The simple way to do Walla Crag

So we were missing Walla Crag, which is a fairly short walk from a decent road, so I'd been saving this in case we really needed a short walk.  With Evie sitting this one out, everyone was quite happy to extend this a little.  It would have seemed a rude otherwise, given the weather was much better than the previous days.

Difficulty: 5.9
Walkers: Tim, Caroline, Poppy (12), Piper
11:19, 0.0km 0h00 0m, Start (93)
12:12, 2.1km 0h52 300m, Walla Crag (376, Wainwright)

13:05, 4.5km 1h45 560m, Bleaberry Fell (590, Wainwright)
13:54, 6.4km 2h35 685m, High Seat (Lake District) (608, Wainwright)
14:25, 8.2km 3h05 728m, High Tove (515, Wainwright)
14:54, 9.5km 3h35 796m, Armboth Fell (475, Wainwright)
17:37, 17.5km 6h18 941m, End (65)

Climbing up from Derwent Water

Walla Crag.  The view is really worth the short climb up from the lake.

Looking back towards Derwent Water

Bleaberry Fell

High Seat

Also from High Seat

The wonderful new path.  Now some poeple complain about paths like this, other people are mindful of the benefits to minimising erosion.  I liked keeping my boots dry.

High Tove.  At this point we agreed we had time to go a loop to the next one before heading home.

Armboth Fell, clearly worth the additional steps through boggy ground and crossing streams to let Poppy tick this one off.

Piper was very pleased that our route home was next to some water.  She was less pleased that she was kept on lead...

We finally found another place to let Piper off lead for a bit and go paddling.

The viewpoint in Ashness Wood, looking over Derwent Water

Ashness Bridge.  We had to wait a bit as there were quite a few people hanging around taking pictures here, it's quite a famous packhorse bridge.  It was definitely insta-ready.  We, however, were very much not by this point in our walk!

Sodden fell above Thirlmere

On the last day we picked out a likely looking lowish walk since the weather was pretty foul.  However we hadn't really considered what the ground would be like under foot, a fairly simple school boy error.

Difficulty: 6
Walkers: Tim, Caroline
10:16, 0.0km 0h00 0m, Start (266)
13:24, 8.9km 3h08 629m, Raven Crag (461)
14:49, 12.5km 4h33 864m, Bleaberry Fell (590)
15:37, 14.5km 5h20 944m, High Seat (608)
16:08, 16.4km 5h51 965m, High Tove (515)
16:40, 17.9km 6h23 965m, End (266)

So we set off early to make sure we'd get a spot in the car park.  The minor road/track leading to the car park was quite interesting to drive, I suspect in a Land Rover it would be trivial...  It looks like we just about made it in time.

Climbing up, and looking back to the car.  It was dry inside the car.

Up here, however, it was ever so slightly waterlogged.

We thought this was Armboth Fell, but without GPS confirmation at the time we'd just gone a little short, so that's saved for another day.

From here, we descended to Thirlmere, to walk along the lake before heading back up at the north end.

Quite impressive engineering.

We climbed back up to Raven Crag, a fairly short but direct climb up.

And from there to Bleaberry Fell, the north end of this ridge.  This is another fine example of the benefits of cairns for seeking shelter from horizontal hail.

Looking north, past Derwent Water.

I have a sustaining memory of a long slog through waterlogged fell, where every step of the way I was testing just how waterproof my boots were.  Anyway, the end (or at least High Seat) eventually came in side.

And from High Seat, back to High Tove where we had first come up to the ridge.

By this point we had the nice downhill to look forward to, before the drive back to Birmingham in the dark and rain.  At least we warmed up, and several days later had dried out as well!