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" Local Rambles around Loweswater "

Date & start time: 3rd to 13th February 2012

Location of Start : The red phone box, Loweswater , Cumbria, Uk ( NY 143 211 )

Places visited : Gasgale Gill, Crummock Water and Mellbreak.

Walk details : Three local walks..

Highest point : Mellbreak northern top. 1654 ft (509 m)

Walked with : Elizabeth and John, Ann and the dogs, Harry and Bethan.

Weather : It's been cold but the snow is gradually disappearing as there's been no new falls.

" Local Rambles around Loweswater " at EveryTrail

[ Alter the settings to zoom or change the Map, use Everytrail to download the Gps route ]

For a change, I'll let someone else introduce this first set of pictures.

A Loweswater viewer, Barry Hutchinson, wrote to me recently on the topic of the Gasgale Gill bridges with the following email . . .

Good evening Roger and Ann,

Just thought I’d tell you how to confuse a fell walker.

Last month I parked at Lanthwaite Green and did a clockwise round up Whiteside and on to Crag Hill and Grasmoor before returning down the gill. I crossed the footbridge at the start of the climb up to Whin Ben and thought to myself, what’s the point of building a second bridge a bit further down the gill.

On returning I stood scratching my head searching for the footbridge, which seemed to have mysteriously disappeared. Then I heard the shouts of a workman waving me onto the ‘second’ bridge. I asked him if I was going crackers as I was sure I’d crossed by another bridge. Where is it, I asked. .... On the back of that truck over there, he responded.

So I claim to be the last person to cross the old footbridge and the first to cross the new one. Will I go down in the annals of Lake District fell walkers ?

Barry Hutchinson.

A spare morning recently allowed me to take a look too.

Parking at Lanthwaite Green, I crossed the open fell towards Gasgale Valley.

This is the view over to Red Pike and High Stile on the other side of a hidden Crummock Water.

It was cold here . . . it looked even colder up there !



Looking round from the car park . . .	. . . Blake Fell also has a covering of snow.

A quick photo of the new house at Lanthwaite Green . . . it looks rather nice and presumably almost completed.

The track is solidly frozen and the pools are pure ice and best avoided.

I cross over towards the Gill.

Do I go left to the beck or right to the fell and bridge.

Left it is to an old farm building and sheep shed at Peel Place.

There used to be a narrow footbridge here which was wiped out in the 2009 floods.

The gravel and the damage to the beck below here has closed the Brackenthwaite footpath ever since.

The old bridge on the High Hollins path has been removed . . . in pieces I would imagine.

The cold weather has formed interesting icicles where the water has flowed off the grass.

Splashes from the stream have caused these to form.

Here's Barry's new bridge . . . a rather nice single span steel bridge crossing the beck.

They have cut a short new path onto the fell to meet up with the original path towards Whin Ben and Whiteside.

The old bridge has gone despite being undamaged by the floods.

At least the tricky path onto the fells will not need to be used any more.

All that is left is the old stone buttress on the left hand side of the stream.

I walk up to the falls and the bad step that leads into the upper part of the valley.

This will now be by-passed by most folk as the new path alignment climbs over the high bluff above.

[ If you're walking down from Grasmoor then take the upper path by the big boulder 400 yards or so further up the beck.]

Back to Lanthwaite Green now with this last view of the new bridge below me.

Full marks Barry . . . you've reached the annals of Loweswatercam if nothing else . . . Rmh

- - - o o o - - -

A few pictures, again locally, of a walk this time with our friends Elizabeth and John.

One with me in this time as the four of us walk across to Crummock Water.

The weather has been a bit overcast but there was a short burst of sunlight which lit up the slopes of Grasmoor.

- - - o o o - - -

Again locally on another day I took the dogs up Mellbreak and back for a more extended dog-walk.

Loweswater itself has a layer of ice but it's not complete.

Looking across to Hopegill Head.

Gasgale Gill Valley that I was walking in earlier can be seen across the other side of the lake.

Nice late-afternoon sunshine on this walk

which lights up the cliffs on the face as I climb up the northern end of Mellbreak.

The classic view up Buttermere Valley never fails to impress.

Bethan and Harry in the sunshine at the cairn on the summit.

Zooming in on the snow on the high fells above and beyond Fleetwith Pike.

Thick ice on "Tom's Pool"

Even I couldn't break the ice and fall in this one today.



Looking down into Mosedale . . .	. . . as we take the traverse path back towards home.

A study in afternoon sunlight as I look across Hen Comb

towards the Floutern Cop / Banna Fell ridge, up to Great Bourne and finally to Grike Fell over in Ennerdale.



On the walk I met our local farmer, Mr Chris Todd . . .	. . . star of stage, screen and Cumbria Magazine this month (Feb 2012).

He is seen here with our dogs . . . not his !

He was also interviewed by Howard Jackson recently at the Caldbeck Sheepdog Trials.

It turns out there was a DvD and a YouTube video of the occasion.

Click here to enjoy Chris's chat about his sheep dog trialing days

- - - o o o - - -

Technical note: Pictures taken with my Canon G10 camera.

Resized in Photoshop, and built up on a Dreamweaver web builder.

This site best viewed with . . . a host of local interest to enjoy.

Previous walk - 8th February 2012 Loughrigg Fell in the Snow

A previous time up here - 22nd April 2010 A Gasgale Gill Ramble

Next walk - 15th February 2012 Birds, Horses and Cold Fell