Area: Lakeland
Distance: 12.5 Miles 20.1K
Start Location: Keswick
OS Sheet: Explorer OL4
Outline: Keswick – Braithwaite - Coledale Hause – Gasgate Gill - Loweswater – Buttermere
Journey
Leaving Keswick proved a bit difficult due to some faffing about. First I decided that as I had experienced some pain and stiffness in my left knee while coming down from High Street on Sunday and again while walking along the railway line to Keswick on Monday, and since the next two days included a fair amount of climb and descent, I wanted to buy a cheap walking pole to help the knee, naturally several gear shops were visited before the right pole was found, at the right price. Then half way to Portinscale we both realised that in the excitement of me actually buying pole, after all I said about them, we forgot to draw out money for the next three days, so we retraced our steps back to the Coop to use the ATM, eventually got away about 10:30am.
On the way through Braithwaite we felt compelled to stop at the Café in Scotgate Holiday Park for tea/coffee and homemade cakes and get a brochure for future visits with family. From our quick visit it looked a very good site.
Finally we made it to the start of Coledale, so far the day had been fine and sunny with a gentle but cold wind. Walking up the valley the surrounding hills came in to view and it was obvious that the weather was about to change. Approached the workings below Force Crag Mine the wind got up and the rain started, so we decided to move up to the mine buildings to shelter and kag up. Passing the ford where the track up to Coledale Hause starts, two men came across dragging a large bundle of what looked like wire fencing, although we exchanged a few shouted comments we got no clue as to what they were doing and they walked off down the valley.
Close by was a very small tin hut which we dived into, through a hole where a corrugated iron sheet was missing. There was a 150mm dia. plastic pipe passing through the hut about waist height and with two of us and rucksacks in it, it was crowded. Then the wind and rain really set in, the hut vibrated and trembled and the noise was at times deafening. The rain was ferocious as it lashed across the hillside. So we stayed put, had a brew and eat our sandwiches. As we looked out we could see the stream rising and watched as several people struggled to cross.
After about an hour the rain subsided, we climbed out the hut, looking around to work out how we could continue. It was clear that we could not cross the ford, people coming down that way were continuing to walk down through the heather on the south side of the stream. We spotted more people scrambling down below a small crag to the north of the stream and on talking to them it seemed that, that was the only way up available to us, one guy said it was a fairly well used route, so up we went. The best I can say is it’s definitely not a backpacker’s route, we scrambled, slipped and struggled but made it, out of breath but in one piece. Then pressing on over Coledale Hause we entered into a different world, Gasgale Gill.
As we started down the Gill with the Liza Beck on our left the sky cleared and the sun came out, Gasgale Gill was simply stunning, I have never seen a more beautiful place in the Lakes possibly in England, it felt almost Alpine and it is nearly three kilometres long.
Due to the rain the beck, which pretty much fills the floor of the narrow, steeply sloped valley, was a living mass of white foaming, steaming, riving water smashing into and over the massed rocks and boulders that lay in its way. The noise was deafening and as the path which clings to the heather, rock and scree is often only a foot or so from the water, with the flying spray, at times you felt you were breathing the water. The heather, crags and screes all form a backdrop to, on this day, the becks master class performance.
After so much noise and excitement the Gill ends in an anti-climax, you cross a footbridge turn a corner and you’re out in the open on a grassy field, the becks gone, its noise abated and a bus trundles by on the road a couple of hundred meters away. Since getting home I’ve read that Gasgale Gill was once a packhorse route, which surprised me considering how tenuous the path was across the scree slopes and along by the beck.
From here the original plan was to walk west around Crummock Water and along its south side so as to come into Buttermere from the south. Due to the time we had lost earlier we decided to turn east and take the lakeside path and road to Buttermere. This looked to be a pretty straight forward four – five K walk. We went by Lanthwaite Green Farm, through the woodland to the Boat House, then headed east along the shore only to find a fifty metre section of the path was now in the lake, as our feet had been wet for several hours already, we just stepped in and splashed through the waves, back on the path and about a K later re-joined the road. A brisk road walk is great for warming up wet feet so we were feeling fairly happy about things until out of a clear sky we got twenty minutes of rain which ended as reached Buttermere. We got to the YHA at about 6:30pm with 12.5 miles on the GPS.
Although we did our usual washing and put it and our shoes in the YHA drying room, it was not very warm and little drying was done overnight, which was a shame as in all other respects the Hostel and staff were great.
Despite the efforts of a group of about twenty people who disturbed everyone by rearranging the dining area so they could all sit together in one small corner, we had a good meal and a few pints in The Fish in Buttermere.
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