When my eldest son and I last left the reach of phone signal last Sunday evening before spending the night at YHA Honister Hause, the forecast for Monday was for a dry morning with thunder storms from mid-afternoon. We decided to set out to do a half day of Wainrights, with the option of visiting the slate mine afterwards.
First up was a steep climb up to Grey Knotts. The path was running with water, something we were to see throughout the day thanks to the recent heavy rain.
After a redundant stile, it was a short walk to our first summit of the day. From there we had views to Buttermere and Crummock Water.
The next target was Brandreth. It wasn't clear where the summit was as lots of piles of rocks could have been the highest so we wandered around taking pictures at various points. We spotted a hardy Tortoiseshell butterfly (and later in the day a peacock butterfly).
On the walk to the next summit, Green Gable, there were fantastic views to the East and West:
The highest point of the day, Great Gable, loomed behind us as we took summit pictures on Green Gable.
I got my walking poles out for the descent to Windy Gap. The climb from there up to Great Gable starts off as a path with lots of loose stones but then turns into a short scramble up some rocks. We had views across to Styhead Tarn, Sprinkling Tarn and the Corridor Route, which we planned to do the next day.
The summit plateau on Great Gable is a large boulderfield. We headed across it to the summit, where there is a memorial to the members of the Fell and Rock Climbing Club who died in the First World War.
A 360 degree panorama from the summit.
Before we set off on the next stage of our route, I walked south west from the summit to take some pictures across to Scafell Pike, our challenge for the next day.
The Westmoreland Cairn was built to mark what is supposed to be the best view in the Lake District. In this picture you can see the cairn with Wast Water beyond.
Although the route I'd looked at had us doubling back down to Windy Gap, I thought we could continue down the north west ridge of Great Gable. Unfortunately in trying to follow a path on the ground, rather than checking back with the map, I went off course and we ended up descending a horrendous scree field. Bad for us and bad for the ecosystem as we slid down it.
If you look very closely in this photo you can see one of the low flying jets that screamed through the valley.
It was a great relief to get to the bottom in one piece. From Beck Head, we went round below Stone Cove and Greengable Crag, across Tongue Beck and on to Moses' Trod, allegedly named afer a smuggler who used the path. The weather was holding and R wasn't keen on going underground at the mine so we pressed on.
Where the path turned to go between Green Grag and Little Round How there were some people taking photos of each other on a rock with Buttermere and Crummock Water in the background. It seemed like a good idea so we did it too.
There were stepping stones to cross Warnscale Beck. I did ask my eldest if he was getting his phone ready to video me falling in.
By now it was late afternoon and the thunderstorms still hadn't arrived. My son decided he wanted to head back to the Youth Hostel so I pressed on alone to Fleetwith Pike. Not a great summit in itself but it gave more lovely views of Buttermere.
On the way back I stopped off at Black Star on Honister Crag and skirted some old mining workings with some very deep holes to avoid.
We'd been out the whole day and now the clouds were looking ominious. It was one of those annoying walk outs where you can see where you're heading from some way away and it seems to get closer very slowly indeed. Thankfully I made it back to the hostel in the dry and we were sitting down to the Supper Club meal of spaghetti and meatballs before the thunder and lightning arrived.
It had been a rather longer day out than I'd first imagined as our warm up for Scafell Pike but we'd been very lucky with the weather. You can see the full route
here - just don't follow our way off Great Gable!
You can see the pictures a bit larger at
https://claire-walking-blog.blogspot.com/2019/08/august-2019-great-gable-and-other.html