I decided to spend a few days in the Lakes at the Bank Holiday and base myself at Honister YHA as I had planned 2 walks straight out the door, so no problem trying to find a parking space. The previous day I walked from near Whinlatter forest, doing 7 Wainwrights and nearly 15 miles but most of the day was spent in cloud with some rain, no views and the photos were hardly worth taking. "Barf" was not only a hill I climbed that day but how the days walk felt.
So, it was fantastic to wake up to a wonderful sunny morning and I set off in t-shirt and shorts instead of the full waterproofs like I did the day before, it wasn't long before the sun-cream was applied in ideal conditions. Leaving the Hostel, there was 2 options to get to Grey Knotts, you could follow a fence from the hostel right to the summit, which looked a steep option OR follow the route that most people take to Great Gable, along the old tramway and then turn to the left at Drum House and take that path. I chose this one rather than straight up. My route was that when I got to the craggy part further up the path I would contour along until I reached the fence and then follow that to the summit, I couldn't see a path but you just followed underneath the crags. It wasn't long after meeting the fence that the summit was reached and I got my first real views of Great Gable hiding behind Green Gable and fantastic views.
It wasn't long before Brandreth was reached and then I decided to "bag" Base Brown while I was up that way which meant almost getting to the top of Green Gable and taking a path down to Base Brown. The problem with going down is that you have to come back up again, and it feels twice as steep but it was a good path. It was only a 12 mile walk today so I spent longer on the summits taking in the views, at times looking down towards Borrowdale and at times looking over the summits of Haystacks, High Crag etc. and the track past Black Sail to Ennerdale Water and remembering a year to the day that I'd been up those hills on a Coast to Coast, happy memories.
After Base Brown, it was a bit of a puff and pant to Green Gable summit where I decided to have my lunch, rather than at Great Gable as it looked far busier and I could see people approaching it from all angles. It's actually quite easy to get from Green Gable to Great Gable summit as you start of quite high anyway and there was only a couple of places where I had to use my hands for little scrambles before I got to the top, decided it was far too busy and headed off towards Kirk Fell.
Now, had I had known what the descent to Kirk Fell I had chosen was going to be like, I would have taken a longer but easier route. The path started off steeply but a decent enough path but then soon turned into scree and very steep at that. It was very hard to keep upright on bits of this as both feet were sliding and nothing to hold onto with your hands most of the time. Eventually when I reached the bottom I actually gave out a big "phew" and a few expletives, vowed never to go that way again. I looked back up and realised just how steep it was.
I hadn't taken in much scenery on this part apart from looking down to Wasdale as I was more concerned about trying to stay upright, the bottom of my legs all scratched from the scree as I was wearing shoes and not boots.....oh, but that's another argument.
After the scree episode, it was nice to walk in a normal stride up to Kirk Fell and look back at Great Gable. There was a helicopter flying round it and it spent ages out of view but I could hear it, I was hoping it was a training exercise, it would later fly over my head towards Ennerdale. Again, the views down to Black Sail and the surrounding hills were fantastic in this weather.
It was time to head back towards Honister and very soon the path was joined by the one that Coast to Coast walkers would take after they pass Black Sail. It was quite a long walk back towards Honister but it was a nice path and very enjoyable. When I got back to the old tramway, I decided to head straight over it and towards the quarry as I was going to "bag" Fleetwick Pike then walk down the road to the hostel. Not a lot of climbing was involved as you are already quite high up but the views from the summit again were fantastic, looking down to Buttermere and Crummock Water.
Although it wasn't one of my longer walks, I enjoyed this route and would do it again (apart from the scree)
some of the views...
