It was another damp day when I parked next to the bridge at Dockray, I had planned a route but it was difficult to tell exactly how long it would take or even if I would have time for it all; I had no intention of following the circuitous right-of-way route and would have to make my way as best I could. It started off easily enough, I crossed the bridge and turned right almost immediately to walk up a track, signposted as leading to Aira Force; there are many signposts and they all remind you that it is a permissive path. I get the feeling that the permission is given grudgingly, but it's better than just putting barbed wire on the tops of the fences and locking the gates.

There is a signpost pointing out a permissive path to Gowbarrow Fell, it's up the hill and very muddy; it should be better once the path-under-construction is finished. There is quite a nice view of Ullswater as you gain some height, attractive even in the gloomy conditions; as the gradient eases, the path becomes less muddy and less distinct and there is a steady climb by the side of wall almost all of the way to the summit. Shortly before the crest of the wall, a fainter path bears right; the summit triangulation point is visible as you walk on a soggy path through the heather before the short, muddy climb to the summit of Gowbarrow Fell. Everything I had planned to climb was visible from the summit but it was obvious that there was a lot of walking to do between the climbs.

It is a steep muddy descent from the summit, heading generally back towards the wall and in the direction of Little Mell; there are a couple of interesting looking outcrops to negotiate on the way down before you reach a very soggy bottom. The path disappeared amongst the wet grass and lush bracken, I could see a ladder-stile over a wall-junction on the other side of the depression, but there was no obvious direct route through the fully-grown thicket of bracken. I made made way to the nearest wall thinking the bracken might be less dense by the side of it, but I was wrong and had to struggle through the six-feet high fronds to reach the stile. On looking back down directly to the soggy bottom I could see that there was a better way through the bracken that simply wasn't visible from the other side.

After climbing over the stile I was pleased to see that there was no more bracken, I walked on an easy gradient over grass and heather to the summit of Great Meldrew. I then descended to a fence by the side of a forest plantation, then walked by the side of the fence until I reached a corner where there was a wooden stand holding some fire-beaters. I turned to follow the fence as it bore left, until I reached a small stile; I crossed the fence using the stile and followed a path that resembled a fire-break. The long grass was swampy underfoot and it felt as though there should be forestry on my left as well as on my right, maybe that is the plan.

After I got past the forestry, I had to climb over a locked gate and walked along a track to the road; I had to climb over another locked gate topped with barbed-wire and when I got to the other side of it I saw was it was marked “Private”. I crossed the road where a stile gives you access to an obvious steep path through more bracken, muddy foot holes in the grass are not quite as slippery as grass by itself. After I got above the bracken-line the path turned right on an easier gradient up to the plain, grassy summit of Little Mell. There is a faint footpath in the grass heading towards Great Mell; after an easy descent, I got to a col, where I bore left at first until I reached swampy ground by the side of a fence.

I decided that this route was taking me out of my way so I walked back up to the col; I followed the contours around to the right hand side of the subsidiary mound, the faint path I was on ended at a gate and I carried on round towards where I thought I should descend. I had to climb up on to the ridge to avoid a gully, but my plan to descend directly towards Great Mell seemed to be working. It was a good idea and it would have worked perfectly if it hadn't been for the gorse; with hindsight it would have been easier to climb back up the slope and walk around the gorse that struggle to find a sometimes painfully sharp way through it. Eventually I got down to a tarmac road and remembered how I had climbed Little Mell last time, I should have continued on my original route down from the col.

It was easy enough to find my way down to Greenrow, one of a small number of houses in the area, but it took me a while to work out how to get across to Brownrigg Farm. There is a shiny new kissing gate that I walked through at first and the signpost said “Permitted Footpath to The Hill”, only when I realised I was going in the wrong direction and wouldn't be able to get directly across the Nature Reserve did I see that The Hill is just another house. I walked back up to the new kissing gate and on to the road to find an innocuous looking gate just a few yards away. I walked on a faint footpath across the field in front of Greenrow, passed through a gate in the fence, and followed the fence on an increasingly diminishing footpath until I reached an un-crossable barbed wire fence guarding an impassible stream.

I walked back along the fence to a gap and walked diagonally across a field, not really sure that I was going in the right direction, until I caught sight of the footbridge that is marked on the map. I had to make a convoluted, but signposted, detour around Brownrigg Farm until I found a stile crossing a stone wall; after crossing the wall the uneven and overgrown path had been planted with trees. Eventually I reached the road, it had taken so long to get here that it was too late to complete my planned walk.

At the road I turned right, and after a short walk I reached a track on the left; after walking a few yards up the track I cam to a gate where a National Trust signpost bore the name “Mell Fell”. I went through the gate, and followed a muddy path on the left that kept inside the fence to the edge of woods; then there was a grassy highway climbing steeply upwards through the bracken. As I got above the bracken-line it was an easier gradient, walking through the interestingly shaped wind-blown pine trees and beyond to the grassy summit.

I had planned to descend directly to the track running by the side of the derelict Racy Cottage; it was steep but not too much, what I hadn't accounted for was the fully-grown bracken, it would have been very awkward to get through. I had decided by this time anyway that I wasn't going to get over to Great Dodd, so I followed the contours around the steep green slope back to the path through the trees. I wasn't too disappointed though, it had been a different walk to my usual, and the sun had come out in spite of it still being very breezy, and Great Mell was the nicest hill of the day.

Having got back to the path I retraced my steps down to the track at the bottom, and walked along the quiet roads to Ulcat Row and then followed the green path back to Dockray.

© Andy Wallace 16th August 2008