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We got out of the log cabin quite early, having decided not to bother with parkrun. On the agenda today we had a bit more walking followed by a drive down to the East Midlands. First up though, we drove into Keswick to find a local sandwich shop and get ourselves tooled up for the day.
We drove from Keswick down the recently reopened A591. This was badly hit by the floods in December 2015, the result of which was the loss of significant stretches of the road on this section. It only opened about two weeks before we drove down it, and there were obvious signs of rebuilding everywhere.
We drove down into Ambleside and then headed up Langdale for our walking. On the cards was a walk up to Stickle Tarn and a potential climb up one or more of the surrounding peaks.
We parked up in a car park that I’m sure wasn’t there when Kas and I came in 2004, and headed off up the somewhat improved paths up the mountain.
It took us a while to climb up as it was pretty steep. We kept needing to take a break, however that was fine, because having a break means having to turn around and enjoy the scenery.
When we got up to the tarn it was lunchtime, so we found a good spot on the grass and ate the sandwiches we’d bought in Keswick earlier in the day.
After lunch we’d regained some strength and enough confidence to go for a climb up a mountain.. We weren’t quite sure how many mountains we’d manage, but we decided to head initially for Pavey Ark, and then see how we felt at the top. We had to walk all the way around the tarn to get to the path up the mountain. When we found the path it looked quite unappetizing. It was kind of steep and would be classed as a scramble rather than a walk. I didn’t enjoy looking back down, and I wasn’t particularly keen on walking back down that way either.
At the top, the view was spectacular. You could see a long way as it was another clear and quite sunny day. It’s also quite a long way up.
Time was marching on so decided not to attempt any other mountains, but just to head back down instead. To get back down again we decided to follow a path that was marked on Kas’s Ordnance Survey app but wasn’t on my Garmin OS maps with Open Street Map overlay. Hmmm ! I think my maps won. There wasn’t a path there. Thankfully there was a series of gently sideways slopes we could walk down until we reached the stream bottom, and were then able to follow the stream around to the tarn and the place we’d headed off up the scramble on the way up. We know for next time, if there is a next time.
We failed to get ice creams at the NT property at the bottom of the mountain, so we decided to drive into Ambleside instead.
We parked up in a big car park near the centre and walked just a couple of hundred yards up into the town to grab an ide cream. There was a cunningly placed streetside wagon thingy selling locally made ice cream. Izzy also wanted to buy a souvenir. It was quite late in the afternoon so most places were shut already. The best we could manage was a small place right over the road. It didn’t stock very much, but Izzy eventually decided on a scarf (for some reason) and Ami didn’t really seem bothered about anything.
We drove home alongside Windermere and then past Kendal and straight home down the M6. We stopped at Knutsford Services on the way down for some tea and then drove round to my folks place in Measham to spend the night.
It had been a good week overall, especially with the weather. We’d got the kids interested in a new sport of walking up Wainwrights. Kas had done a few runs and I’d found a handful of caches in some lovely locations. It also reawakened my love of the Lake District after many years of not visiting.