At the National Trust carpark at the other side of Lanthwaite wood, an information board told us that Crummock Water is an oligotrophic lake. Now, oligotrophic is a new word in my lexicon, but luckily the information board explained that it meant the lake had a low level of nutrients. It said that this was a good thing in that it prevented algal blooms from occurring. It's also the home of the Arctic Char, which it said had been here since the melting glaciers cut the lake off from the sea. That must make them very old fish! The board also said that Buttermere and Crummock Water flows towards Cockermouth via the River Cocker, and that 'cocker' means crooked in Old Britain. I made a mental to note to always check my change for any round I might buy in a pub in the region. 

Fully informed about the area, we wandered away from the carpark and headed off towards Mellbreak. The north face of Mellbreak looks unclimbable, but there is a walkers path up there. In fact, we even managed to cajole the Cabin Boy up the route 3 years back. There is a tiny bit of hands-on scrambling, and quite a bit of exposure at one particular point. After the recent Yewbarrow trauma (see Yewbarrow Cabin Boy's Nemesis), it was out of bounds for us today and so we walked around the bottom of the north face to join the substantial track, that runs southwards along the Mosedale valley.

Mellbreak

It was easy and pleasant walking down the valley with a good view to Hen Comb on our right.  Although, it certainly wasn't easy walking when we headed off uphill to the top of Mellbreak. It was straight up with little relief. It wasn't that far but it gave us a good workout. Near the top we met a man in his early sixties wading through the ferns to reach our path. He was dressed well and spoke so posh, that I couldn't help myself doffing my fleece hat to him. He said that he'd come up via Mellbreak's north face. 'Oh, you must have had an early, start' I said. 'It's a tough, old path up the north face isn't it? I added. 'No, it wasn't an early start, and I didn't find the north face a problem,' he informed me. Well, that was me told. He then said that he was heading across to Hen Comb using the bridge over Mosedale Beck. As he started to make his descent to the valley, I considered booting him up his arse, so that he'd roll downhill and up the other side to Hen Comb. He then wouldn't find that peak a problem either.

The path had brought us up between the two summit peaks of Mellbreak. The north peak is 3 metres lower than the south one, according to the OS map, and so we started heading southwards. There isn't a cairn on the south summit and so we found the highest bit of land for our photos. We also took a stroll to the eastern edge where there are tremendous views down to Crummock Water and the Buttermere valley. It was hard to drag ourselves away from the view, but we eventually managed and started our descent down Mellbreak's south face. Next stop was Crummock Water.

 Crummock Water

Our descent brought us down to the Black Beck track we had used yesterday when we travelled westwards through Mosedale (see Great Borne Starling Plod). We even found some birdseed that the Cabin Boy had left on one of the rocks. We saw Scale Force on the other side of the valley and we would have gone across to have a look, if we hadn't fully perused it the day before. The approach to Crummock Water is a confusing mess of bridges, streams and bogs, but we finally found our way to the water and started our lakeside walk. The lake provided some stunning reflections of the mountains on the opposite side. Low Ling Crag is a small peninsula of rock that offered an amazing spot to take photos and an ideal lunch location too. It's only disadvantage was that Red Pike was preventing it being bathed in sunlight and so it was a chilly stop. After lunch we started walking away, and we looked back to see a crow flying to the spot where we had been sitting. They aren't daft. We'd not gone far down the lake when we heard the familiar rumbling of approaching jets. I'd got gloves on and I struggled to get my camera on the appropriate settings to get a decent shot. I gave up in the end and took the shots anyway. Two or three of them turned out okay.

Bare Arses

'LOOK AT THAT BARE ARSE!' It was a full two minutes before the echo of the Cabin Boy's exclamation subsided. We'd followed the lakeside track around to the Pump House at the north end of Crummock Water. At the very end of the lake, a wild water swimmer had got out and was getting dried on a pebble beach. Normally they wear bathing jackets whilst they get dried, but for some reason this person had decided not to. It was hard to detect whether the person was male or female since, as asserted so audibly by the Cabin Boy, we could only see the 'bare arse'. I decided that, for modesty's sake, I'd stop to take a picture of the fish ladder that leads from the River Cocker up to Crummock Water. I tried to engage the Cabin Boy in a discussion about fish ladders as a distraction, but she was more interested in 'bare arses'. It was to my personal relief that the owner of the 'bare arse' eventually covered it and started off towards the National Trust carpark. This allowed us to proceed with the walk and the Cabin Boy eventually calmed down. We took an alternative path through Lanthawaite woods, to the one we used in the morning. We found a stick shelter built up against a tree that fascinated Captain Mo so much, I thought we'd have to leave him there. At Lanthwaite Green Farm, the farmer had left the farm gates open, disorientating Captain Mo, resulting in us trespassing on the new shortcut to the road.

It had been an amazing day, with excellent weather and exceptional views. This walk drew an end to the current Wainwright campaign. I had entertained the idea of finishing all the Wainwrights by the end of this campaign, but in the end I'm still left with four more to do: Pillar, Steeple, Scafell and Slight Side. Not a problem though. It gives me more time to savour them.