Day 4: Grasmere to Patterdale

Weather: Wet, cold and windy to start, improving later

Distance covered today: 13.6km (8.5mi)

Last night's B&B: Raise View Guest House

% Complete: Cumulative distance: 25.5% 77.9km Total Ascent/ Total Descent  656m/ 577m

GPS satellite track of today's route: Day 4 (click!)

I met the Devil today.  He was right at the top of the pass, right where you would imagine him to be. He tempted me and I was very tempted, but I held fast.  Let me explain. 

Readers of last night’s trivia will recall that I had finally made a decision and informed Veronica that I would not be climbing Helvellyn, nor attempting Striding Edge, because the inclement weather precluded it. Sure enough, this morning dawned bitter and wet and I was at peace with my decision. The first leg of the journey from Grasmere to Patterdale is a gruesome 570m climb, splashing backwards and forwards through the Tongue Gill’s tributaries as they rush down the mountain.   As I made the pass, I noticed that although it was bitterly cold up there, the cloud base was lifting and there were shards of sunlight breaking through.  

Then I met him, appropriately dressed in red!  We chatted and he told me he had just run up the pass from the opposite direction, climbed Glenridding, run along Striding Edge, summited Helvellyn and now he was off to climb Seat Sandal. I told him I was concerned about the weather and wasn’t going to do Helvellyn and Striding Edge, and I had given Veronica my word. He was contemptuously dismissive. He disappeared at speed. 

Within a few minutes, I was at Grisedale Tarn and I had a fantastic view of Helvellyn, just on the other side of the tarn. The cloud had lifted completely and I could easily see the cairn at the summit.  (See the attached picture!).  I only needed to climb a further 300m!  I was feeling fine!  The path to Helvellyn leads off from the end of the tarn, and for a moment I hesitated. Then I remembered he had told me he had just completed his exams as a personal trainer. Of course!  People like him swim the channel and climb Everest, when they’re not busy impersonating the devil!  I decided I would honour my promise to Veronica and come back and do Helvellyn on another day when the weather is perfect! 

Feeling virtuous, I immediately encountered the “Brothers’ Parting Stone”. It marks the spot where William Wordsworth last saw his brother John before the latter drowned when the ship he commanded foundered off the English coast.  Subsequently, Wordsworth wrote these words and they are carved in stone at the site:

“Here did we stop; and here looked round

While each into himself descends,

For that last thought of parting Friends

That is not to be found.

Brother and friend, if verse of mine

Have power to make thy virtues known,

Here let a monumental Stone

Stand–sacred as a Shrine”

In a moment of seriousness, I remembered hearing about a 60 year-old woman from Bolton who died just a few days ago. She was walking Coast-to-coast and she fell 60ft from a crag near Ennerdale Water.  I have no idea of the circumstances.  As I walked down the pass towards the beautiful valley of Grisedale, I thought to myself that the Wordsworth brothers had had no idea that they would be seeing each other here for the last time.  

I don’t feel virtuous now.  I feel I just did what I said I would do; no more no less.  If anything, I feel a little chastened…..  

Tomorrow is going to be the hardest day yet; the longest distance and the highest climb. I will be careful……

On a lighter note, we are all beginning to get to know each other.  So many people do the Coast-to-coast, that there is an established pattern. The initial wariness has worn off and now participants greet each other with warmth, either on the way, or in the hostelries en-route; a bit Camina-esque.  Yesterday, though, perhaps because I was hoping to get a decent rest in Grasmere, I didn’t hold back, despite starting later than most.  The result was that I did a lot of over-taking particularly on the down-slopes – my experience with dual walking poles and my Garmin mightily assisting.  To my amusement, this had apparently been widely observed on the broad and boggy descent from Greenup Edge.  Apparently, my bright red jacket was easily observed.  I learned in the restaurant last night that I was variously called “Speedy Gonzales” and “The Roadrunner”.  

These epithets may not have been intended charitably, but I choose to view them as an enormous compliment!

Clouds covering the fell-tops in Grasmere this morning

Grasmere pasture

Miles and miles of dry-stone walls near the base of every fell

Plodding up to that waterfall!

I got there. What's next?

Cloud level. No chance for Helvellyn....

Looking back down towards Grasmere

Hevellyn beyond Grisedale Tarn. Not a cloud in sight!

Beautiful tarn

Stepping stones over the exit waters

Brothers Parting Stone and its poetic inscription

Hordes ascending Helvellyn. Thos girls are in tee-shirts!  Below freezing temperatures! Sensible?

Looking down at the Grisedale Valley

Water everywhere

Steve Messam installation in the middle of nowhere. Click to see

Snow on the top of the north-facing slopes

Descending to the pastures of the Grisedale Valley

Shepherds with their sheep-dog

Sunlight and contrast

Looking back up to the Grisedale Hause pass. An amazing sense of hopping over mountains

The Grisedale Beck

Moss on dry-stone walls. So beautiful!

Today's elevation profile