perhaps it was saving it up for a proper effort for us, since the night just past had been our first without rain (a rare night of peace for Lake District tent dwellers.)

Continue reading Lakes Day 6 - Great Langdale.

Aside from beginning and ending in Eskdale/Ravenglass we'd reached our only definite destination of the hike: Beatrix Potter. OK, so a dead author of childrens' stories isn't a destination per se. But Hawkshead is home of the National Trust's Beatrix Potter Gallery, and just down the road in Near Sawrey you can find Hill Top, Beatrix Potter's home. Yaël was particularly keen on visiting Hill Top, so it became a mandatory part of our Lakes hike.

Continue reading Lakes Day 5 - Pottering About.

Looking back, leaving the Duddon valley

The evening had been quite rainy and the rain didn't stop until well into the morning, but we survived. Once everything was packed back into our bags we made our way through the fields to the start of Walna Scar road. A crossing from the Duddon Valley to Coniston via a 600m pass. While the climb ahead of us was about the same height as our Scafell ascent it was quite easy and steady going following a much lower gradient route. (Our Scafell ascent had started close to 450m, the Walna Scar pass route started at 100m, so both were ascents of around 500m.)

Continue reading Lakes Day 4 - Walna Scar Road.