Last updated 14:44, Friday, 21 March 2008

Weekend Walk with Vivienne Crow

Map: Ordnance Survey Explorer map OL7; or Landranger 90, Penrith and Keswick.

Parking: Main car park in Ambleside, just north of village centre on A591, GR NY375047

Public transport: The 555, Keswick to Lancaster bus (telephone 0871 200 2233).

Refreshments: Variety of pubs, cafes and restaurants in Ambleside.

Distance: 8.1 miles

Total ascent: 2,435ft

Time: 5-5.5 hours

Grade: Intermediate/hard

Overview: This walk explores Scandale, a wild valley to the north of Ambleside. It ascends a ridge of grassy fells on the western side of the valley, taking in Low Pike (1,666ft) and High Pike (2,152ft), before reaching a high point of 2,430ft. The descent takes in Scandale Pass and then follows a clear track alongside Scandale Beck all the way back to Ambleside. Many of the paths get very muddy in wet weather. Be careful on the descent from the cairn on High Bakestones, especially in misty conditions, because it is easy to lose the path.

The Walk: Use the pedestrian bridge near the toilet block to exit the car park. Turn left along the main road and then immediately right up Smithy Brow towards Kirkstone. Take the first turning on your left and, when the narrow lane forks, keep left – along Nook Lane leading to Low Sweden Bridge.

Follow the surfaced lane until it ends at Nook End Farm (0.5 miles from the start). Now walk into the farmyard and then out through the double green gates at the other end. Keep to the left-hand track beyond the gates; this soon crosses Scandale Beck via Low Sweden Bridge.

The track becomes a little more indistinct as you pass – and ignore - a solid-looking gate in the wall to your left. Continue uphill at a steady pace and you soon find yourself on the open fellside. Having gone through a gap in a wall, you will see the first of a couple of paths heading up towards a wall to the left (1.15 miles from the start). Ignore these paths unless you fancy a bit of scrambling; keep to main track as it climbs at a more sedate angle.

When you reach a low wall followed immediately by a waymarker indicating that the path heads to the left (1.9 miles from the start), you have a choice of two routes. Either turn left, cross the stile in the high wall and then turn right to climb with the wall on your immediate right; or keep straight ahead on the right-hand (eastern) side of the wall. If you choose the latter, you will encounter some boggy ground.

Both paths eventually climb on to Low Pike, the summit of which is marked by a small pile of stones perched on a rock to the right of the wall. If you follow the eastern path (to the right of the wall), you will actually bypass the summit and may not even realise you have passed it.

The next top is High Pike and, again, there are paths on either side of the wall. The true summit, however, is marked by a tiny, easy-to-miss cairn on some rocks on the eastern side of the wall (2.9 miles from the start).

From the top, continue in a northerly direction with the wall on your left. Do not cross the wall on this occasion. The path continues climbing, sometimes on grass, but mostly on soggy peat.

About two-thirds of a mile beyond High Pike’s summit cairn, as the gradient starts to level off, you will see a large cairn to the right of the path. At about 2,430ft, this is the highest point on the walk. Turn right here along a faint path (E veering ENE). With the long, grassy ridges of the far eastern fells filling the horizon, the narrow path contours the hillside before dropping slightly to a prominent cairn on High Bakestones (3.9 miles from the start).

The onward path beyond the cairn is difficult to spot. It actually heads south for a few yards and then swings left (NE) to descend a shallow, rocky ravine. The ground isn’t particularly steep here, but the rocks get greasy in wet weather, so watch your footing!

At the bottom of the slope, the path heads east across some damp ground. It passes a few yards to the left of tiny Scandale Tarn and then, having encountered a line of old fenceposts near a wall, it joins up with a clearer path coming down from the left (4.5 miles from the start). You now walk with the wall on your immediate right and follow it down into Scandale Pass. Cross the ladder stile in the wall and then follow the clear path heading down the fell.

Once in the valley bottom, go through a gated gap in the wall to pass a complex sheepfold on your right (5.3 miles from the start). Now walk with the wall on your immediate left and, when the wall swings left, keep straight ahead to cross some marshy ground. Cross the beck via an obvious ford and then continue along the clear track on the other side.

This track will eventually take you all the way back to Ambleside, but that’s still a few miles off. Its route, meanwhile, crosses several fords, which will put your boots’ waterproof qualities to the test.

Soon after passing the path coming up from High Sweden Bridge (6.65 miles from the start), you suddenly become a lot more aware of the beck to your right as it plunges dramatically into a steep-sided gorge.

Eventually, you reach the edge of Ambleside. A wooden gate brings you on to a surfaced lane (7.75 miles from the start). When this forks, bear right to continue downhill. Turn right at the junction with the Kirkstone road. You now drop down to a mini roundabout. Cross over the main road here and re-enter the car park.

Points of Interest: There is some 19th century graffiti carved on a rock overhanging Scandale Tarn. It says: “Harry Bogle and Percy Laidlaw stocked this tarn with gudgeon fish on July 5th, 1878.” The name Sweden, which comes up several times in the lower reaches of Scandale, is thought to be a corruption of the word ‘swithen’, meaning land cleared by burning.