Words & Photos Ian Battersby

June 01 2010

Carrock Fell deserves a better press, but it’s a victim of its position on the edge of Lakeland. The A66 whisks most potential visitors by to the honey pot of Keswick, and those that do pause are quickly seduced by the grander and testier slopes of Blencathra, whose skirt sweeps seductively up from the carriageway in a series of shapely ridges.

You see – now I’m doing it. I try to sell you the delights of Carrock Fell, and instead Blencathra takes the limelight yet again.

So as you turn right along the lane to Mungrisdale I urge you to avert your eyes. Admire the cottages, and the fields that stretch along the vale to the Pennines. Keep your gaze from those sensuous Blencathra curves. Better still, arrive in the dark as I did, and get on with Carrock’s contours, which also sweep up from the vale for a wondrous view of sunrise.

The initial gradient was surprisingly steep, but I was quickly up for the golden hour. The slopes are clad in heather and grass, but the innards are revealed at the top in a series of rocky outcrops that glowed in the new dawn. Strange lines of loose rock are likely the remains of a Brigantine hill fort. Billowing clouds, painted purple, hung over the middle distant tops of Skiddaw and Blencathra, which brooded darkly beneath them (it’s okay – you can look now that you’re a safely away). Across the Solway Firth, England dissolved into the haze of Scotland. Down in the vale, where the air was coldest, light frosts dusted the pastures, and valley mists hung thinly over rivers, which ruffled in wispy breezes whipped up by a warming sun.

Skiddaw succumbed to engulfing cloud, and Blencathra was threatened with the same treatment, but my Carrock Fell (I was the only arrival) sunbathed in the clear outlying air. I followed the broad ridge down to the col where more rock protruded, and brilliant red marsh grasses coloured a rally of small pools. My faint path now began to dominate as I approached High Pike, and indeed I’d spied the distant speck of another walker on its summit from Carrock Fell earlier, the only sign of life I saw in the hills all day. From High Pike I spotted the head of Roughton Gill, where the land gathered itself in neat folds that have split open at Iron Crag, whose rock topples steeply into the glaciated valley. It seemed a worthwhile detour from the paths, and made a good, sheltered place to snack, while watching cloud shadows chase over the land. I dropped past defunct tungsten mines into the secluded dale, where hungry kestrels hovered and parachuted down onto unwitting prey.

Distance: 9.5 miles/15km Ascent: 2210ft/675m Time: 5-6 hours Start/finish: Verge near Stone Ends Farm (GR: NY 353337) Maps: Ordnance Survey 1:50,000 Landranger sheet 90 (Penrith & Keswick, Ambleside); Harvey Maps 1:25,000 Superwalker (Lakeland North) Information: Keswick Tourist Information Centre, 017687 72645 Travel: No buses to Mosedale. Traveline: 0871 200 22 33, www.traveline.org.uk

Technical Spec
Take path SW climbing steeply up Carrock Fell. Follow path NW to summit noting fort remains on left. Continue generally WNW passing Round Knott and Milton Hill. After two miles climb N to High Pike. Return S then leave the path heading SW along the northern limits of the ridge past Great Lingy Hill. Follow edge WNW to Iron Crag. Cross open country SE to Lingy Hut (1km). Descend track ESE into valley. Lane ESE to Mosedale. Lane N to Stone Ends.