White Nancy and the Saddle of Kerridge.

A short walk to start my ten days off work...Oh how I love being a lazy workfree bugger. Todays walk started from the lovely,little,laidback town of Bollington in Cheshire. Tucked away in the folds of the hills just outside the western edge of the Peak district national park. Being outside the park doesn't seem to bother Bollington the beautiful countryside around these parts are as nice as anywhere..We parked up near the Crown public house and set off...Rubbing my hands I said "That little beauty will be open by the time we get back". We could see White Nancy peeping at us over the brow of the hill, but we turned left, we would visit her on our return...The sun was smiling down on us as we climbed away from the village.

We skirted along the Eastern edge of the ridge as far as the village of Rainow, Nothing much to report along here, apart from lovely views and the swooping Swallows...They will be off soon on their long trip south to Africa...Spoke to a chap who was walking to Congleton and back via the Gritstone trail and Macclesfield forest. Good luck with that I said as I wiped a bead of sweat from my brow...boy it's hot today...We climbed up to the southern part of the ridge and were instantly treated to views in every direction.

To the west we had The cloud, Macclesfield [pictured] and the Cheshire plain with the Peckforton hills and Welsh mountains away in the far distance.

And to the east we had the beautiful prospect across the River Dean valley to gentle rolling hills backed by the hills of the Peak district...A very pleasing scene..i enjoyed it up there along the crest of the  Kerridge ridge, the ridge gets its name from Key ridge from the old English Caeg hrycg..Standing at around the 900 ft mark every step is a pleasure....We also noticed footpath signs for a new walk that has recently been devised by the friends of the Peak district called The Boundary walk..a 190 mile route keeping to the perimeter of the Peak district...oh to be fit again, I suppose I could do it in short sections [very short sections]...Us old walkers never give up. we hobble on always....Back to the ridge I noticed it was alive with Knapweed and Harebells, so I spent several horizontal minutes trying to photograph them.

I spoke earlier of White Nancy peering down on us, well we eventually caught up with her at the northern extremity of the ridge...It was like entering a party uninvited as there were several folk up there having a whale of a time..lots of frolicking and picnicking...it was hamper to the left, blanket to the right...good to see people enjoying the countryside, especially children as these are the walkers of the future, they will be looking after all things rural long after we have pegged it...so if anyones reading this that has children, you must get them out there at every opportunity...it really is important. If we all turn into couch potatoes then that's it for the English countryside.

So what exactly is White Nancy..in short a folly, built in 1817 by a local man called John Gaskill, some say it was built to commemorate the Battle of Waterloo..In those days it was a hollow structure where folk could sit down to admire the view but it has long been filled in and rendered, standing at around 18ft high it is regularly given a fresh coat of  whitewash by the good people of Bollington...More often than not it is emblazoned with an eyecatching design such as poppies or the Olympic rings at the moment there is an outstanding Manchester Bee on it...with the words Hope,strength and peace to commemorate the terrible terrorist attack in Manchester..Back down in Bollington I was pleased to see that the doors of The Crown were flung open, for all us thirsty walkers. We ordered a sandwich to have with our pints...we witnessed some proper Northern hospitally as they also brought out chips for us saying they had fried them by mistake and that we could have them free of charge..lovely people, most places would have just thrown them out....

A wet day on Bowscale fell.

Fancied doing something on the Northern fells, Bowscale fell sort of jumped out at me. Must have been over 20 years since I last climbed up there. I remember following a scrambling path from Mungrisedale  up through Gorse and Bracken to reach the 2306ft  summit via the east ridge early one summers morning. I recall continuing on to Bannerdale crags and returning over Souther fell before returning to the tent for breckie....Hey we could do that again I thought, but this time I also wanted to visit the fabled Bowscale tarn en route....I will be great I thought,i thought about it again and again....2 weeks I have been thinking about it, cant wait.

We left Doncaster at 5 am..beautiful blue skies, but we had a feeling it wasn't going to last. The feeling was right, as we passed over Stainmore into Cumbria it all took a turn for the worse, I drove the length of the Eden valley with windscreen wipers going full pelt, they still couldn't take it and at one stage we had to slow down to a crawl...it will pass I said,by the time we get to the Lakes....Fingers crossed. We pulled up into the little layby at Bowscale, it was clearing up [a bit]. Best put waterproofs on just in case.

No sooner had we left Bowscale and the bastard rain came down big style...I mean real rain, I tried sheltering behind walls, I tried sheltering behind Karen...I sort of lost it and shouted every four letter word I know at it. But still it rained...don't get me wrong, I quite like rain, but not when you are trying to take photographs, not when you have been looking forward to a walk for 2 weeks...Anyway, not going to go on about it, carried on along the track towards Bowscale tarn. This was once a popular route in days gone by, Victorian ladies would have been escorted along here on ponies to visit the tarn. It would have been part of many folks grand tour of the Lake district. Today it is much quieter, just daft buggers out bagging peaks or even dafter buggers going for a wild swim in the tarn.

We arrived at the Tarn, a beauty that sits in a craggy glacial combe. This was going to be the highlight of my walk, but not in this weather. I had planned on a paddle,or a refreshing wild swim, but not in this weather...Bowscale tarn biggest claim to fame is that 2 immortal trout live here...William Wordsworth wrote about them in a poem...No sign of them today though...As I say, this was going to be the highlight of the walk, but I think we stayed all of one minute before pushing on. Steeply uphill now following a grassy rake towards the edge of the combe, I had hoped for a shot of the tarn from above but the camera was put away into my rucksack...I felt quiet pissed off

We trudged on towards the summit shelter...it was blowing a hoolie up there, it literally felt like people were throwing buckets of water over us...soaked through by now. All fell walkers will know this situation well.

We banished all thoughts of continuing along the ridge to Bannerdale crags and took the wimps route down alongside The Tounge headed down to Mungrisedale..Things began to clear up a bit and we were treated to some lovely views of Bannerdale. These views make everthing seem worthwhile..I kept looking back up to Bannerdale crags. In a way I wish I had continued up there, I felt that we had failed to do the walk. Karen said its not a race, not a competion and she is right, those other hills aint going nowhere, they will still be there for future visits.

Nearing the valley saw evidence of the power of Mother nature as the path beside the Glenderamakin river had been washed away and the bridge over Bullfell beck was teetering on the brink of collapsing. A soggy boggy detour was asked for.

We trudged back along the lane from Mungrisedale to Bowscale...I suppose it was quite a good day. But then ive never known a day in the Lake district that wasn't.

August 5th 2017..Up,over and around Gowbarrow fell.

"Been sitting around too long we need to get back to the hills for some serious walking" i said to my wife Karen...... A few years back on my 50th birthday I finished my round of Wainwright fells, it was a sunny day in March, a day I wont forget in a hurry, finishing off with the summit of Mellbreak. Since then the bagging of hills has been put on the backburner,occupying my time with long distance paths such as the Pennine way,Cleveland way and a few local walks around the Peak district...but the call of the fells is too strong and now they are calling me back.
Today we have chosen to walk to the top of Gowbarrow fell. It is always exciting to wake up and instantly think "HILL DAY"...Its quite a drive from where we live up to the lakes but it is always worth it.We pulled into the High cascades car park just south of the village of Dockray. The sun was out and all was fine and dandy. It has been many years since I climbed Gowbarrows slopes and time had blurred my memory so it felt like a new hill to me...A lovely sight greeted us as we started our walk as we passed through a group of the most beautiful horses I have ever seen, they didn't bat an eyelid at Alfie [ our Springer] I think they liked him  and I think Alf like them too.

It was downhill to cross the Aira beck then a left turn to slowly gain height, I noticed a sign for the Ullswater way, not a walk I am familiar with, I shall be looking it up when I get home I thought to myself.

Onwards and upwards now as we climbed gently up the heathery slopes of the fell,nowhere was it too steep, no difficulties. Looking back we were treated to a nice view back down to Dockray, the weather seemed to be changing and we noticed rain heading our way

Somehow it missed us and the blue skies soon returned, in no time at all we were stood on the summit.We leant against the trig point to take a traditional selfie. The summit is set too far back for any great views over Ullswater. My fave view was looking north towards Little mell fell a beautiful scene.

We had only come a couple of miles from the car park but by now we were buzzing.Sadly though it was downhill from here but we still had much to look forward to. We followed the path down through slopes of bracken until we came to the path that traverses the eastern side of the fell. The views across Ullswater were second to none. We stopped here for a coffee and a butty on a little rocky outcrop, could have sat there all day.

It was heaven sitting there looking out across the water to the Far eastern fells,the High street ridge at the back with Hallin fell and  the emerald green fields of Martindale in the foreground. after half an hour or so we pushed on, wondering what was round the next corner. In all my visits to the Lake district I have never followed the path along the side of Gowbarrow before, its now a path I would recommend to anyone as every step is a delight, a surprise around every corner.....It certainly was a surprise when we rounded Ivy crag to be greeted with this lovely atmospheric view up along Ullswater.

Once again luck was on our side as the rains somehow missed us. This view was the view of the day for me....dropping down more steeply now. The walk still had something to look forward to though as we were nearing Aira force waterfall...we knew we were getting near by the amount of people that we met, from the one or two folks we saw on the fell we know came across dozens upon dozens of folk...on the bridge below the waterfall I had to push my way through about 50 people to get this shot of the waterfall.

From here it was back uphill alongside Aira beck..things slowly got quieter, back at the start the horses were still standing quietly by the gate...The walk was only about four and a half miles but it took us about 4 hours which was perfect as we don't like to hurry...slow down and enjoy each moment..back at the car I congratulated Karen on her 136 Wainwright top and I congratulated myself on my 29th second round top...aye its been a grand day.