Steep at Hart - Photo Gallery

The forecast of showers in the morning becoming less frequent in the afternoon didn't really tell me much. The two inches of wet snow on the road at the top of Kirsktone Pass and the interesting ABS-assisted descent gave me a much better idea of what the fell conditions were going to be. I left my car in the parking area you find at the end of the narrow road on other side of Hartsop village. There is some snow and much cloud on the tops of the hills, I should take my ice axe today it is likely to get a bit slippery underfoot.

I walked back through the village, turned right for a short walk along the road before going through the Cow Bridge car park to get to the track that goes by the side of Brotherswater. Shortly after passing Hartsop Hall there is a signpost directing you over a wooden plank footbridge, across a wet field, over a more substantial bridge on to a wet track leading to an old barn. High Hartsop Dodd starts here, there are signs of a faint path higher up but basically it is straight up a steep grass slope.

I have only made this climb once before and I remember it as a horrible, pathless, steep green climb but these days I am fitter and there are signs of a path that make it less likely that I will stray off it. Having said that it is still hard work, there is soon a good view back to Brotherswater, colourful even on this dull day. There is a big rock outcrop to get past but with the soil being thinner over it a more obvious path has been eroded to show a safe way through the rocks.

Once you get past the outcrop the path seems steeper, there are muddy foot steps in the steep green surface rather than a path and the steepness still seems to go on for a long way. Then you get to a fence with a stile where there is an old metal post with a curious hexagon shaped head looking more like part of an engine than a fence. Once across the fence the ground is immediately different, wetter and softer but no less steep and it still looks a long way up.

The higher I get now the more snow there is lying on the ground, there is another rock outcrop with boulders to step over and around before finally getting to what Wainwright called the top wall. There is still a good view of Brotherswater water behind and the view ahead is more climbing but maybe not so steep anymore. Eventually I got to the top of the steep slope, then there was snow everywhere and I was well and truly in the mist with a good breeze.

Before long I came to a small cairn that is the summit of High Hartsop Dodd, not a distinctive summit by any means and without lingering I carried on along a reasonably obvious path. There was a slight gradient and after a short while I came across another small cairn, higher than the last that seems more likely to be the summit of High Hartsop Dodd especially as there is a bit of a descent just after it. I continued over rough grass interspersed with wet peaty bogs, the wet snow making the ground more saturated than usual.

This is a flat grassy landscape where you could easily lose the path and you should keep referring to your compass in poor visibility; one of the advantages of snow is that it collects in the paths however faint they may be to the naked eye. I followed the path but I was still checking my compass anyway until I came across a sudden outcrop, an obvious small peak. The path carried on past the peak but I knew this was the summit of Little Hart Crag so I went straight up over grass and through boulders to reach the cairn on the lower of the two summits.

There is a faint path showing the easy scramble down to the col between the two summits, there is a tarn there and the water looks the colour of condensed milk; the water being in that strange state between snow and ice. There is another little scramble to the summit of Little Hart Crag and a bit more awkward scramble, especially over boulders covered in wet snow, back down to the path. There is an obvious looking path straight ahead that would take me to High Bakestones and Dove Crag but I want to go to Scandale Pass.

It is very a confusing area even without the snow and a complete lack of visibility but I know I have to turn left here, I also know that it will be slippery so it was time to deploy my ice axe. The snow here is a bit thicker but it isn't good snow, it is too wet to provide a good foothold and each footstep is followed by a little slide. As you get to the wall that guides you to the pass the snow isn't thick enough to cover the muddy path so the way down is in no doubt and you soon reach a ladder stile that noone uses because of the adjacent hole in the wall.

You cross the wall and start to climb up the other side of the pass and soon you pass back through the wall again, by that time there were a couple of sets of footprints to help confirm my navigation. Follow the wall upwards getting over the slippery boulders and past the worst of the boggy sections as best you can. After a while you will cross a wall whose condition could be described as ruined, you can follow your guiding wall all the way to the ridge but I know that after the ruined wall there is another path leading more directly to the summit.

Sure enough two sets of footprints headed off half left on a snow covered path but after a while the path disappeared and the two sets of footprints went off in different directions. I decided in the absence of path and visibility just to keep going in the same direction, as long as I was going upwards I must reach the summit, mustn't I? Anyway I got to the summit tarn so my route finding technique had worked; this tarn too was a vague milky colour and there were strange icy ripples around the edge of the water and on the banks of the tarn.

The ridge path runs past the tarn and I soon reached the summit, the other walker resting there told me he had climbed up from Kirkstone Pass and had been surprised by the depth of snow. I had decided that I was going to descend to Kirkstone Pass but I was having second thoughts, it is very steep and the path can get you into trouble on a good day. I decided to go and have a look to see if I could find a reasonable way down and as it happened there were a couple of sets of footprints going my way; would I have been brave enough to descend if the footprints weren't there?

Anyway the descent was as awkward as I had expected it to be, it is a steep way down and there are many edges and ledges not to mention dangerous gullies. The snow was deeper, several inches in places, but it was very wet and gave way easily causing me to slide downwards. I was glad of the ice axe, it helps you to get a stable foothold before transferring your weight to the other foot and you can plant it in if you feel yourself sliding. On one occasion I started to slide on my backside towards a small ledge and I stopped myself by planting the ice axe between my legs.

The scree filled sections were easier, at least there were footholds to be gained even though the rocks were loose. Further down as the ground was wet below the snow I had to plant my ice axe ahead of me and use it to hold my next footstep. As you get within site of the pass there is a final scramble down over wet ground and rocks before thankfully reaching the car park.

I crossed the road, theoretically the most dangerous manoeuvre of the day, and found the path behind the Kirkstone Inn leading up to St. Raven's Edge. This is going to be a problem for me, how do I categorise this walk having just crossed from the Eastern Fells to the Far Eastern Fells? The fairly obvious path was very wet at first until it got steeper over at first a reconstructed section and then the short scramble up to the enormous cairn on St. Ravens Edge.

I saw a couple of homing pigeons here, probably lost and confused in the mist, poor things being sent out on a day like this whereas I had come out on purpose knowing what it was going to be like. I knew what the next bit of the walk was going to be like, a long slog over the wet and sometime boggy ground of Caudale Moor before starting a steady climb towards Stony Cove Pike. In the absence of visibility, landmarks and signs of other living walkers and with ankle deep snow to walk through it seemed to take a very long time to reach the wall junction I was expecting to find.

Eventually I got to the junction and I knew I had to turn half left and somewhere in the near distance would be a couple of substantial cairns at the summit. If you come this way you should make a note of where the northwards wall is, you will need to find it again if you are going to Hartsop Dodd. After reaching the summit cairns I knew I had to follow a wall northwards, I just didn't make the connection with the wall I had passed until I had wandered around for a while.

I wasn't just wandering around really, I had a good idea of the direction I wanted to go but was beginning to wonder if I should turn around when I came across the wall. The wall was going north and there were a couple of sets of footprints too so I was fairly confident that I was heading in the right direction. The descent wasn't steep but it was a slip sliding walk over wet snow that really didn't get any easier until there was less snow.

The final climb of the day wasn't exactly arduous, just keep by the side of the wall and keep your head down and plod. There is a fairly large cairn that I suppose is supposed to be the summit but the wall is definitely and I saw something that I had to investigate by the side of the wall. It turned out to be an old wooden fence post that Wainwright describes as being the summit of Hartsop Dodd.

I wasn't looking forward to the descent from here, I have only climbed this route before and it is very steep and very green, not my favourite way of getting up or down a hill. As it happened the path is much more defined, another way of describing the erosion, than when I was here last and as such it wasn't as bad as I was expecting. Suddenly below the mist for the first time since morning is once of the nicer views of Brotherswater and the valley to Ullswater.

You reach a wall and a fence where a sign points that the footpath is down to the right but the top barbed wire has obviously been stepped over before now. I turned right and although the section of reconstructed path isn't good, small slippery stones sloping down the hill, it is far better than the eroded mess that used to be there. A final steep wet green slope got me back to the car park, the first walk for a while where I have completed my planned route.

Andy Wallace 16th April 2005