Mardale South - Misty Photo Gallery
It was a typical grey October morning when I arrived at Mardale Head, it was clear enough at valley level but the hills were full of mist. I walked back down the road to find the start of the old Corpse Road from Swindale, I had made sure to look out for it as I was driving up. After walking for about a mile you get to where the imaginatively named Rowantreethwaite Beck passes underneath the road and shortly afterwards you get to a gate that lets you on the the fell. The gate is opposite Riggindale on the other side of Haweswater and in the middle of the lake is the small island of Wood How where there were a number of geese, I couldn't really make them out but there was certainly a gaggle of them judging by the noise they were making.
When you go through the gate there is an obvious path taking you steeply uphill, if this was a corpse road the undertakers must have been strong boys to get coffins down or up even with the help of pack horses. On the lower part of the path you can see a couple of impressive waterfalls on Hopgill Beck and another beck with the intriguing name of Captain Whelter. Not only is the path a constructed one in places there are also some ruined buildings, were these related to the purpose of the path or part of the community forced out by the creation of the Haweswater reservoir?
The initial steepness of the path gives it some interest and if you stray off the path to get better views of the waterfalls you can get into a very steeply interesting climb requiring hands. After you pass the ruined buildings you get to a wide grassy plain where the faint but obvious path is marked by upright poles, in the absence of rock there isn't much material available for cairn making. I know where Selside Pike is but I have no intention of making a beeline for it, the direct route is bound to be boggy. Just as you start to descend towards Swindale there is a marker pole where another path leaves at right angles and in the right direction into the mist.
The path is faint but obvious enough to follow although I should really check the map and compass, I have followed wrong paths before. Apart from the path there are no other landmarks, in the mist it isn't clear where the high ground is so the last thing I wanted was for the path to split. I chose the left hand branch because it seemed to be the more obvious path but it wasn't long before I felt that I was not going uphill enough. I reached the remains of a wooden enclosure, confirming my suspicion that I was on a shepherds track and decided I had to use my instinct and experience and head uphill, and the map too of course.
Shortly after starting to go uphill over rough, pathless grass I saw the fence that the map shows as leading to the summit and sure enough it took me to with ten metres of the substantial shelter cairn. The fence turns off at a right angle and is a reliable guide all the way to Branstree even though there are some muddy sections to bypass, especially just below the old survey pillar. At the bottom of the depression between Selside Pike and Branstree there was a view below the mist of sunshine in Riggindale. Shortly after you start to climb upwards you can see the remains of an old survey pillar on the horizon, a reminder of the days when Manchester was in the process of turning Mardale into Haweswater.
The fence would take you directly to Branstree but on the high ground ahead you can see a tall cairn, you have to walk over the only rocky ground on this hill to reach the impressive two cairns on Artlecrag Pike. The cairns are in fact the only things higher than the fence on Branstree but the fence is what you head for again, although I had to use my skill and experience again to find it because I couldn't be bothered using my compass. The fence meets a wall almost at right angles on the left close to a permanent puddle too small to be called a summit tarn. A faint path takes you to the right, past the puddle and within twenty metres you are at the small summit cairn and what looks like the fixing point for a triangulation column.
This was as far as my planning had got the previous evening so it was now time to make up my mind about the rest of the route. I decided to continue on following the fence down to Gatescarth Pass, at the bottom of the path is a very swampy area that in itself justifies the wearing of boots with a high ankle. Immediately opposite is the path leading upwards to Harter Fell, this reconstructed path looks like one of those created by a JCB. The path doesn't look half as good as those nice stone built ones but without any shiny downward sloping slabs I would be happy to descend this one in the dark and wet.
The ascent is uneventful and in the mist it doesn't really feel like a hill walk even with the upward gradient, although there was a brief hazy glimpse of The Rigg and Haweswater. It is something of a surprise when you reach the twin summit cairns with their embedded decorations of old metal fence posts. This big flat top could easily cause the odd navigation problem or two but I'm fairly sure I know where I'm going. I think if I follow the fence there is a big cairn at the place where I have to turn right; I was walking about twenty metres off the path looking for other clues in case I was wrong about the cairn. Even at this distance from it the first thing I saw was the cairn and after turning right I saw another big cairn, I was descending to Nan Bield Pass.
It was good to be walking on rough ground after all that grass and the mist began to clear so I was able to see the rugged descent even if the views of Kentmere reservoir and Small Water were a bit hazy. By the time I got to the shelter at the pass there was a reasonable view to Haweswater on one side and on the other I watched a sunbeam moving up the valley of Kentmere and across its reservoir. There is a fine rugged walk up to Mardale Ill Bell and the conditions had become quite bright although all of the other local summits were still covered in mist.
From the clarity at the summit of Mardale Ill Bell I was heading towards the dark mist, still covering High Street. There are no navigation problems, the eroded path is visible all the way up to the mist, there is not too much in the way of gradient and you reach the summit wall of High Street without any trouble. The wall runs along the length of the crest and as long as you turn in the right direction you have no problem finding the summit cairn and triangulation column. The summit is broad and flat which means that it doesn't drain too well so the walk by the side of the wall is wet and muddy in many places.
I carried on walking past the summit and as I started to descend I could see that it looked bright and sunny on the other side of Straits of Riggindale. Before you get to the Straits the path crosses over the wall to take a drier course before you start to climb upwards on a suddenly much more substantial path. The path would take you to The Knott; I thought about it but I might not have enough time for everything else so I took the path that branches off to the right around the head of Riggindale. The path upwards quickly becomes good and wide, the distinctive shape of Kidsty Pike is straight ahead, the mist has mostly cleared and a strong breeze is providing the weather conditions description.
If you follow the path you will end up at the summit of Kidsty Pike, but where it makes a bend to the right a very faint path continues ahead upwards. The faint path is much clearer than it used to be but still there is an element of having to know that the summit of Rampsgill Head lies ahead. A short distance beyond its summit cairn is another cairn where I could see the valley of Rampsgill filled by sunlight in contrast to its dull windy Head. If you continue onwards there is a faint path that takes you downwards and if there is any visibility you will see High Raise ahead, in any event you will come across a reasonably obvious path.
The path will take you past the summit if you are not careful, you need to bear right a little over rough ground before reaching the large cairn at the stony summit of High Raise. From the summit I retraced my steps back towards Rampsgill Head but at the muddy bottom of the col a less obvious path goes off to the left over grass. In less than ten minutes you take Kidsty Pike by surprise and you are suddenly at the summit at its impressive high position where the ground falls away dramatically. Now the sun has really come out, the wind has dropped, the visibility is good and I'm beginning to feel a bit warmer.
I set off along the easy ridge towards Kidsty Howes and it had become a lovely afternoon, it's a pity my camera batteries had run out and the spares were uncharged for some reason. The walk downwards is longer than it looks as usual but I was expecting it to be so, I seemed to be walking for a while without losing much height. After I passed the rocky knob of Kidsty Howes I started to lose height on quite an interesting rough descent, it seems to be very eroded as though it is a busy path, maybe it was more popular before Mardale was flooded.
After the roughness the path became like a steep lawn, admittedly there were some deep foot holes in places but it was a lovely easy walk on a warm October afternoon. After crossing a small area of wet ground and the footbridge over Riggindale Beck the path was marked out by parallel rows of upright stones, a very nice and neat municipal solution. This really is a beautiful valley in a way that has not been obvious to me before, was it always this way or has the enforced abandonment to make way for the reservoir made it so?
Andy Wallace 15th October 2005