Last year's Lakes trip, just before this year's Lakes trip

Saturday 28 September to Saturday 5 October 2024

Ruth and I are about to set off for the Lake District, on Saturday morning. Ray and I went at around this time last year, and the weather was mainly good, but I can’t help noticing that Storm Amy is on the way. This image from the BBC distinctly includes Cumbria.

Also, the BBC weather forecast for next week doesn’t look fantastic, but I suppose Sunday onwards clears to one drop of rain rather than two.

Here’s a collation of notes from last year’s Lakes trip, as I yet again failed to blog about it at the time.

Where we stayed

Acorns, a duplex apartment that’s part of a complex on The Falls, a road off the Kirkstone Road on the eastern side of Ambleside. There were various mills in this area in the past. Further up The Falls there are some converted mill buildings.

View of the development that includes 'Acorns'

The living area at Acorns

I loved Acorns and submitted a relatively gushing (for me) review of it after our stay, and have booked it again for this year’s trip (it’s now being let via Lakeland Retreats, who did seem to have a significant presence in the area judging by a number of properties we walked past). The flat was lovely and very comfortable accommodation. It included a Bluetooth speaker (very useful) and an Alexa, which I probably wouldn’t have used but Ray was a bit more up for messing about with it. It did give us quite a pleasant jazz selection one evening. I feel no particular urge to get one though.

Acorns has a little balcony and although you can’t see Stock Ghyll from it as it’s down in a dip, you can hear the water, which I found relaxing.

Day 1: Hayes Garden World, Stock Ghyll Force and walk along country lanes

We started our first day with a suitably massive breakfast. Ray cracked into a pack of black pudding that he’d brought. I don’t care for it but had brought some Richmond skinless sausages, which I was equally keen to get started on.

Ray's black pudding

My skinless sausages

We went to Hayes Garden World, as I had an idea to get a pair of Crocs or similar for use on Acorns’ balcony and Ray decided he wanted new walking boots. Neither of us actually found what we were after, but we were distracted by the OTT Christmas display that was up. I was childishly amused by the genuine fake bits on this faux stag.

We went for a bit of a walk, initially taking a steep path up behind the Salutation Hotel and walked along Lower Gale, then turned up into the exclusive-looking Gale How Park. We followed a footpath that brought us out onto Stock Ghyll Lane. We walked into the woods and had a look at the falls.

Gale How Park

Stock Ghyll Force

Then onto Stock Ghyll Lane again further up, past the Victorian turnstile, and carried on up the lane. At Low Grove House we turned in and crossed a field, passing Roundhill Farm and eventually coming out onto the Kirkstone Road. We walked a short way down here and then returned to The Falls via a footpath through Thistly Wood, and Sweden Bridge Lane.

View from Stockghyll Lane

Looking careworn by a field

Some cute small sheep with horns

The part of this from the falls onward was following the ‘Stock Ghyll Force’ walk from Walks Around Ambleside.

Route of our walk; about three and a half miles

Day 2: Bowness and boat trip

The only rainy day of our stay, and even then it was more drizzle than lashing rain. We took the bus to Windermere and walked down to Bowness Pier, a walk of about a mile. I hadn’t been to either Windermere or Bowness in quite some time and had forgotten that it is actually a bit of a walk between the two, though the walk enabled us to call in at Stuart Sports, where Ray bought a new flask and I bought a pair of socks. I also spotted this adorable portable sandwich toaster – if I ever did that camping thing (it’s still a no) I might even have bought it.

Bowness is pretty tacky - it seems to be the Lakes' one tacky place. Which I guess is fair enough. The forecast had been for much heavier rain than it actually was; I think we’d have done more of a walk if we’d known it was only going to be light rain. However, the fun part was that we decided to take a boat back to Ambleside. I do love a boat trip. Here I am looking absurdly excited, even though it was raining.

Tiny island

Arriving at Waterhead

We had an OK-but-not-memorable lunch at the Waterhead Hotel, before walking back into Ambleside.

Ray back at Acorns, perusing Wainwright

What's this then? The John Lewis Partnership? Is this like a weekend place for staff?

Day 3: two walks from Grasmere village

Quite a strenuous day, this.

We took the bus to Grasmere and set off to walk up Helm Crag, a pleasingly-shaped pointy mini-mountain. This was a lovely walk with fantastic views at pretty much all points.

Looking ahead to Helm Crag

View from the path up

View from summit plateau

Technically speaking, the summit of Helm Crag is a craggy bit of rock called the Howitzer. I was not going to shimmy up that and was happy to count the grassy plateau as the summit. I think one of Ray's Wainwright books noted that Wainwright himself never scrambled up to the actual summit. This page gives instructions for how to scramble up it, if you're so inclined. There is apparently a pretty steep drop off the far side. Ray had a brief go but gave it up fairly rapidly.

Helm Crag elevation

Helm Crag route from Grasmere

We lunched in a café in Grasmere and then Ray persuaded me (at least, I'm blaming him at this stage) to tackle a second walk, to Easedale Tarn. This was a slightly longer walk than the first one, albeit not as steep. We left Grasmere in a north-westerly direction once again and then followed a path uphill alongside Sour Milk Ghyll to reach the tarn.

Easedale Tarn

Easedale Tarn is a "corrie" tarn, which I think means that it's in a bowl-shaped glacial hollow. It's a scenic spot. It's on this list of Lakeland wild swimming spots (not that I'll be doing any of that). My book Exploring Lakeland Tarns tells me that it's 69 feet deep and that in the 1930s, teas were served up there from a hut. That's long gone. Ray and I have been there twice and it's been a pretty quiet spot both times.

The route back

Getting to the tarn was fine; getting back proved a bit more of a schlep as it was over some waterlogged and uneven ground. The walk book describes the path as "vague and damp in places", which was about right though as I recall "damp" seemed a bit of an understatement.

Footbridge over Far Easedale Gill

Route of our Easedale Tarn walk

Both these were walks out of the above book. Both were between 4 and 5 miles, the Easedale one slightly longer.

Day 4: walk to Troutbeck via Skelghyll Woods

We started off along Old Lake Road and then took the steep and narrow Skelghyll Lane.

Rusting sign at the bottom of Skelghyll Lane

My fascination with the houses high up in Skelghyll Woods continues. Once again, we passed the clearly no-longer-used gates to a house called Skelgarth, and I photographed them again, a bit more overgrown this time. I don’t know why I wrote on the previous trip’s blog entry that I couldn’t find any existing house called Skelgarth, as one such came up readily on the Royal Mail address finder.

There are now only two driveway accesses that look current. We did some rootling around on the invaluable National Library of Scotland map resources, and found a 1970 map (snip below) that clearly shows a winding drive up to a house. It must have been quite steep, hence the bends I suppose, so maybe it was left to grow over for safety reasons.

Gates to Skelgarth, 2020

Gates to Skelgarth, 2024

Map showing old drive to Skelgarth

A bit of internet nosing suggested that Skelgarth and the two large houses either side of it are all in the ownership of Skelghyll Estates – or at least, were at the time we looked. The two bigger houses, Broad Ings and Skelghyll Woods (the top and bottom houses on the Google Maps snip; I assume Skelgarth must be the one in the middle) seem to have been let as holiday rentals in the past, and Broad Ings seems to be currently listed on AirBnB.

Path through Skelghyll Woods

We followed the path through Skelghyll Woods and then across farmland and down a lane to Troutbeck. I don’t think we walked into Troutbeck village, mainly because we’d already ascertained that the tea room was closed. We followed a bridleway, Wain Lane, down to the A591, passing Middlerigg Tarn. Exploring Lakeland Tarns told me that this tarn is artificial, and describes it as follows:

It is a fine, broad ornamental pond with swans a-swimming and fish a-leaping

We didn’t see any fish a-leaping, but did see a couple of swans.

Middlerigg Tarn from Wain Lane

The Lake District Visitor Centre at Brockhole was just across the road from where Wain Lane comes out, and we popped in thinking we’d get a cup of tea there, but popped back out again on encountering vast numbers of infant-school-aged children with their minders. We caught a bus back into Ambleside and had tea in the town instead.

Our route (about five miles)

Day 5: Red Screes via Scandale Pass

This was our 'big' walk of the week. We had, in fact, planned to do the Fairfield Horseshoe, but both wimped out of that one. Ray has done it before, but I hadn't and probably should have done but felt a bit lazy - though, in my defence, not too lazy to tramp up Red Screes. This was another walk out of the book with the orange cover.

We followed Nook Lane north to Low Sweden Bridge and then footpaths to the beautiful High Sweden Bridge.

High Sweden Bridge, behind trees

The path up through Scandale

The path through Scandale was lovely. After we turned right at the end of the valley to go uphill towards the summit of Red Screes, things got a little more gnarly as the ground was very wet and it was difficult to follow the path. We did, eventually, get to the top of the ridge, probably via a more circuitous route than we'd have taken in dry weather. There were a few people at the summit. This was a lovely day weather-wise; great views from the top.

Me at the summit of Red Screes

Red Screes Tarn

We followed the path back down suggested in the book, with Kirkstone Pass down to our left.

The route of our Red Screes walk. About eight miles.

Day 6: walk to Grasmere

Despite declaring the previous evening that we weren’t going to walk at all on the Friday, we did end up walking along Rydal Water and Grasmere into Grasmere village, a walk of about five miles. We left Ambleside via Rothay Park and the little road Under Loughrigg. Ray crossed these stepping stones over the Rothay that had been under water at the time of our previous visit in March 2023.

Rydal Water

Our route

We had tea and cake at Freda & Ray's in Grasmere village. In the evening, we went to Zeffirelli's, where we had dinner and saw the Sam Braysher Trio perform.

Dinner at Zeffirelli's

The Sam Braysher Trio