Coledale Valley

I'd not walked along the path on the south side of Coledale Beck before. It turned out to be quite a pleasant route offering good views across the valley to the mighty Grisedale Pike. Normally, I'd take the high level route over Barrow, Stile End and Outerside. There was quite a strong wind down in the valley and it did make me wonder how strong it would be up on the tops. There were no clouds near to the top of Grisedale Pike and it wasn't possible to gain an impression of the wind strength higher up. There was occasionally a light mizzle, but it didn't amount to much and soon disappeared. remnants of the Force Crag Mine was clearly visible on the other side of the valley. 

My track along the hillside became rather vague and then eventually disappeared altogether. The weather seemed to be holding up and so I decided to do the high level route, over Hobcarton Crag and Grisedal Pike, back to Braithwaite. I made my way downwards a short distance to the obvious stone track that ran uphill to the end of the valley. It was easier going on the stone track. There were remnants of mining activity around here too with old metal pipes running across the track. The path led up to a higher level valley and I made a mistake by not visiting and ticking off the nearby Explorer hill, Force Crag. I'll have to tick that one off on another day. The stone track continued upwards and eventually I reached the grassy area of Coledale Hause. Apart from the mist on Eel Crag, the weather was still good. In fact, even the wind had dropped now.  There didn't seem any reason to return down the valley route and so I decided to continue with my plan to return over Hobcarton Crag and Grisedale Pike.

Hobcarton Crag And Grisedale Pike

The wind seemed surprisingly benign at Coledale Hause. After the strong winds in the valley I thought it would be blowing a hooley up here. I started on the gradual climb up to Hobcarton Crag. The higher I got, the stronger became the wind. I noticed that the wind was now blowing the mist from Grasmoor and Eel Crag, across Coledale Hause towards Grisedale Pike. By the time I got to the top of Hobcarton Crag, Grisedale Pike had mostly disappeared view. It didn't look like I'd be getting a summit view today. I descended Hobcarton Crag and started climbing up to Grisedale Pike. The wind was getting very strong now. At least it was generally behind me and blowing me uphill. It was thick mist on Grisedale Pike and I wasn't that surprised to find that I was on my own. There was no shelter from the wind on top and so I decided not to linger and to drop down to a lower level.

Grisedale Descent

It's a steep, craggy descent off Grisedale Pike to the east. It is a reasonably steep drop on either side of the ridge. The wind now felt like a cross wind and it tried remarkably hard to fling me down the north slope of the ridge. It is a difficult track to descend, especially so under these conditions. Near to the bottom of the steepest section I came across three chaps hunkered down in the rock, trying to get some sort of shelter from the gale. We had a shouted conversation. They'd come up from Thornthwaite and intended going over Grisedale Pike and then returning down the Coledale valley. 'The wind is especially bad just down there' one of them pointed to a section about 50 yards below. I thanked him for the warning, but I thought that it couldn't be as bad as on the summit or further up the ridge. I was wrong. For some reason it was a lot worse. I had to crouch down at one point since it felt like my backpack was acting like a sail and that I was about to tack over towards Whinlatter. The wind seemed to be continuous rather than gusts. I shuffled down and was relieved when the track levelled out somewhat and the wind seemed less intense. Well, that had turned out to be an interesting descent. I looked back up the ridge and saw that the three fellows had escaped from their sheltered spot and were making their way up the ridge.

Return

I don't normally descend on this track from Grisedale Pike since I find it easier to go up it. An advantage of coming down it though is that there is a great view of Skiddaw, Blencathra and Keswick in front of you. Further along the ridge, as you walk over Kinn Hill, you also get a bird's eye of the village of Braithwaite. I could even see the holiday let where I was staying. The sun made a half-hearted attempt to make an appearance, but gave up in the end. I wasn't complaining though. This morning's expectations had been for a day of rain and I'd actually got conditions that were very reasonable for late February. I dropped down into Braithwaite and returned to the holiday let.

Grisedale Pike is a significant lump and offers a good challenge for the walker. I rather liked the mixture of the valley and the high level walk. The track along the south side of Coledale Beck was quite good and I'd prefer to use that than the stone road up to the Force Crag Mine. The weather forecasters say that they'll be rain tomorrow. Let's hope they are as accurate as they were today.