Langdale Backpack - Look at the photos
I have never been camping in my life but I have somehow been persuaded by fellow members of Mixed Routes to join them on a backpacking trip in the middle of January. Having purchased some essential camping equipment it is obvious that it won't fit in my sack so I'm borrowing one that is suitably large and correspondingly heavy.
The seven of us set of from the car park at the New Dungeon Ghyll hotel up the constructed path leading to Stickle Tarn, keeping to the right hand side of the gill for the nice little scramble up twenty feet of near vertical rock. It's odd that Wainwright gives the name Mill Gill to the outflow from Stickle Tarn, the stream is called Stickle Ghyll on the Ordnance Survey maps.
When we arrived at Stickle Tarn it finally started to rain as it had threatened to do all morning. Whilst walking along the path that forms part of the dam, Robin somehow lost control of his laminated map page and it ended up in the tarn. Unfortunately I had put my camera away because of the rain otherwise I would have been able to share the view of Robin hanging over the wall at the edge of the tarn. Two of his companions were holding a leg each and a third was spanking him on the buttocks with a walking pole. He got his map back!
Walking around the edge of the tarn to a point opposite its outflow there is a short climb over scree to the joint starting point of Jack's Rake and Easy Gully, the rain had stopped by this time. Easy Gully begins with quite an awkward rock step and then becomes a steep scree climb. Robin was the third to climb over the step and somehow dislodged a couple of football sized boulders as he brushed past them, it's a pity the photos didn't record the conversation as he held onto the rocks to stop them rolling down on to the others.
Easy Gully is an intimidating place, scrambling over boulders and loose rocks surrounded on all sides by steep cliffs and then you reach the really big boulders that block the way. At the best of times this is a difficult obstacle with a twenty foot drop on to rocks at the side but with heavy backpacks it becomes even more interesting and we had to take the packs off in order to get over it. Good co-operation from the team and determination from each individual got us all safely past the rocks and onto the easier path leading to the summit of Pavey Ark.
By the time we reached the summit the mist was reducing the visibility enough to give the Mountain Leaders a good test whilst practising their navigation skills. We walked over to Thunacar Knott and then on to High Raise over featureless grass in extremely poor visibility. The walk then to Sergeant Man is complicated by the wetness and muddy peat hags that makes even the most detemined of purists to make diversions from the required route. In all of this it has to be said that with my local knowledge I knew where I was all of the time and in fact I had to tell the rest of the gang that they were wrong when they thought they had reached the summit of Sergeant Man. It is ceratinly a very confusing place in mist but there is no mistaking the summit of Sergeant Man.
More confusion on the descent from the summit as I missed the path and realised I was heading in the wrong direction, followed by everybody else. It was a few minutes before I recognised where I was having retraced my steps for a short distance back to a place where I had taken a photograph last week. Having found the footpath going eastwards towards Blea Rigg it was a matter of locating the rash of cairns that mark the left turn towards Easedale for Codale Tarn. As well as being misty it was also getting dark, it was interesting to note that there wasn't much navigation being practised as I led the way until we reached a point that was deemed to be suitable to make camp.
The rain held off just long enough to pitch the tents, my first attempt at cooking on a camping stove resulted in an acceptable meal of pasta, a tasty sauce and a snow shower that preceeded the rain. Confined to the tent from half past five, Dave and I managed to share the contents of a bottle of whisky, we both slept well as a result of the day's strenuous exercise. Fortunately it had stopped raining by morning and the mist was clearing as I got up, remarkably showing no ill effects from the evening's strenuous drinking.
I took the short walk up to Codale Tarn in a wonderfully wild setting, and the easy path up to the summit of Belles Knott in complete contrast to the fierce crags it displays to Easdale. There was a splendid view down to Easedale Tarn, and further down the valley a temperature inversion caused the hills to look like islands in a sea of cloud.
When we got going it was back up to the ridge, the view down Easedale getting better as we gained height. On getting to the ridge we were greeted by a view of the sombre but exhilarating crags of Pavey Ark with Harrison Stickle beyond, seeming to be competing for the attention of Stickle Tarn. We headed downwards without searching for footpaths down to Bright Beck and accompanied it to Stickle Tarn.
Rather than follow the path by the side of the gill (or is it ghyll?) we followed the under used footpath passing below the cliffs of Tarn Crag and then zig zags down the steep slope to meet the popular path at the waterfalls. The path is well constructed but slippery when wet with being under used. The temperature inversion also existed in Great Langdale and lasted almost until we reached the waterfalls. The final walk back down to the car park was very warm with the large packs and without being cold for the first time since yesterday morning.
An excellent outing in excellent company.
Mixed Routes is a virtual club comprised of members based throughout UK with a mix of outdoor related interests, if you want to find out more about the club visit http://www.mixedroutes.org.uk We originally met through our membership of the internet magazine www.outdoorsmagic.com that has a forum where informed and relevant discussion quickly deteriorates into meaningless but humorous banter.
Andy Wallace 18th & 19th January 2003