Cloudbusting in Kentmere

It’s been a while. My summer has been spent elsewhere but the seasons wait for no one and in my absence autumn has arrived. Golden yellow leaves, having enjoyed a brief summer of life are falling to become mulch and then food for leaves waiting to be born. In the cycle of the seasons the land is going to sleep, preparing and protecting itself for the cold dark months ahead. There has been rain, lots of it and the ground is sodden underfoot. Moisture hangs in the air and I can smell the scent of Lakeland on the fresh morning breeze, moss and manure, wood smoke rising from the cottages, comforting and familiar. It’s good to be back.

During the great covid lock down as history books may call it, the only running water I heard on my lock down walks was a small drain overflow from the local tennis club. During those long months I yearned for the sound of the rushing becks and ghylls of Lakeland. To hear the roar of torrents tumbling over waterfalls, the constant unstoppable movement of water flowing to the sea to be drawn up and dropped back onto the hills to start the journey again. All of nature is movement, regeneration and rebirth. The poetry of earth is never dead as Keats puts it, far more eloquently than I.

The recent torrential rain has left the ground saturated. It’s a day when paths become streams and streams are promoted to rivers. A day for wet feet, a day indeed for the sound of water everywhere. I knew I had to get to Kentmere early if I was to get parked in one of the few places available and at 7am most have already gone when I pull up at the small community hall.

The forecast is mixed and although the higher tops are covered in rolling cloud it is due to improve so I set off along the Garburn road trusting in the met office.

Climbing out of Kentmere village I pass by Badger Rock, a huge rock boulder and local landmark resting in a field near the path. It’s a popular place for bouldering although I imagine the rock would be slippy today.

Instead of climbing to the head of the pass I cut the corner off heading steeply up a faint path towards Buck Crag. The colours of autumn blanket the hillside and all is orange, yellow and copper. The path narrows through a gully and then follows a wall until the main route is rejoined.

After joining up with the main path at a gate there is a short uphill pull to my first summit of the day, Yoke. The summit is clear but I have walked myself into the cloud base and banks of cloud move slowly across the hills teasing me with disappearing views. The Kentmere valley lies unseen below, covered by a cotton wool blanket.

By the time I reach Ill Bell cloud has settled on it blocking any hope of a view. I settle down to eat drink and wait, hoping the cloud will lift, knowing that it’s a long walk back if I have to re visit. Thankfully after twenty minutes or so there is a lightening of the sky, the cloud at first thins and then breaks. Like a curtain being pulled away Windermere and the surrounding hills are suddenly revealed.

Leaving Ill Bell there is a steepish downhill section and the scene across to Froswick and Thornthwaite Crag is moody and dramatic with clouds drifting around them, bringing the tops in and out of view in a game of hide and seek. The weather is starting to clear though and as the cloud decreases my confidence of getting a completely clear round increases.

On Froswick the cloud has reduced to small drifting patches and there are now clear views all around. Looking across the deep ravine of Hall Cove I see the newly born River Kent, a glistening silver streak of water cascading down the hillside into Kentmere reservoir below.

It’s a pleasant walk to Thornthwaite Crag in increasingly good weather. I have the place to myself and settle myself down by the tall pillar of stones that distinctively marks the summit. I’m sat on its lee side, protected completely from the wind that I can hear whistling and pummeling the rocks on the other side of the pillar.

The last time I was here was in the summer when stubborn cloud refused to move denying me a clear top and necessitating this re visit. Prior to that I remember visiting this hill twenty years ago on a lovely clear day with a friend. His wife had not long given birth to their third child, a daughter and I think both of us were pleased to have negotiated a boys weekend away from the kids in the Lakes. A few years ago after a long brave battle with cancer, this youngest child of his passed away. She was fifteen years old.

My own daughter also has been on an unwanted journey with that disease, taking us, her helpless parents with her through sleepless nights and anxious, uncertain times. Thankfully her treatment succeeded and today, and I pray all days, she remains cancer free.

Over the course of a lifetime a person faces many challenges and changes of circumstance. Many of these are welcome, others, like ill health, bereavement or redundancy are not within our control. They all shape our character in some way though, what kind of people we are and who we become. How we let difficult times define us, whether we allow ourselves to be defeated or embittered by them, or try and use them to grow into wiser, kinder, more considerate people, that is one of life’s greatest challenges.

We may change, but the mountains and the views remain reassuringly the same and I sit thinking of my friend whilst looking down on the same view of Windermere that we were privileged to see twenty years ago. I’m brought back into the present by the sound of voices. A group of maybe ten people have arrived. When I stand up and move away from the tower I’m surprised by how strong the wind has got up.

The path to Nan Bield is undulating and one that would be difficult to follow in mist. Thankfully the weather is getting better all the time and the sun is now out. I curve around the head of Hayeswater and follow a subsidiary path skirting the head of Kentmere missing out Mardale Ill Bell. After rejoining the main path I drop to the impressive giants seat of a shelter that sits at the top of Nan Bield Pass.

There are good views down to Haweswater. This will probably be the last time I see it as I only have a few Far Eastern Fells to complete before moving on to the Central Fells so I say farewell before heading down into Kentmere valley.

It’s a long walk back to Kentmere from the Nan Bield Pass but I planned it this way as I have never walked down the valley before and the path is good even though it is a stream today.

After the initial S bend drop off the pass the path levels out and there follows a pleasing walk down the valley. Below me is Kentmere reservoir, no longer a reservoir but kept as a lake as it’s in the National Park. Across the valley I can trace my route of the day along the skyline.

The landscape changes subtly from high rocky mountain to bracken covered fellside above the boundary wall and then eventually down to the manicured intake fields and solid stone walls of farmland.

As I reach the outskirts of Kentmere there are ancient lanes to walk down lined by green moss covered dry stone walls that look like they have been there for centuries. If they could talk the tales they would tell about this quiet and beautiful corner of Lakeland.

I cross over the River Kent, now a toddler and make my way back to the van via a visit to St Cuthbert’s church. My feet are soaking, but my heart is satisfied.

Route Map, Walk Stats, Geolocated Picture Gallery and 3D Flyover Video Below.

Click ‘Learn more’ on the map.  Note: you won’t see the map if reading in WordPress reader but click on the little world at the top of the page to view it on the browser.