Scotland, Feb ’23: Loch Garten, Elgin, Findhorn

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Saturday 4 February

After an active couple of days skiing at the Lecht and climbing Aladdin’s Couloir, we decided to have a rest day exploring new places and giving Ryan’s sore-looking new blisters a chance to heal (graphic photo at the end of this post). From our scenic overnight spot overlooking Glenmore Forest, we drove a couple of minutes up the hill to Cairngorm ski centre, had a quick look in the large, cosy, chalet-style café, decided it was too expensive and headed back down into Aviemore. On the way we gave a hitchhiker with a broken boot a lift back to his accommodation in Glenmore Forest, then parked at Tesco and treated ourselves to a couple of tasty pies from Ashers bakery.

Loch Garten nature reserve

Ryan was keen to show me the nature reserve at Loch Garten and I was even more keen to go, so we left Aviemore (a little reluctantly, as usual) and drove 20 minutes north to the RSPB car park. Unfortunately the visitor centre was closed, but we walked up to it through mossy, lichen-covered pine forest and watched an incredible number of great, blue and coal tits feast on huge bird feeders. I was delighted when a brave coal tit landed briefly on my outstretched hand, and I wished I’d saved him some pie. I didn’t see any crested tits but I managed some relatively awful photos of the other tits and chaffinches, although I missed the greater spotted woodpecker – my wildlife photography skills could be improved:

We returned to the car park and enjoyed the Big Pines trail, which was a half-mile, there-and back footpath through the “best bits” of the forest according to the information board. It took us past some huge Scots pines which towered over a thick canopy forest on the edge of wild Loch Garten, and I was captivated by the abundance of thriving vegetation. Feeling very tranquil and (excuse the cliché) in touch with nature, we went back to the van once again and decided to head north through what was for us an uncharted part of Scotland, to the former city of Elgin.

Leaving the Cairngorms

The drive began through the northern Cairngorms, where huge grazing fields and swathes of heathland stretched between thick forests beneath rolling hills. These levelled out slightly after the pretty town of Grantown-on-Spey, and once we’d left the national park the sprawling, agricultural landscape, dotted with occasional buildings, seemed incredibly vast compared with England’s densely packed fields. We passed through the unremarkable-looking town of Forres and arrived at Elgin after just over an hour’s drive.

Elgin town

We refuelled and parked at a very busy big Tesco in the middle of Elgin town. A short walk took us onto the high street, which was old and pretty – if slightly tired – and featured a large, tiered fountain, a toga-clad statue and an impressive, six-columned church plonked in the middle of the cobbles. The yellowish-grey buildings reminded me of Inverness and the town had a pleasant buzz. Ryan grabbed some more blister plasters from Boots and we wandered towards the cathedral, stopping briefly at a couple of estate agent windows to contemplate buying a larger, cheaper, closer-to-the-mountains house than our own, and wondering why on earth anyone (including us) would choose to live in southern England rather than northern Scotland.

Elgin Cathedral

The cathedral is near the middle of the town at the end of a long, straight path that runs alongside a large, grassy park. Although most of the nave has collapsed, leaving only foundations, its two tall, graceful towers stand at the entrance, a slightly wistful reminder of architecture’s lost majesty. It was free for us to enter thanks to my English Heritage life membership (an 18th birthday gift from my incredibly generous cousin) and we wandered around for half an hour.

The two towers contained several round, high-ceilinged rooms full of old sculptures and features salvaged from the ruin, and we climbed to the top of one up a spiral stone staircase for an excellent view of Elgin and its relatively flat surroundings. To get there we went through a tiny door and walked between the towers via a narrow first or second floor passage, and it was interesting looking at the ruins to work out where other passages would have connected the various parts of the building. While we were up the tower the air smelt like rain, so we descended and shot around the rest of the cathedral.

Back on the ground it was clear where several vast columns would have supported the roof of the nave, which is now carpeted by grass and surrounded by gravestones. We walked over to the well-preserved octagonal chapter house, went inside and marvelled at its intricate arched ceiling (I’m mind-blown by our ancestors’ understanding of physics), whizzed round the rest of the grounds, where old walls stood in varying states of ruin, and left just as the deluge came.

We got utterly drenched on the 15-minute walk back to the van, although nipping into Lidl for some rugby drinks gave a moment’s respite. We’d had the audacity to venture out without waterproofs during a Scottish winter, which is a mistake I’ve made before and I’ll certainly make again. Fortunately our plans for the rest of the day involved a fair bit of driving, which gave me the chance to dry my soggy fleece.

Findhorn Foundation

From Elgin it was a 20-minute drive through flat, arable land to the Findhorn Foundation, which is situated down a long, straight road between the wide River Findhorn and Findhorn Beach. I’d read about this “ecovillage and spiritual community” online and was fascinated by the concept of an alternative type of society based around self-sufficiency and communal living. We turned right into the village and immediately it felt like a kind of holiday park, with lots of signs, narrow, tarmacked tracks, pine trees, communal buildings and a bizarrely eclectic mix of houses, huts and chalets in all shapes and sizes made from wood, stone and corrugated metal.

Findhorn Beach

We felt a bit guilty and intrusive as we drove around the Foundation, so didn’t stay long before turning back onto the long, straight road towards the pretty, coastal, almost Cornish-looking Findhorn village. We did an accidental lap around the cottage-lined streets before finding the turning for the beach, then parked up and headed over some rolling sand dunes to the edge of the North Sea.

It was grey, on-off rainy and very atmospheric. The top half of the beach was a raised stretch of smooth, multicoloured pebbles, backed by grassy dunes and a row of brightly coloured beach huts, and the bottom half was a vast, flat stretch of compact golden sand where water sat in shallow channels left by the retreating tide. The sea was calm and dark grey beneath a moody sky, which accentuated the colours of the sand and the huts, and everything was cold, wild and tranquil.

Having got sufficiently wet and chilly on our beach trip we returned to the van over the dunes, which were thick with rippling, butter-coloured grass and dark green gorse, and started our journey west. We’d finished in the Cairngorms and planned to travel across the country to do some hiking, climbing and exploring in the wilderness of the northwest highlands. We travelled along the main A96 road through Forres, Nairn and Inverness and it was dark by the time we arrived at Loch Glascarnoch, halfway between the east and west coasts of the Highlands, about an hour and a half later.

Evening

We pulled up for the night in a large roadside layby overlooking the dark, mountain-backed loch. Despite my best efforts to stream the England-Scotland six nations game I’d failed to find a way to watch the whole thing as it had already finished (thanks ITV), so we got by – having accidentally seen the score on whatsapp group chats and news headlines – watching the highlights. This was frustrating, although at least England lost (classic England – they did the same the previous year when we watched the opening game in a pub in Aviemore). Once the rugby was over we had dinner, assessed Ryan’s blister situation and planned the following day’s outing: a hike up nearby Ben Wyvis.

Scotland, Feb ’23: Climbing Aladdin’s Couloir

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Friday 3 February

Waking up amongst the great, wild hills of the western Cairngorms never gets any less special, particularly with the view we had over the vast, dark forests of Rothiemurcus and Glenmore. Our plan for the day was to park at the nearby Cairn Gorm ski centre, hike into Coire an t-Sneachda and climb Aladdins Couloir, a Grade I winter route. We’d ticked off our first winter climb at Sneachda last year (Jacobs Ladder) and had really enjoyed it, so we were keen to develop our experience on snow and ice.

Walk in to Coire an t-Sneachda

We packed our bags, drove a couple of minutes up the hill and set off from the ski centre car park. I was slightly ratty at the fact it was approaching 10am as I’d have liked to start earlier, partly because I was worried about getting stuck behind another group on Aladdins Couloir (as we had on Jacobs Ladder) and partly because I’d quietly considered attempting to climb two routes in the corrie that day, or “nip up” a nearby mountain (Braeriach, 1296m) “on our way back” to the van. It wasn’t long before Ryan expressed concern that he might develop a blister, but – perhaps a little sensitive to my delay-induced mild irritability – he refused my offer of compeed. Unfortunately that is not the end of the story.

The hike into Coire an t-Sneachda is, as approaches to winter climbing routes go, short and easy, being only a couple of straight-ish miles. We followed the clear path south to the corrie, which climbed gradually up a sweeping, heathery valley. Behind us, the Cairngorm plateau dropped away to reveal the misty swathes of forest, loch and valley around Aviemore, backed by faint rolling hills that were now shrouded in cloud. We rounded a corner and Sneachda appeared ahead, a dead-end, three-sided bowl, its dark, jagged face streaked with the bright white seams of icy gullies and irregular snow patches.

From a distance we eyed up Aladdins Couloir, which follows a wide, kinked gully wrapped around the left side of Aladdin’s Buttress, a distinctive, triangular mass of rock. Along with Jacobs Ladder it’s one of the most obvious lines up the corrie face, and probably the most central. The path ended and we scrambled across a large, awkward boulderfield at the base of the wall, stopped on the last bit of flat ground and prepared to climb. This involved pulling on harnesses, crampons and helmets, selecting an arsenal of climbing nuts and slings to use as rock protection, attaching ourselves together by a short length of rope, extracting our ice axes and – on Ryan’s part – finally affixing a blister plaster.

Aladdin’s Couloir

We’d passed several groups on the hike in, so I wasn’t surprised that we found ourselves behind four other people heading up this popular, low grade route. From the boulderfield, the approach to the gully is a snow slope which, although steep and unprotected, was firm and reliable underfoot, and we caught up with the group quite quickly. Three of them had stopped on reaching the first proper belay position, which was on the left wall at the base of the gully about 100 metres up the snow slope. With that belay spot unavailable, we checked they were happy for us to climb past and continued on, moving across the wide gully to the right wall to avoid sending any loose rocks or ice chunks down onto them.

Two factors contributed to our spontaneous decision to solo the route: firstly there were no obvious placements in the rock to set up a belay, and secondly (and more importantly) we immediately felt so comfortable moving on the firm snow that we simply didn’t feel it necessary to use the rope we’d brought. The gully looks intimidating face-on, but it’s actually far from sheer – much more of a steep slide than a vertical wall, and the gradient was consistent. Decision made, we traversed from the right wall into the middle, carefully climbed over the other group’s rope (which was draped across the width of the gully), passed the fourth climber and headed upwards.

I settled into a steady rhythm of foot-foot-hand-hand, kicking the front points of each crampon into the ground, burying the tip of my single axe with a flick of my right wrist, planting my left fist for stability and repeating. If I wasn’t happy with a foot or axe placement I’d pause and reposition, although it felt so solid that this was probably unnecessary – two constant points of contact would have been plenty. Although it was steep – an unarrested fall would have sent me and perhaps Ryan, who was below me, careening down towards the rocks below – the movement felt natural and the position stable, so we were quite happy working our way up the firm but yielding snow, occasionally resting by angling our knees into the slope and leaning in.

When we were halfway up, the gully veered right and steepened slightly. We passed what looked like a small, frozen waterfall and continued all the way up to the lip at the top, which we pulled over at 12:15, 40 minutes after setting off up the snow slope. On our right the towering, rocky spire of Aladdin’s Seat teetered over the sheer wall of Aladdin’s Buttress, as if threatening to fall all the way down into the corrie, and two friendly climbers rested below it.

Hike back

On emerging from the gully, the Cairngorm plateau appeared in its usual character: a barren, wide, foggy wilderness strewn with small, grey boulders and a strange, soil-like covering of fine, reddish stones. I pulled off my crampons and put away my unused climbing gear, feeling a little victorious. However, although we were thrilled with the Couloir, Ryan’s heel blisters had become quite established during the climb, which dampened both our moods as we moved through the Mars-like landscape – Ryan’s because he was in pain, and mine because my secret scheme (to climb Braeriach or another route in the corrie) had been thwarted.

Fortunately the dramatic, dark face of Sneachda dropped away steeply to our right and made for easy navigation – we followed the edge for a mile or so up a gentle gradient to Cairn Lochan (1215m) , then around  and down the long, sweeping ridge that forms the corrie’s west side. Interestingly Ryan and I had picked different battles: mine, without crampons, was ice, and his, with crampons, was rock. I’m still not sure who was right – there was a lot more rock, but the icy patches were so slippery that at one point I held my arms out and the strong southwesterly  wind caught me like a sail, sending me sliding slowly backwards. I had a couple of minor slips coming down the ridge, one necessitating a fairly casual ice axe arrest, and I quietly wondered if I should have left the crampons on, although with hindsight I still think they would have been more hassle on rock than my boots were on ice – and I didn’t want to blunt them.

The combination of blisters, fog, wind and frustrating terrain rendered the four miles back from Aladdin’s Couloir bleak and relatively miserable, save for Ryan’s sighting of a couple of ptarmigans. Nevertheless we made it down from the plateau in fairly good time and returned to the van along the easy Ben Macdui path. Unfortunately I don’t have many photos of the way back because I managed to lock myself out of my phone for an hour, having left it in a damp pocket.

Loch Morlich

From Cairngorm ski centre we drove for 20 minutes into Aviemore for a few supplies, then back to Loch Morlich for a scenic late lunch. The loch is about a kilometre square, conveniently located on the Glenmore road and nestled between the immense, merging forests of Glenmore and Rothiemurcus. We pulled off the road and parked on the north bank, where a few camera-wielding birdwatchers were keenly eyeing something through large telescopes. The little car park afforded lovely views across the water and above the trees to the edge of the Cairngorm plateau, and our moods were lifted further at the prospect of some hot soup and bread.

I scrambled into the back of the van, assembled the dubious kitchen setup, heated some tinned Scotch broth for Ryan and made myself a much-anticipated peanut butter sandwich. Hunger and associated irritability dissipated, and I grabbed my binoculars and approached the water in search of whatever the birdwatchers had spotted. I returned shortly with a humble report on a few lethargic mallard ducks.

Evening

The blister-gate scandal meant that further physical activity was off the cards for the rest of the afternoon, so after a brief excursion back to Aviemore to post a house key to Ryan’s brother – who, in the process of feeding Ryan’s fish, had locked his key inside the house – we drove back up to our favourite overnight spot below the ski centre and did some planning. I cooked gnocchi in a tomato sauce with miscellaneous leftovers for dinner and we spent the evening in the usual way, scattering the van with an assortment of maps and books and checking the weather forecast at far-too-regular intervals. Contentment manifest.

Scotland, Feb 23: Skiing at The Lecht

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Thursday 2 February

Our day started in the large car park of the Lecht ski centre in the northeastern Cairngorms. Ryan slept while I made coffee and watched through the window, waiting for the ski lifts to open. It was a while before there was any activity on the neat, parallel runs that spread across the snowy hillside above us – conditions were okay (ie. there was some snow) but not perfect (there could have been more). At last a couple of primary school groups arrived, I managed to rouse Ryan and we left the van for the huge, chalet-like ski centre where we hired equipment, bought ski passes and headed for the slopes at about 11am.

Given that I’d previously spent a not-so-grand total of one day skiing, uninstructed, (see previous post – Alps, January 2020), I was a bit nervous about how I’d find it. I can be impatient and easily frustrated when I’m not instantly good at something and the Alps trip had taught me there’s a knack to snowsports that I hadn’t yet grasped. I’d have liked to try snowboarding again but I’d learnt in France that a snowboard, when attached to me, cannot travel by button lift, so I hobbled awkwardly out of the centre in stiff ski boots, clutching a pair of skis and poles, £52 poorer (which I thought was good for hire and a lift pass).

Remembering the basics

There were two green and two blue lifts open. I’d have liked to start on the low-level, shallow angle green beginner slopes, just to get a feel for skis before heading up higher, but they were swarming with small children that I didn’t want to flatten. We headed for the far left button lift “Eagle 1”, worked out the contactless ski pass turnstile system – but not before I’d nearly tripped over my own skis at least once – and grabbed a lift.

Button lifts consist of a revolving cable going up and down the hill carrying a series of dangling metal poles, each terminating in a plate-sized disc at bum-level. When the traffic light at the bottom turns green you shuffle forward, grab a pole, jam the disc between your thighs and let it pull you up the slope, still standing, poles tucked under one arm. Luckily it was quite easy to get the hang of on skis, so to my great relief and mild surprise I made it to the top without making a fool of myself.

The southwesterly wind hit us hard as we dismounted but the view was lovely: the Cairngorm plateau opened up over the brow of the hill, rolling across the horizon as a panorama of snowy peaks and heathery moorland. Dark grey cloud contrasted with the bright white snow and shafts of yellow light broke through in places, making for an atmospheric sky. Somehow inspired and suddenly full of unwarranted confidence, I snowploughed (front ski tips together, rear tips wide) my way down the blue intermediate slope, which branched halfway down to give two route options. My legs were ridiculously wide and I looked like Bambi on ice, but I was having fun. The fences lining each run  – unprotected lines of battered old wooden posts jutting out at miscellaneous angles – were dubious enough to sober me into controlling my descent, which was definitely a good thing.

Presumably mid-slip
An archetypal snowplough

Unexpected improvement

This continued for several runs and I started to get a feel for the different types of snow (it was quite icy and thin in places), gradients and manoeuvres. I fell over a few times, although less than expected, and I actually found it easier than I remembered – I only got frustrated once, when I crashed and got momentarily stuck on a steep bit right by a particularly treacherous section of fence. Dragging the poles lightly behind me helped me balance and my legs inched closer together as I got the feel for it. Happy with my progress on that run, I branched left and headed for the other operational lift “Grouse”.

Grouse was a steeper lift that led to another blue run, which started off nice and gradual, then dropped into what seemed to me a near-vertical wall of icy snow. It wasn’t near vertical but it did look and feel a little beyond my skill level, so I approached it slowly and levelled out my descent as much as possible by zig-zagging down with lots of tight turns, which seemed to improve my control. Happy not to have crashed but in no rush to repeat that run immediately, I went back up the Grouse lift and took a well-travelled, gentle slope down to the top of the Eagle 1 run.

It was down this easy, scenic section that something clicked. In the Alps I’d watched people do parallel turns (where the skis remain parallel and the turn is made on one inside and one outside edge) and thought it looked so cool, but having tried unsuccessfully on those steep slopes (I’d “learnt” on blue and red runs) I was resigned to the fact that I might just be a perpetual snowplougher. However, that morning I’d googled “how to ski” and taken some basic tips from a Wikihow page, which I put into practice on this long, gentle slope. Happy that nobody was watching, I tried a parallel turn and to my utter shock, just did it. I was amazed at how natural it felt on that gradual hill, and even though I only adjusted my course slightly I was delighted. I did it again and again, thrilled that I now understood what it should feel like, and that I was in fact capable of learning to ski. I flew down the Eagle 1 blue and at the bottom I promptly informed Ryan of my success and my newfound, unbridled passion for skiing.

The “vertical” wall
Base of Eagle 1 run

Triumph

We clunked our way over to the van for a quick snack and a coffee, then eagerly returned to the slopes. The resort became busier after lunch, but pleasantly so – it was helpful for me to watch competent skiers, and the only holdup happened when a couple of kids couldn’t get the hang of the button lift. We spent most of the afternoon repeating the Eagle 1 run, alternating between the left and right finishes, and I was delighted with the day’s progress. I’d gone from a slow, wide-legged snowplougher to a quicker, less cumbersome parallel turner, although I still resorted to snowploughing the steepest and thinnest sections, the bumpy bit where I accidentally caught air and the narrow passage past an exposed, person-sized hole in the ground. I still went slightly too quick a few times (a horrible feeling), once on being cut up by another skier, but somehow managed to keep control and avoid fences, holes, moguls and children. I even did the steep run again, for fun. I couldn’t get enough of it, and we reluctantly returned our gear just as the slopes emptied and the lifts closed about 4pm.

A brief note so he isn’t left out – Ryan prefers snowboarding and is way more competent and experienced on snow than me, having learnt as a child and been on several trips to the Alps. He spent the day looking annoyingly at ease as he carved smooth turns, flew nonchalantly down steep bits, practised little jumps and coached me in his inscrutably patient, encouraging manner. He even fell over a couple of times to remind me that he’s human. 10/10 would recommend to anyone looking for an unofficial coach, price negotiable.

The person-sized hole
Getting the hang of those parallel turns

Aviemore

From the Lecht we drove around the northwest edge of the Cairngorms to Aviemore. It was a lovely road: in the foreground wild heather blanketed undulating moorland, which often gave way to areas of dark green forest, above which layers of hazy mountains stretched out lazily beneath bluish clouds. We arrived after just under an hour and straight away everything seemed familiar, as if we’d returned home after a long trip. It’s a cosy, buzzing little town, a well-known hub for mountain seekers almost within touching distance of the Cairngorm plateau, and I’ve almost never been to Scotland without visiting.

We did a big food shop at Aldi, drove along the outdoor-shop-lined road and headed east past Loch Morlich and Glenmore Lodge to one of our favourite overnight spots overlooking Rothiemurcus forest and its basin-like valley, just below Cairngorm ski centre. Ryan cooked his signature dish – burgers – while I planned the next day’s hiking/ice climbing adventure up in Coire an t-Sneachda. Wind shook the van violently and lulled us to sleep as we reflected on our wonderful day on the snow.

I was so buzzing from the day’s skiing that I forgot to take photos of the scenery, oops

Scotland, Feb 23: Glenshee, Linn of Dee, Braemar, Tomintoul

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Happily I’ve slipped into the habit of going to Scotland every winter in search of mountaineering exploits, tourist-free roads and cold, midgeless air. 2023’s trip was preceded by two weeks of chaos as Ryan and I (with some help from my perpetually patient dad) scrambled to convert our new campervan to a point where we probably wouldn’t freeze to death in our sleep, which meant spending every non-working minute sound deadening, running cables, making thermal blinds and installing a skylight, electric hookup unit, extractor vent and vapour barrier into Vandalf the Blue. It was an utterly exhausting, all-consuming, antisocial and rewarding couple of weeks, and we left for Scotland inside our shiny silver spaceship, which contained a lot of outdoor gear and an old mattress, on Tuesday 31 January at 1:30pm.

The drive up went surprisingly quickly despite two mechanical hiccups: on returning to the van at Warwick services, the driver’s seatbelt jammed as a result of – as we discovered to my intense chagrin – my overzealous stuffing of wool insulation above the mechanism. We managed to extract the insulation from the tiny holes I’d poked it in and went on our way, relieved. All was quiet until shortly after Perth, when the full beam and fog lights decided to call it quits after nearly 9 hours of driving; vanxiety returned in full force as I googled fuse box diagrams and relay replacement costs, but on finding a layby to stay in shortly after entering the Cairngorms, we turned the engine off and on again and the truant lights returned. We settled into our tin can at 1:30am.

Wednesday 1 February

Glenshee

I woke up in another world. We’d parked in a large layby set back from the A93 between the Spittal of Glenshee and Glenshee ski centre in the southern Cairngorms. I slipped (literally, the ground was icy) out of bed and climbed a little way up a hillside to get a better view, not quite believing that after the van-related stress of the previous few weeks, we were finally in Scotland. The road snaked smoothly between vast, rolling, heather-covered hills, which sprawled around each other as if each trying to take up as much space as possible. The sun had just risen over the high, near horizon, the sky was clear, the heathery ground was thinly covered in snow, and I remembered what peace felt like.

Ryan, who had spent half the night sleepily whinging that he had cold legs while also refusing to put trousers or socks on, emerged from the van, nearly slipped on the ice, and retreated back inside. I joined him and we checked the ski forecast for Glenshee. There were only a few lifts open lower down due to a lack of snow, so we improvised a plan B and headed off to explore the Linn of Dee, a well-known beauty spot half an hour northwest of us.

We wove through the immense, rising glen, which whitened as we climbed, to Braemar village, then took a long, dead-end road to the Linn of Dee. We passed some lovely, cabin-like houses overlooking a wide, flat-bottomed valley backed by the huge, smooth humps of the Cairngorm plateau and harbouring the almost delta-like River Dee, crossed a stately stone bridge and parked in the National Trust car park (£3 for the day).

Hike around the Linn of Dee

We wanted to explore but didn’t want to use up too much time, so we took a 2-mile waymarked circular trail. From the car park it descended a short way through an enchanting pine forest brimming with mosses and lichens to the bank of the Dee, which flowed white through a short, narrow, rocky gorge, then gin clear over a wide, stony riverbed. Above the gorge stood the bridge we’d crossed, which had a single arch and was made from neat, pinkish-grey stone blocks. It was a very pretty place – I could see why it was a favourite picnic spot of Queen Victoria’s.

We followed a well-maintained footpath along the river through the verdant trees. Ryan spotted a red squirrel ahead, which – presumably on hearing my squawk of eager delight at the early sighting – shot up a tree and crept around the trunk as I tried to photograph it. After half a mile we took a track north along a different branch of the river, which widened and narrowed at intervals. Majestic Scots pines lined the banks at random, heather and blaeberry bushes blanketed the undulating ground and everywhere that wasn’t river was covered in forest or scrub; the whole place felt so alive and unadulterated.

It started sleeting but lacked conviction – I needn’t have put my waterproof on. We passed an island, a couple of waterfalls and a salmon ladder (a series of steps that allow salmon to swim up steep sections of river), then headed back to the van through another kilometre of thriving, wild forest. Backed by snow-topped mountains, it was still and serene, and I felt like a not-unwelcome outsider passing through an ancient, whispering landscape. It was so good to be back in Scotland.

Braemar

After 15 picturesque minutes we arrived back in Braemar, an almost obnoxiously quaint, pretty village nestled between high hillsides and sweeping glens that – after a handful of visits – I feel very at home in. We popped to Co-op for some snacks, had a quick look in a local craft/gift shop (of which there are several) and went to the irresistible Braemar Mountain Sports, where we somehow managed not to buy anything. Ryan treated me to coffee and cake in the adjoining, cabin-like Bothy café and we sat looking at the pretty buildings, watching the river run its wide course and planning our upcoming mountaineering exploits – the frantic build-up to the trip meant we’d done no prep, which is very unusual. A moment of cosy bliss.

Scenic route to The Lecht & Tomintoul

We wanted to make the most of the thawing snow and having scoured google for ski resorts with open lifts, we concluded that our best bet was to head up to the Lecht ski centre in the northeast of the national park. Braemar is central-south and there’s no as-the-crow-flies road due to the impassable nature of the mountain plateau, so we took the incredibly scenic and now quite familiar route around the east side of the Cairngorms. After the deep forests and wide rivers around Balmoral, the landscape opened up to a rolling panorama of endless, white-topped hills, whose lower swathes were carpeted with golden grass and red-brown heather, broken only by the occasional remote farmhouse. I felt so wonderfully small.

Having stopped just once to allow a twee-clad roadside shotgun-wielder (I wasn’t going to argue) to down a pigeon and a pheasant, which were quickly retrieved by a labrador, we arrived at the Lecht about 3pm. We went in to check that we didn’t have to pre-book  ski equipment for the next day and were told by a friendly instructor that we were welcome to camp in the large car park, so with that plan in mind we watched some inconceivably-looking heavy snow ploughs darting around the slopes above, then continued a little way along the scenic road to kill some time.

Shops were closing by the time we arrived in the small, distinctly rectangular village of Tomintoul, where neat terraced houses lined the single main road. It was dead quiet, even a little eerie, so after a quick poke around a little gift shop/café we headed 10 minutes back up the road to the Lecht, nestled deep in the barely inhabited hills.

Evening at the Lecht

Our first evening in the van was lovely. I missed Björn Bongo so deeply and for the first time since selling him last August, I felt truly free. I sat on a camping chair on the mattress and did some research for the trip while Ryan cooked at the end of the bed, both of us surrounded by miscellaneous climbing and winter gear. Ryan’s lovely stew was made from burgers and leftover veg and we ate hungrily, excited to go skiing/snowboarding the next day. Life was simple and good.

Map showing the whole 12-day trip (home is the pink arrow)
Day 1: section of trip covered in this post

Bat in a Bothy

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Brecon Beacons, 26 August 2022: Redefining “crazy Friday nights”

August was a sad month owing to the long-put-off but inevitable sale of Björn, my beloved campervan. I felt tethered, having tasted the freedom that comes with van life, so I was looking forward to a bank holiday weekend spent camping with friends in the Brecon Beacons.

Björn the Bold 😥

Ryan and I headed up in an accidental convoy with Gus (who has featured in my blog previously) and his girlfriend Dan, after realising 20 minutes from home that they were in the car behind us. The journey was uneventful apart from a long-awaited McDonalds and a stunning sunset as we crossed the Prince of Wales Bridge. We entered Wales, got past the drabness of Newport (sorry Newport) and drove across the National Park, which became darker and wilder as we moved further west. We crossed a moor, navigated the steep, snaking, dead-end road to the small car park for Llyn y Fan Fach, hauled our crammed rucksacks out the boot and set off hiking just after 10pm.

I already felt immersed in the mountains. The car park sat in a narrow valley between high, rugged hillsides whose jet black silhouettes stood beneath a star-spattered sky, and the air was still and quiet. Our plan was to hike up to a bothy by Llyn y Fan Fach, spend the night there, and set off early in the morning for a 14.5mi/23km loop around the Camarthen Fans, the distinctive flat-topped mountains of the western Beacons.

To reach the bothy we walked up a gravel track that ran parallel to a river between long, high hillsides for 2km. At one point we turned our torches off (curiosity is a strange thing) and were plunged into a blackness so thick that it was quite disorientating. The path was uphill all the way but easy to follow and we reached our accommodation after about half an hour.

The bothy is a simple stone hut on the flat northern edge of Llyn y Fan Fach. I have a feeling that within bothy circles it’s known as being one of the less pleasant ones to stay in, probably because of its prominent location by a popular lake and its slightly disconcerting graffiti. At least “english BASTARDS”, which was sprayed on the wall last time Ryan and I stayed there, had been mostly removed.

Photo of the bothy from our last trip (October 2020)
Thankfully the decor has been updated

Its single room is big enough to sleep about 12 people (if you like each other) and has a squat wooden door held in place by a rock, benches along two walls, a small fireplace in the corner and a beamed ceiling that we attached a lamp to. We were immensely relieved to find it empty as we didn’t fancy spending the night with strangers, let alone ones who might consider us “english BASTARDS” – if it had been occupied and we didn’t like its occupants, we’d have had to hike back down to the cars to get the tents. We dumped our bags, set up our mats and sleeping bags on the floor and went out into the night to assess our position.

We climbed just above the bothy to the wall of a large concrete dam overlooking the lake. It was shockingly empty, presumably as a result of the summer drought; I’ve only ever seen it full of glassy, dark water, which in daylight reflects the colossal escarpment stretching high above and along its far bank, so I was a bit sad to see only a huge, deep crater of mud and concrete. In addition there was a load of construction/engineering work going on along the path up and along the edge of the lake, but that didn’t really bother us as we couldn’t see the temporary fences and assorted debris in the dark, so it was wild enough.

The dry lake and construction debris were more than made up for when we looked back towards the valley we’d walked up, over the roof of the bothy. We’d gained about 220m elevation on the hike up, which meant that the silhouettes of the huge black hills all around us had shrunk – apart from the huge, dark escarpment towering over the lake – to reveal a wide, clear, impossibly starry sky. We stood and stared, feeling incredibly small, then went back inside to try and get some sleep.

We shared Gus’s mead and settled in, four in a row. I felt a bit like a kid at a sleepover. Just before we turned the light off there was an exclamation from the vicinity of Gus that went something like “there’s a bat!”, which I giggled at and put down to his excitement, until I too spotted a shadow flitting across the ceiling. For some reason this was very funny and we watched it fly around for a while, although just for good measure we reassured each other that even Welsh bats don’t suck blood and no harm would come to us from sharing the bothy with a bat. The light went off about midnight and none of us slept much, but at least we didn’t come across any bothy-dwelling murderers.

Lake District, June 2022: 9 – Needle Ridge, Great Gable, Kirk Fell

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Sunday 19 June

We packed up, had one last breakfast with mum, dad and Angus and left the campsite at 8.30am. Saying goodbye to them always puts a little lump in my throat because I’m secretly a bit soft, particularly when we’d just spent such an amazing week together, so we hastened to plunge ourselves into the mountains for one last day of adventure. They were to drive home that day but we’d booked the following day off work, so the plan was to return to Napes Needle – the iconic rock pinnacle on Great Gable where we’d climbed a couple of days previously – this time to climb the classic trad route “Needle Ridge”, summit the mountain, hike across to tick off its neighbour Kirk Fell, then drive home that evening.

Hike up Great Gable (899m)

We drove deep into the dramatic Wasdale valley one last time and parked again at Wasdale Head. Great Gable loomed ahead in all its distinctive pyramidal glory, its dark, jagged upper reaches calling to us with the siren song unique to high and distant horizons. Loaded with rucksacks full of metal and rope, we hiked the easy, flat mile to its base, then started up its steep southwestern face.

Having already hiked up to Napes Needle, we were prepared for what was coming: a long, steady march up a steep grassy path to gain 450m of elevation in just one kilometre. Green fells surrounded us like towering, frozen, rolling waves, their sweeping, curved edges pitted with rocks, scrub and streams that cut across the surface like long scars. Kirk Fell loomed to the left beyond an impassably steep ravine of grass and scree, which actualised the scale of our undertaking – in terms of vertical elevation gain/loss our first 450m would be followed by a five pitch rock climb for another 350m to the summit of Great Gable, then a descent of 300m to a col between the mountains, then a climb of another 200m to summit Kirk Fell, then a loss of 700m to return to Wasdale. That’s a lot of up and down.

We reached the scree slopes two thirds of the way up the mountain after an hour’s walk, keeping a keen eye out for the practically non-existent path towards Napes Needle. We were eager to take a less treacherous route than we had done previously but I’m not sure if we actually found it. Paths can’t easily be spotted where they run across loose, steep, uneven rocks, changeable terrain where boots leave no mark, so our scrabble along the mountainside was no less perilous and awkward than before. Thankfully we were now vaguely familiar with the triangular pinnacles and seemingly endless grey rock faces of Great Gable’s southern face, so finding Napes Needle was more straightforward than last time and we breathed a sigh of relief as its distinctive form came into view.

Needle Ridge

We scrambled up to the base of the Needle, geared up and as is typical of fickle mountain weather, it started raining – that light but cold and deceptively wet kind of rain. It had been cloudy and dry until then, and we willed it to stop – climbing slippery rock is unpleasant at best. Deciding to push on before it got too wet, Ryan led the first pitch at his own request, which was probably the trickiest due to its polished, slabby nature and seeping rock. Thankfully the rain stopped as he clung to the marginally less slippery left hand side of the slab, struggling a little to find a good gear placement, then pulled through the crux to both our relief. While belaying I chatted to another couple of climbers who had turned up, then I followed up the first pitch, which was easy but admittedly a fairly bold lead due to the polished, damp surface.

The climb was graded a comfortable VDiff so we didn’t bother changing into climbing shoes – our comfy, grippy approach shoes were fine. Rather than belaying at the points shown in the climbing guide, we lengthened the pitches for the sake of speed and ease, choosing the ledges and flat sections (of which there were plenty) that seemed most sensible to us. This made the climbing more natural and allowed us to get way ahead of the other two climbers, reducing the risk of sending rocks tumbling towards them and ensuring we didn’t hold them up. I led the second pitch, an enjoyable venture up a steep crack followed by a scramble over blocky rock, and we continued in this way, alternating leads all the way up the ridge.

We absolutely love classic climbing routes due to their long, adventurous, committing nature, inspiring history, exciting exposure and exclusive views only attainable by those who love the mountains enough to truly immerse themselves. Wasdale sprawled below us, the far reaches of glassy Wast Water almost touching the horizon, and the rugged, hulking Scafell Pike range sat across the steep, deep valley of Lingmell Beck beyond the crinkly, green shoulders of Lingmell. We were so immersed in the landscape that we barely noticed the pitches going by, and before we knew it we were at what is described in the book as pitch 5, a 40m scramble along the final part of the ridge. This last section didn’t really involve any climbing so we de-harnessed, flagged the rope and effectively free soloed along a long, narrow stretch of rock and grass, moving quickly along the undulating ridgeline. It was easy but exposed, with a serious drop off either side, and lots of fun.

We pulled up onto Great Gable, whose summit is a sea of loose boulders, and walked a short way to the top, marked by a cairn and a plaque commemorating local mountaineers lost in the First World War. We sat and stared at the panoramic view of rolling fells, chatted to some hikers, then made our way down the mountain’s east side. The path was steep, awkward and almost indistinguishable among the litany of unhelpful rocks, and our knees were relieved when we reached the relatively flat col between Great Gable and Kirk Fell. We stopped here to talk to a 70+ year old solo hiker with an astoundingly long, difficult-sounding itinerary, passed the nearly-empty Beckhead Tarn, and started up the side of Kirk Fell.

Kirk Fell (802m)

It was a grassy, minimally rocky ascent up an easy but steep path to the top of Kirk Fell, a shapely mountain with smooth, regular slopes in comparison with its jagged neighbour. We made it up in about 30 minutes and stopped at the plateau on top to munch some Grasmere gingerbread, chat to a friendly northerner assessing a small mountain leader group and admire the breathtaking rolling landscape from our last summit of the trip. We looked down on the tiny buildings and patchwork fields of Wasdale Head directly below and reluctantly gathered ourselves for the final descent.

The path led us straight down the south face of the mountain in one sustained line and was long, very steep and at times quite awkward for our well-worked legs. It involved a combination of grassy “steps” and loose rocks, which required careful route-picking to avoid starting mini rockfalls, and was only a mile long but with over 700m elevation loss. Wasdale Head seemed not to get any bigger until the gradient eased slightly and the cricket-to-football-sized boulders were replaced by a sea of ferns split by a wide, grassy path – the home straight. We went through a gate at the bottom, trees rose up around us and suddenly we were back at the Wasdale Head Inn, where the babbling of an idyllic, picture-postcard stream signified the end of our time in the high fells.

We returned to the car feeling quite wistful and started for home about 4pm. It was a lovely drive out of the Lakes across the undulating eastern moors, followed by a brief stop at Broughton-in-Furness (won’t rush back) for fuel and a commiseratory McDonalds to mark the end of a wonderful trip. The drive home was mercifully uneventful once Scabbers (the beaten up old Yaris) stopped making dubious squealing noises, and we made it back in just over 7 hours.

A relatively big mountain day was the most fitting way to conclude a lovely holiday, which is something I struggle to do in words. We had such a good time exploring the Lake District with my family and managed to squeeze in a great mix of activities across the whole National Park, although as always we could have stayed there for a good deal longer – probably in perpetuity. Doubtless it won’t be too long before we’re back.

Lake District, June 2022 – 9/10 overall. Minus one for the fact we had to leave so soon.

Lake District, June 2022: 8 – Hardknott, Coniston, Ravenglass

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Saturday 18 June

It was our last full day of the holiday together, although nobody wanted to think about that as we were all having such a good time. Our plan was to head over Hardknott Pass and visit Coniston. Mum and dad treated us to croissants from the campsite shop, then we all piled in the van and headed east through Eskdale for the Pass.

Hardknott

Eskdale is a stunning valley, more agricultural and less wild than dramatic Wasdale (see previous day’s post) but similarly hemmed in on both sides by high fells peppered with rocky undulations and scrubby vegetation. The basin is filled with lush, stone-walled fields, seas of greener-than-green ferns and swathes of verdant woodland. We stopped halfway up the hill to look at the remains of Hardknott Roman Fort, which was clearly once an impressive structure, the remaining walls standing 2-5 feet tall and showing the position of the old headquarters, commandant’s house and bath house. Its striking position overlooks Eskdale to the west and the serious-looking fells around Scafell Pike to the north. The view over valleys, mountains and forests was sensational and well worth the climb up the hill, even for mum, who has knee problems and was giggling uncontrollably as she tottered all around the fort.

Then came the Pass. We bundled back in the van and continued up the hill at the head of the valley. As we got closer the gradient got steeper and the bends sharper, mum sounded her distress call (which goes something like “Ross, I don’t like this” in a panicked tone) and as the wheels began to spin we realised that the front wheel drive, long wheel base, fully loaded van might struggle. Luckily there was nobody behind or in front, so mum, Angus, Ryan and I bailed out and left dad to negotiate the 30% gradient and hairpin bend with Bosun for moral support. It was equal parts funny and nerve-wracking, but he made it up with minimal wheel-squealing and we raced up the hill to clamber back in.

We continued along the Pass feeling relieved. The landscape on the other side was different, higher and wilder, the road cutting through a wide, U-shaped valley between sweeping slopes of hardy mountain grass. We descended into this valley slowly, down a slightly gentler gradient with slightly more forgiving hairpin bends, and continued through the belly of the valley along Wrynose Bottom. We started climbing again and we made it through Wrynose Pass with relative ease, which opened out to sweeping moorland and a landscape that gradually flattened with distance. We headed downhill into pastoral Langdale, the idyllic valley we’d explored at the beginning of the week, and drove southeast on much more sociable roads to Coniston.

Coniston

We went straight to Coniston Water, a five-mile long lake on the edge of the village. Dad hired us a little pleasure craft and as we pulled on buoyancy aids we coaxed Bosun to enter the boat rather than the water. Two seats faced forward under a little open-backed cabin and benches at the sides and back of the “deck” allowed enough space for us to all squeeze in. The dog enjoyed climbing as close to the edge as we’d let him and we motored south down the middle of the lake, taking turns to steer. It was lovely being on the open water in such a scenic place: on the far bank the dense trees of Grizedale Forest climbed steeply up and over the long ridge that runs parallel to the lake, and on the other side the green, undulating Old Man of Coniston towered over the village and its surrounding woods.

After an hour of cruising around the lake we landed the boat and walked the short distance to Coniston village, a very pretty, quietly bustling place full of neat stone buildings, various little shops and a few pubs and cafes, all set beneath the high, rocky flanks of the Old Man of Coniston. Mum treated us to a lovely lunch in the Green Housekeeper tea room, then we wandered round the village. Ryan and I nosed in a couple of outdoor shops, an eco shop and a nice art/gift shop, then we all reconvened at the van and agreed to go to Ravenglass via the coast.

West Coast

We drove for an hour through the rolling, relatively tame, agricultural countryside of the far southern Lakes and stopped at Stubb Place, a strange area along the western coast which felt deserted. The road ran parallel to a long, pebble beach on one side and a large, flat swathe of grassland on the other, which looked very odd to us, having spent the past week in England’s most mountainous area. The dramatic skyline of the rolling southwestern fells sat above this flatness in a long, hazy grey chain, and a military zone up ahead gave the place an eerie, slightly run-down feel. Bosun ran down the beach for a swim while we had cups of tea in the van and watched him frolic in the waves.

Ravenglass

From Stubb Place we drove a short way up the coast and around a marshy estuary to Ravenglass, the village mum, dad and Angus had visited via train when Ryan and I climbed Napes Needle. It was a tiny but very charming place, set on a curve of the estuary where the Rivers Irt, Mite and Esk meet, and we parked in the village centre overlooking a long, flat stretch of water and silt. We walked along the main street, which is wide and old-fashioned with no road markings and a long row of pretty, painted cottages either side; it would have been utterly timeless had it not been for the few parked cars. We turned a corner,  read about the village’s rich history as a Roman naval base, port and fishing village, and came back along the edge of the estuary, where the low tide revealed long mud flats and grassy, marshy peninsulas on the opposite banks that must be paradise for wading birds. Residents of the houses backing onto the path could have fished out of upstairs windows at high tide, and we were baffled by a little Post Office that was strewn with newspapers and looked derelict, except that the shelves were stocked with chocolate bars and the fridges were full of fresh milk.

By this time we’d all worked up an appetite, so after some minor bickering we agreed to go to the charmingly named Ratty Arms, an interesting pub situated on the Ravenglass railway platform with cosy train-themed décor (naturally Angus chose this pub, which was acceptable as he was paying). We sat in the pretty courtyard garden drinking cider and reflecting on the holiday until our food came, which was excellent – I had an outstanding seafood salad, then a slab of sticky toffee pudding. It was a lovely final evening in the Lakes together, and after dinner we waddled back to the van and returned to the campsite at Eskdale, a 20 minute drive that took us from the coast back to the mountains along winding roads. We went to bed after an Ovaltine and more chatter in the awning, desperately wishing that the holiday wasn’t nearly over.

Lake District, June 2022: 7 – Wasdale, Egremont & St Bees

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Friday 17 June

The weather looked unreliable so we all decided to have a van-based day exploring the area. We had breakfast, piled in the van and headed off to Wasdale, Eskdale valley’s dead-end neighbour where Ryan and I had set off from to climb Napes Needle the previous day. We were keen for the others to experience the dramatic landscape of the drive along wild Wast Water and the remote quaintness of Wasdale Head hamlet.

Wasdale Head, St Olaf’s Church

Dad navigated the twisty roads and we arrived in the valley after a 20 minute drive. We stopped at a wide, grassy area of Wast Water’s western bank so Bosun could have a swim. He frolicked merrily, unconcerned by the chill of the dark, glassy water, while we hopped over rocks and took in the vastness of the rolling mountains all around us. The most iconic was Great Gable, stood majestically at the head of the valley, its triangular glory perfectly framed  by steep, symmetrical fells on either side.

Damp dog in tow (it’s impossible to effectively towel dry a thick-coated labrador) we got back in the van and continued along the narrow road to Wasdale Head. We parked up and walked along a path between delightfully bucolic stone-walled fields to England’s smallest parish church, St Olaf’s, which sits in a little wooded churchyard in the midst of the fields and fells. It’s charmingly tiny, with a low tiled roof, pebbledash walls and simple rectangular shape, and the inside is wooden beamed, whitewashed and extremely cosy, with rustic décor, rows of wooden pews, a little stained glass window and a small altar backed by deep red, velvety curtains. Mum in particular was very taken, and as we waited for her outside we read stone memorials to the mountaineers lost in the hills.

We left the church and walked a short distance between more little fields to Wasdale Head, the hamlet that seems to revolve around the iconic Wasdale Head Inn, a long, three-storied building painted cream with thick black windowframes set beneath the hulking backdrop of Yewbarrow fell. Ryan and I had been there a couple of years before to use the landline to inform Ryan’s dad of our safe return from a six-mountain hike (the valley has zero phone signal), and the place had a pleasant, familiar feel. We pottered around the little shop adjacent to the pub before going back to the van and driving back to the banks of Wast Water.

Paddleboarding on Wast Water

As is convention I was desperate to squeeze as many adventurous activities out of the trip as possible, so I inflated the paddleboard borrowed from Ryan’s brother Tom (on a seemingly long-term basis), portentously informed everyone that there was no need for me to change as I had no intention of getting wet, and – avoiding the dog at all costs – made my way out onto the water. Being alone on the lake was isolating and wonderfully liberating, and I felt like I may as well have been the only person on Earth. My world was reduced to a 7x3ft plastic board, a tiny speck set deep between the steep sides of rolling, rugged mountains, and looking over to the opposite bank I faced an insurmountable wall that formed the northern face of Ilgill Head, whose 609m summit was shrouded in thick white cloud. Grey scree seemed to flow down from the cloud, forming channels like rivers which widened to deltas and estuaries before depositing into the lake. Rough scrub, grass and heather peppered the hillside wherever it could take hold, and there were no signs of human interference – it was too steep for a path.

Fighting the wind as it tried to push me towards the southern end of the lake, I crossed half a kilometre of cold, dark water to this intimidatingly lofty wall of scree, clambered awkwardly onto slippery rocks, cut my toe and waved excitedly across the lake at the others – who weren’t even watching – as if I’d discovered uncharted land. I retrieved a stick for the dog, returned to my tethered board and just paddled around for a while, ignoring the rain, countering the wind and relishing every moment in the immense, lonely wilderness. My hiking trousers were wet from kneeling on the board and being rained on, but I didn’t mind – thighs dry. Eventually I was waved in for lunch, so I returned to the western bank, beached the board slightly more gracefully on the pebbled beach, packed up and joined the others in the van for mum’s delicious bacon sandwiches.

Egremont and St Bees

The rain didn’t subside so after lunch we left Wasdale, stopped at the nearby Sawmill farm shop (nice but pricey) and drove west out of the Lakes to the town of Egremont. I’m sure it’s a nice place but the weather didn’t do it any favours – to me it seemed decidedly grey. We bought supplies from co-op, dashed back to the van and moved on to St Bees, a nearby village on the coast. We stopped in a large car park overlooking the foggy sea and I tentatively suggested a walk on the beach, which motion was unanimously rejected. We sat in the van for a while pondering what to do; it was claggy, grey and wet, so we agreed that rather than get soggy and miserable, we’d return to the campsite and relax like normal people do on holiday – a notion that was totally alien to me.

Back in Eskdale

Dad drove us back and to my surprise the relaxing was actually quite nice. Ryan and I watched Ammonite on my phone, a lovely film about the life of Dorset fossil hunter Mary Anning, as rain drove down on the tent, mum cooked dinner and we all ate in the awning. The weather started to clear in the evening and at 9.30pm Angus, Ryan and I decided to walk the dog up the hill behind the campsite.

We went past the waterfall we’d found a couple of days before, climbed up a track and emerged onto an open, rolling moorland plateau looking out toward the high fells around Scafell Pike. The sun set over the mountains, casting a stunning red glow across a mackerel sky, and with some minor resistance we managed to prevent Bosun – who was otherwise very well-behaved – launching himself into the smooth water of Eel Tarn. We navigated around some rugged, rocky outcrop and returned back the way we came, extremely pleased to have squeezed an very pleasant, scenic sunset walk into an otherwise wet, poor visibility day.

Lake District, June 2022: 6 – Climbing Napes Needle

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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.

Lake District, June 2022: 5 – Climbing at Hare Crags

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Wednesday 15 June

Hare Crags

The weather looked dry so Ryan, Angus and I decided to go off and do some climbing while mum and dad explored Eskdale on foot. We’d looked at the climbing guide the previous evening and set our sights on Hare Crags, a southwest facing area set high in the valley just a short drive up the road with a mix of low grade routes. Our first choice was Brantrake Crag as it has a greater variety of routes, but we’d read that climbing is prohibited in June due to nesting peregrine falcons.

We had breakfast, watched delightedly as a red squirrel ran along the drystone wall behind the tents, packed our bags and set off in Scabbers. We drove east for 5 minutes along the narrow road through the scenic Eskdale valley, parked in a little roadside car park and hiked towards the crag through waist-high ferns, following the vaguest of paths. It took us about 20 minutes to find the first area, a huge slab of low-angled granite set high up in the valley in a wild area dominated by bracken, boulders and hardy grass.

The Slab

The low-angled rock was fittingly called “The Slab” and contained four routes from Diff to VS 4B. Ryan and I soloed the Diff, an easy but occasionally exposed scramble up and down the top side of “The Rib”, then Ryan led a combination of the adjacent, poorly protected “Celebration” (VS 4b) and “Easy Slab” (VDiff). While seconding the route Angus somehow dropped his belay device, so while waiting at the bottom I went to look for it among the thick ferns without much hope. Thankfully I caught a glimpse of blue and picked it up. Angus abseiled down and went off to search the thicket while I toproped the climb. At the top I took pity on him and revealed the device, then abseiled down, which took just long enough for him to see the funny side. He’ll never be too old to be taught a lesson by his big sister.

We hadn’t trad climbed for a while and were happy to take the day slowly, so after warming up on the Slab we sat at the bottom and had some lunch – some of those cheap, slightly dubious hot dogs, heated in the tin and stuffed into buns. The weather was warm and sunny and the view was stunning – we were halfway up the northern side of the wide, green Eskdale valley, which was filled with broadleaf woodlands and fields divided up by drystone walls. As we sat there some fighter jets soared overhead, their deafening roar resonating between the rugged ridges of the lumpy southwestern fells on either side of the valley. We hadn’t seen another person since leaving the car, not even from a distance, and it was one of those moments in which time stood still and everything was perfect.

Lower Buttress

Lunch over, we traipsed our gear up to the next section of the crag, Lower Buttress, which involved more bushwhacking and some careful bog avoidance. I geared up and started leading “Fireball XL5”, an interesting-looking VS 4b that started up a crack and was given two stars (meaning it’s a worthwhile climb) and a pumpy symbol by our Rockfax book.

I led the first section without difficulty, but halfway up I came to an awkward bit which involved a committing move away from a pinnacle on tiny holds and little to nothing in the way of good gear. I chickened out of the move once, returning to the relative safety of the solid pinnacle, hovered there for a bit, then gave myself a strict talking to and tried again, this time pulling myself up via a different (but still very small) hold, executing a rockover and finding a good nut placement with relative ease. Relieved but annoyed that I’d fannied around with it, I continued up a high-angled slab, probably not placing quite enough gear, to the top, a grassy ledge 20m up and out of view of Ryan and Angus at the bottom. Ryan seconded, then scrambled down the walk-off and Angus toproped up. Thankfully the others (and later the UKC forum logbook) agreed that it was bold for the grade and “a good lead”.

Our climbing was limited that day – and indeed the whole trip – by the Toegate Scandal, an incident that happened a couple of weeks before the trip whereby Ryan injured his big toe. How? By kicking the toilet while flicking his boxers off his foot while attempting to undress for a shower. Life is chaotic sometimes. The result was a persistent sore toe and accompanying whinge, not ideal for climbing shoes or relatively unsympathetic belayers.

I was keen to carry on climbing but on top of Toegate, the other two were satisfied and ready for a drink at the pub, so I conceded without much persuasion and we packed up. We scrambled back down to the car through the ferns, boulders and undulations, and headed to the well-known Woolpack Inn, only two minutes back down the road towards the campsite.

Lazy evenings in Eskdale

We had a cider in the garden and headed back to the campsite about 5pm. Mum and dad cooked a nice barbecue and we all went for a lovely evening walk, this time heading up the hill behind the campsite, past a little waterfall, and through some rugged moor-like farmland along a drystone wall. We came to an orchard, walked through a farm, watched lots of lambs chase each other round a field then returned to the campsite along the little road that splits the valley in two. As usual we finished the day talking and planning over some drinks in the awning.