Thursday 16 June

Our appetite for climbing had been whetted by the previous day’s excursion in the Eskdale Valley and the weather looked dry, so after breakfast and red squirrel watching at the campsite Ryan and I left the others for an attempt at a particularly special rock climbing route. Mum, dad and Angus would spend the day catching the train from Dalegarth, the cute station we’d walked to a couple of evenings before, to explore Ravenglass on the coast. Angus thought about coming with us but decided that he was happy to have hiked up Helvellyn and climbed already at Hare Crags, so he decided to commit some time to steam trains, historical places and other Angus-like stuff.

Napes Needle

Napes Needle is one of the UK’s most iconic climbing destinations. Set halfway up the south face of Great Gable at the end of dramatic Wasdale valley, the popular starting point for Scafell Pike, it is a distinctive, upright pinnacle of igneous rock about 18m high at an elevation of 680m. Ryan’s dad had been to see it in his mountaineering days and it was detailed in all of his old climbing books, so we felt obliged to go and stand on top of it – for me, classic routes of such rich historical calibre have a special kind of allure.

We bought lunch from a tiny shop in Eskdale village and drove along little roads to Wasdale. As we reached the banks of the wild, black Wast Water, the deepest of England’s lakes, we seemed to shrink into a landscape that grew upwards all around us all the way to Wasdale Head, the dead-end hamlet nestled in the heart of the long, three-sided valley. Each mountain merged into the next in a vast mass of green and grey, and I felt that spine-tingling anticipation that I only ever seem to encounter in wild, whispering places that seem as old as time.

Approach

The weather was cloudy but clear, and Great Gable – along with its nearly-as-gargantuan sister Kirk Fell – blocked the head of the valley like a sleeping guard dog. Named for its recognisable pyramidal outline when seen from Wasdale, its southern aspect has a distinctly serious look about it: loose, grey scree sweeps down into the valley, dominating over scrubby grass that grows patchily wherever it can take hold, for about three quarters of the way up its steep face until turning to huge, vertical blocks of grey rock that form cracked, triangular ridges all the way to the 899m summit. Although the walk-in is barely two miles as the crow flies, it involves hiking up about 650m of steep elevation gain on awkward terrain, as we would soon discover.

The first mile took us through a farm and along Lingmell Beck, a suspiciously flat, pleasant walk between the hulking sides of Lingmell and Wasdale Fell. Ryan decided that he felt unwell after crossing a little bridge just before the ascent began, so we sat down and he ate a pasty while I masked my concern that he might get ill on the mountain. He perked up a little and we began the climb up to the climb. It was an unforgivingly steep and direct route up a rocky, grassy path, and I kept an eye on Ryan while making a concerted effort not to go too far ahead. Luckily he seemed to recover just as the going got really tough, when we calculated (using an OS map) that it was time to turn off the path and seek the Needle high up on a steep scree slope spanning the face of the mountain.

There was no obvious path that branched off, so we found ourselves scrabbling sideways across tight clumps of grass and loose, slippery scree on the most-path like course, which wasn’t path-like at all. This continued for what felt like an age, and was really quite treacherous – most of the scree chunks qualified as small boulders, which we desperately didn’t want to send toppling down the side of the mountain, and neither did we want to go that way. As well as unstable the ground was very uneven, with boulders of all shapes, sizes and jaunty angles jabbing into legs and doing their best to roll ankles. We also had to keep our eyes peeled to the left, as Napes Needle was marked on the map (such is its significance) along the ridge of sheer grey, samey-looking cliffs and ridges that we’d seen from the car park.

The Needle

After a couple of false identifications, a lot of staring at seemingly identical pinnacles of grey rock and even more frustration at the ongoing struggle over tricky ground, we suddenly looked straight up at the unmistakeable Napes Needle. We approached up a deep, rocky, grassy gulley and, on seeing a couple of climbers already on it, scrambled up the rocks opposite and perched on a grassy ledge overlooking the Needle and its mind-blowing backdrop.

Seeing Napes Needle in person made me appreciate why it has its own name, position on the map and place in mountaineering history. Its undeniably phallic form stands independent from the rocky ridge behind it, a proud pinnacle watching over the valley beneath Great Gable. A skyward-pointing arrowhead forms its right hand side, split neatly into large triangles and diamonds by large, geometric cracks. The wildly undulating slopes of Lingmell rose up across the other side of the valley, looming over grassy Wasdale to the right, and just behind the Needle the immense form of Scafell Pike sat neatly between the rugged shoulders of Lingmell and Great End. To our left hulked the intimidating southern face of the top of Great Gable, a vertical maze of sheer ridges, slabs and gulleys, the blocky, brown-grey rock punctuated by grass wherever it could set root. There aren’t many climbs I’d queue for, but this is one of them.

One pair of climbers was on the second of the two pitches and another pair was gearing up ready to climb, so we sat across the gulley and watched. It was mild, sunny, still and clear, perfect conditions, and we happily ate snacks and photographed the other groups. Another pair scrambled up and onto Needle Ridge, the long route we’d complete in a few days time (and a later blog post) that began in the V between the Needle and the exciting-looking ridge behind it, so they were added to my “give me your email address and I’ll send you the photos” list, which I made by calling across the gulley.

The first pair abseiled off, which was helpful to see as we’d read mixed reviews of the abseil online, and later confirmed that the in-situ gear is good. We had to wait a while for the second pair to climb but we didn’t mind – we took photos and encouraged them from across the gulley. When they started abseiling down we crossed to the base of the Needle, geared up and discussed who would lead each of the two pitches of the classic 18m HS climb “Wasdale Crack”.

The first pitch was a 13m diagonal climb up the large crack between the arrowhead and the needle to the “shoulder”, a ledge just below the bulbous tip of the needle. The second was a short 5m up the back of the tip, but is famously polished and supposedly the crux move. We decided that I should lead the longer, crackier pitch due to Ryan’s injured toe (see previous post for an explanation) and he would do the short move to the top, so I chose some nuts and cams and started up the crack.

It was a straightforward, easy crack climb and the gear was solid, but its polished surfaces worn shiny by thousands of climbing shoes added a layer of uncertainty and excitement. I reached the belay without much difficulty, clipped into the five in-situ slings thrown around an overhang under the back of the rock, added a couple of nuts for extra protection and brought Ryan up from a very comfortable anchor. He tiptoed around the bulbous, exposed end of the “needle” and after some minor reluctance, pulled himself up and over the summit. He made an anchor by draping the rope under the overhanging rock and brought me up, at which point I understood his hesitation – the holds were polished, the moves were awkward and the position was extremely exposed.

Standing on top of that pinnacle was a surreal experience. We were on a tiny island just big enough for two people to squeeze onto, surrounded by a sheer 15-20m drop on all sides. The dramatic panorama I’ve already described stretched around us, the valleys seemingly even deeper, the mountains even wilder and the horizons even further than they had been before. It was isolated, extremely exposed and somehow serene.

After a long, quiet moment of appreciation, I downclimbed to my belay point and Ryan followed my instructions, boldly downclimbing while removing the gear he’d placed. He nearly failed to dislodge a nut, later joking that he could have been “that guy that placed the big silver nut in Napes Needle”, but managed to get it back and return safely to the ledge. We clipped into the five slings, noting that at least two looked new, and took it in turns to abseil down the first pitch. Back on the ground, we packed up our stuff, vowed to come back to do Needle Ridge, and scrabbled out of the gulley and away from the Needle.

Descent

We headed east along more treacherous scree for about a kilometre, following an extremely vague path through the rocky rubble. At one point I kicked a rock (thankfully I had my stiff approach shoes on so no further toes were injured), stumbled and nearly toppled sideways down the steep slope – I caught myself just in time and when I turned around, saw that Ryan had also grabbed my rucksack. By the time we reached the main path through Lingmell we were quite bored of the awkward ground, where every step necessitated precise planning and execution, and it was nice to be back in amongst the ferns.

We walked back to the car along the base of Great Gable’s intimidating southern face, surrounded by high, unforgiving fells and pleased with the day’s adventure. Back in the idyllic agriculture sliver that is Wasdale Head, a tiny green paradise wedged between the monstrous hills, we nosed around the miniscule St Olaf’s Church, but later returned with mum, dad and Angus so I’ll save writing about it until then. It had just gone 6pm and we were due to meet the others at the Woolpack Inn in Eskdale for dinner, so we shot back to the campsite, changed and walked the short distance along the road to the pub.

The Woolpack Inn

The Woolpack is a historic inn nestled deep in the Eskdale Valley, miles from any major town, let alone phone signal, yet somehow it always seems to have a nice, quiet buzz – I’d visited years before and we’d been in for a drink the previous day. Painted white with black-framed windows, high-ceilinged and timeless, it feels very welcoming after a day in the mountains. We sat out the front in the large, grassy garden and Angus and I argued for a while about something or other until it turned too political and dad issued a telling off – at least it had taken us until Thursday. I had a lovely stonebaked veggie pizza from the simple but varied menu and the others had various forms of pizza, pie and salad, then we walked back along the quiet, bucolic road and had Ovaltine in the awning. A relaxing end to an eventful day.