Patterdale to Shap

DAY 5 – WEDNESDAY 13 JUNE

Mileage: 16.5 miles

Looking out of the window during breakfast, seeing the branches moving in the wind and rain lashing down we were preparing ourselves for another rough day.  Was this going to be like last year when we faced hurricane winds going over Kidsty Pike?

We are now leaving the lake district behind. At least we had a few pleasant days earlier in the week and could enjoy the beautiful scenery, how many times will we have to come back though to get a good view from one of the summits?  We set off, going up a long road.  We joined a footpath going up but on seeing 3 walkers hesitate in front of us, we consulted the map and realised we were on the wrong path.  It was not clear if the paths joined up higher up, and although I was fairly sure we had used this path in previous years, we decided to go  back down and join the other path, passing a couple going in the opposite direction as we did so. The path did join the other so we had not needed to retrace our steps after all!

We had set off in waterproofs but  the rain soon stopped and before long we were quite hot and sticky, raingear packed away we set off for Angle Tarn. 

The cloud came down again but fortunately it remained dry, and to my relief there was no wind.  Sadly. there was also no view –  the cloud was quite dense – and I found myself singing in my head “Is there anyone out there?”  and “I think we’re alone now”.  It was eerie looking over to the right knowing that Angle Tarn was just a few steps away but not being able to see it. More disturbingly we couldn't see any of the other people who had set off at the same time as us.

On we went. I remembered vividly from the previous year that, on the approach to High Street, there was been a deceiving junction of paths, a well trodden route which encouraged several walkers ahead of us to carry straight on up a hill, when in fact you need to turn right, I kept an eye out for that right turn but with no visibility it was impossible to tell where it was, I didn't have a clue, couldn't see a thing, in fact we were just concentrating on the map and GPS following the waypoints only sensing that the path was going up or downhill left  or right from the way we were walking. Last year we had our heads down into the raging wind, this year we were gazing at the blinking marker on the GPS!

Suddenly the hill I was walking up went flat and grassy.  To my right I was aware of  a steep drop.  We were already at the top of Kidsty Pike.

It felt odd.  I didn’t recognise any of the walk at all to this stage.  The cloud gave it a very different feel.  Then suddenly a rocky incline veered up.  I recognised this – this was where I had twisted my ankle for the second time last year.  I cautiously made my way down, turned a corner and there was Haweswater Reservoir. 

We could hear voices behind us.  The  couple  we passed earlier in the day when we backtracked along the path had caught us up.  We let them go past, nodding hello at them. Then, a few spots of rain fell onto my arms and suddenly it was bucketing it down.  Kev and I dived into our waterproofs and trudged down to Haweswater where we stopped at a nice scenic spot by a waterfall for a quick bite to eat.

Going along the path by Haweswater, we peered over to an island in the middle covered in slate headstones.  Kev wondered aloud what these were and we concluded that perhaps they had been put there as a memorial to the old village lost when the valley was flooded to make the reservoir?  The path was hard going and I wondered how I had coped the previous year with my twisted ankle. 

This path seems to go on for ever, with the end never coming in to sight.  Whether I was affected by memories from last year, but I found this bit so hard going.

After Haweswater there is a strange village, which brings Stepford into mind. The sort of place where everyone has the same car, same clothes and vacuums the garden!  After that there is a nice wood, home to red squirrels, although we didn't notice any.  It was then out on to a road, before we crossed over and stopped for a welcome break under a tree at Naddle Bridge. 

We have a picture from last year, showing me sitting by the tree in the sun (minutes before it started to pour it down).  Today the rain drops were already dripping from the tree when we arrived, little chance to rest but we found a dry shaded spot and had a quick snack.  

The main difference of being out of the Lake District, is the speed we move across the maps. In the lakes it seems to take twice as long to cover the same distance and we seem to be on the same section of map for ever. It is quite satisfying following your route with a map rather than guidebook although they are only updated every few years and do not always show recent changes on the ground. I remembered from last year that there had been a couple of walls shown on the maps that were 'missing' on the ground along this part of the walk– but couldn’t remember where.  We soon found them though - or at least arrived at the point where they should have been and once again it caused a little confusion before we worked out the correct alignment and direction of our route.

We reached Shap Abbey.  It was already well past 5pm and we knew that it was still quite a hike to get to Shap itself but knowing that we were heading to one of the best guest houses on the Coast to Coast we took our time and decided to ignore the normal road route and to follow a series of footpaths through farmland which would bring us out towards the far end of Shap. 

We are now convinced that Shap is one of the wettest places in England, so why, oh why, do they have so many rock wall stiles?  Rock steps become so slippy in the wet!!!! The paths we went along were not well used.  I was glad we had our waterproofs on as we fought along narrow paths full of nettles and thistles.  We came to yet another rock stone stile! – Baulking I looked at the map and suggested we avoid it and carried along the path we were on which should come out onto a trackway – with hopefully no more stone stiles.  It was longer but boy was it worth it.  We came out on the main road.  Walking towards us was Mr Duncan, who we hadn't seen for a few days and seemed to be a bit chirpier.  “Margaret is getting worried about you”.  It was well after 6pm.  We would once again be arriving at Margaret’s completely dripping wet.

We went around to the side of the B&B to the drying room – there was Margaret waiting for us.  Kev seemed to take an age going inside  I was behind him, still outside, with the rain pouring down and getting even wetter!  Eventually he moved, but not very far.  I squeezed in behind him.  It was off with our boots. Still left out in the rain I asked Kev to move down slightly, which he eventually did, looking surprised at how wet I was!.  We unpacked our rucksacks, took off our boots and hung up our wet clothes and at last we were in. 

Margaret is such a lovely lady.  She was so disappointed for us because of the weather, ushering us into the lounge where she plied us with tea and home baked gluten-free goodies for me, including specially made cheese and onion pies which were gorgeous.  She had also tried to make gluten free scones, an almost impossible task (brave woman) but these had unfortunately turned out rock hard. 

She told us that she had had several cancellations with people pulling out of the walk due to injuries and the poor weather. As this was our second Coast to Coast our drive and ambition to continue each day wasn't quite as strong as the first time, but despite the weather we were finding the walk very easy and couldn't really understand people giving up. We did however feel sorry for those camping and carrying all of their gear with them, Margaret had a father and son staying that night, who were alternating between camping and staying in a B&B.  “In fact”, she added, “2 Americans who were going to camp have also been ringing around to see if any guest houses had room for the night  having decided to stay in the dry for at least one night”.  Was that Todd and American Girl, we wondered?

We went for dinner at the Greyhound Pub.  The pub had undergone some serious changes since the previous year making it an even better place to visit at the end of a tough day.  It also had the 5 day weather forecast pinned up  – wet, wet, wet.  Eeekkk………..

Kevanliz@aol.com