Captain's Log

Dockray

It was the last day of our latest Lakeland campaign and looking at the weather forecast, it was going to be our first rain-free one. To take advantage of the improved conditions, I decided to do a high level route.  The route would start near to Dockray and then follow a ridge of Explorer hills that form the northern boundary of Ullswater. There would then be a further climb up to the higher Wainwrights which would include Hart Side, Green Side, Stybarrow Dodd, Watson's Dodd and Great Dodd. The Kapitan, Cabin Boy and I had already completed the Wainwrights of course, but we were now ticking them off for Ted.  We’d then drop down the valley between Great Dodd and Clough Head, before returning to the car using the easy path of the Old Coach Road. 

I was grateful we didn’t meet anybody travelling the other way as I drove along the single track road from Dockray to High Row. There may well have been a lot of reversing involved if we had. I parked in the offroad area at the T junction near High Row. The good thing about this walk was that it had an easy start and we retraced our route along the road to Dockray. It was all downhill and didn’t take long. A Robin, high in a tree, sang us encouragement. A Red Squirrel gave a cameo performance in the village and then disappeared into the foliage of a tree. ‘There’s some hikers down there!’ shouted a young boy who seemed to be precariously half hanging out of a bedroom window of The Royal Hotel. I waved back in the hope that he’d pull himself back in. Just over the bridge, we picked up the path to the open fell. This would be where the hard work would begin. 

Watermillock Common

To be fair, the climb was fairly gradual up to the first Explorer hill of the day, Common Fell. It may not have been raining, but two month’s worth of rain had left the ground very wet and I was glad that I was wearing my waterproof socks and gaiters. There were fine views along Ullswater from the summit of Common Fell. The day had started hazy and this wouldn’t leave us for the whole day. It did provide a lovely layering of the landscape as we looked towards the hills to the east of Ullswater. The cloud ceiling was just scraping the summit of Great Dodd. There was plenty of time for that to burn off before we got there. After the climb up to Common Fell, the path got easier as we followed the broad ridge southwestwards and ticked off the Explorer hills of Watermillock Common, Swineside Knott and Brown Hills. The tops of these hills hardly seemed like summits since they didn’t have a cairn and were fairly flat. We turned westwards, following the northern edge of the Glencoyne valley. This gave us an impressive view of Sheffield Pike on its south side. We reached a stone wall that headed off uphill; this would be our navigational guide to the summit of another Explorer hill, Birkett Fell. 

Dodds

Rather than follow the wall up directly, we drifted westwards away from the wall in the hope of getting a view of Glencoyne Head. We never really got a good view of it and so after a while we started heading directly towards Birkett Fell summit. It was a trackless meander, but the terrain was reasonably easy going. As we crossed the fell, I came across a discarded shovel and two empty canisters. One canister said Lithium HD EP on it. I had to look it up. Apparently it is a grease that is designed for extreme-pressure and high temperature conditions. Presumably some heavy machinery had been up here, although I could see no evidence of it.  At least it probably meant there wasn’t a dead body around here, which was my first thought when I saw the shovel. 

Birkett Fell ticked, we headed up to our first Wainwright of the day, Hart Side. Ted appeared out of the rucksack rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and posed for his photo on top of the cairn. He disappeared back into the rucksack. It was going to be a busy day for him. We stopped for a break and it was rather pleasant to soak up some sun for once. The sogginess underfoot continued as we plodded across to Green Side (aka White Stones). As we approached the summit, the view opened up westwards to Catstye Cam and the Helvellyn range where there was still one or two patches of snow. There wouldn’t be any skiers using the ski lift on the slopes of Raise today though. We headed westwards up the obvious Stybarrow Dodd path. It was a steady plod, but we eventually reached the cairn on its flat summit.
‘I’m surprised we’ve not seen any  people out today given that we’d not seen the sun for a couple of months’ I said to the Kapitan and Cabin Boy.
‘Well there’s two people over there on Watson Dodd’ said the Kapitan ‘...and we also saw somebody walking a dog near Dockray’ he added. It is in the Kapitan’s nature to always contradict somebody at the slightest opportunity, rather than agree with the sentiment of their statement. 

We descended towards Watson’s Dodd. The two walkers that the Kapitan highlighted headed off to climb Great Dodd. This morning’s cloud had completely disappeared from its summit. Watson’s Dodd was slightly off the direct route between Stybarrow Dodd and Great Dodd. I always think it's worth making the diversion though since you do get a great view down to St Johns in the Vale from its summit. 

The two walkers that we’d earlier seen on Watson’s Dodd, were now approaching the summit of Great Dodd. We followed them up the path. It was a gradual climb, made more pleasant by the views to the northwest towards Keswick. It made a change to climb Great Dodd without being buffeted by a strong wind. The conical hill does seem to attract gales. There was only a slight breeze when we reached the top and we were spoilt for choice on its large flat summit to plonk ourselves down and have our lunch. As we munched on our goodies, we watched two paragliders taking flight off Clough Head. There hardly seemed enough breeze to keep them airborne today. 

Wet Descent

Little Dodd was an Explorer hill just off Great Dodd’s west ridge path. Most people bypass it, but we made our way across to its small summit cairn to earn our Explorer tick. It was worth making the small diversion since it did give a good view over Great How to Raven Crag at the north end of Thirlmere. I did think about extending today’s walk to include Calfhow Pike and Clough Head, but it would have made it a fairly long day. Also, I wanted to investigate the path that descends the valley between Great Dodd and Clough Head. I’d a vague idea that I’d used the path before, but if I had, then it would have been decades ago. We could see that five other walkers had a half a mile start on us along the path. 

Mosedale Beck ran down the valley and we crossed it high up before it turned northeastwards. A track kept appearing and disappearing. I wasn’t sure whether these were made by people or sheep. It was obvious that this was not a popular route. The fell was quite wet too and not for the first time today, I was grateful that I was wearing waterproof socks and gaiters.  The terrain got a little wilder as we approached Rowantree Fold. Our ‘carrot’ was a more obvious track that we could see beyond it. When we reached the track, I was disappointed to find it so moist that it was easier to walk on the trackless fell running parallel to it. Even so, the Cabin Boy managed to slip over and muddy her knees. I have to say that this path wasn’t one of my favourites in the Lake District. We were all relieved when we reached the firm ground of the Old Coach Road. Our hard work was complete for the day. All we had to do now was follow the Old Coach Road eastwards, back to the car. 

Old Coach Road

Two paragliders flew along Wolf Crags on our right. We presumed it was the same ones that we’d seen earlier setting off from Clough Head, although we’d not seen them fly across as we’d made our descent of the valley. Admittedly we were watching the ground a lot of the time to make sure that we didn’t slip over. I saw a figure making his way across the bleak flat moor to the north. I’d never seen anybody cross the moor before. About 15 minutes later, a runner passed us on the track. It must have been the same person, since a little further along, we could see that he set off back northwards over the moor. We also made way for a total of 7 mountain bikers on the road. I think it is a better cycling route than a walking one. The landscape always seems to pass fairly slowly as you walk along it, and once Wolf Crags have been left behind, the scenery gets less dramatic. You always know you are not from the carpark once you reach the plantations though and we soon arrived back at the car.     

It felt so good to get out onto the fells and soak up some sun. Sure, there were plenty of sections of today’s walk that were moist underfoot, but we all remained dry above the gaiters...well apart from the Cabin Boy's knees after she slipped over. It had been a lucrative day for ticking the Explorer hills and also the Wainwrights for Ted. The multitude of hills always gave the impression that you were making good progress. It was nice to explore the valley between Clough Head and Great Dodd. Given the choice though, I think I’d traverse Clough Head to get to the Old Coach Road, rather than use the boggy valley route. It would make the route longer and involve more ascent, but I’d prefer that to getting my feet wet. Another alternative would be to take the northeast ridge off Great Dodd and follow the path over Matterdale Common.