The Great Outdoors – August 2019

Cribyn & N escarpment

from Pen y Fan

92 The Great OutdoorsAugust 2019

dropped off into the gloom of
Glenridding, where they were
flicking on the lights above the
bar at the Travellers Rest.
There’s one problem with
all this. To get to Swirral Edge,
you go up Striding Edge to
Helvellyn. And you arrive at
Catstye Cam far too early for
any sunset. So instead, I arrived
from somewhere further away:
from Fairfield. And substituted
for Striding some sharp little
ridgelines on either side of St
Sunday Crag.
The first little ridge is gained
by keeping straight ahead up
the corner called Thornhow
End. Birks is a must-bag
Wainwright summit, so it’s
odd that this direct ridgeline
has only the tiniest of paths,
weaving amongst knobbly
rocks high above Ullswater.
After Birks, the big path

rejoins from the right and

aims straight up St Sunday.

But today I’m tempted by a

different ridgeline. So I contour

out to the left, to St Sunday’s

tiny side-summit.

Gavel Pike means gabled

peak, and it has a ridgeline

I’d never spotted before – but

which is just right as a different

way up St Sunday. Like the

ridgeline to Birks, this too

has a tiny path among rocky

knolls, and a step or two of

scrambling. Plus it’s fun to

surprise walkers on St Sunday

Crag by arriving from a quite

unexpected direction.

After that the pleasures take

on a more familiar persuasion,

via the steep-edged ridgeline

from St Sunday to the narrows

of Deepdale Hause, and up to

Cofa Pike. I’ve been on Cofa

Pike before. And one thing’s

for sure, I’ll be on Cofa Pike

again – I can’t get enough of

Cofa Pike’s little ridge with

its rocky blockage. With the

rocks being nice and dry, the

conditions are good for the

direct continuation over slabby

rocks onto Fairfield. (Those

rocks slope the wrong way, and

in the wet I prefer the bypass

path on the right.)

The descent from Fairfield

to Grisedale Hause is nicer

than it used to be before Fix the

Fells fixed the path here. And

300m of up onto Helvellyn:

well it wouldn’t be fun, would

it, if it didn’t sometimes

involve some suffering? I take

it slowly, so’s to be sure of the

late-afternoon light along the

ridgeline of Helvellyn.

Plus, of course, the

scheduled sunset on Catstye

Cam.

Further information

Maps: OS 1:50,000

Landranger sheet 90

(Penrith); Harvey 1:25,000

Superwalker, Lake District East

Transport: Penrith-

Patterdale-Windermere

bus 508. traveline.info, 0871 200

22 33, timetables cumbria.gov.uk

i

Information: Ullswater

VIC, Glenridding (01768

482414) visiteden.co.uk

[Captions clockwise from top]

Heading up north spur of Birks,

with Ullswater and Place Fell

behind; Scramblers on Swirral

Edge, with Skiddaw; Down

south-east spur of Catstye Cam