Day 6 Eskdale, Devoke Water, Ravenglass

Date : Friday 7 October 2011

Area : Cumbria

Walk : Eskdale to Ravenglass
Start At : Eskdale YHA
End At : Ravenglass
OS Sheet : OL6
Distance M/k) : 10.7 / 17.2
Ascent (ft) : 1245
Descent (ft) : 1491



 Route
From the YHA walk back past the Woolpack turn left down to Doctors Bridge cross and take the path to Low Birker and up to Whincop Bridge, Birkerthwaite and High Ground bear left over Birker Fell, around the south side of Devoke Water, past Barnscar down to the A595 close to Ellerbeck. Along the A595 over the River Esk on to the entrance to Muncaster Castle follow the path through the grounds and down to Newton then follow the Cumbria Coastal Path into Ravenglass.


Journey
This morning’s sky was a boiling mix of big white/grey clouds shot through with numerous patches of blue all in motion, driven by a moderate but chilly westerly wind. As we passed the Woolpack Andy and I agreed that the Woolpacks recent facelift had, in our opinion, not improved it much, yes the bar was longer, we just felt its style was out of place and not as comfortable as when we visited last year.

From Doctors Bridge it was along but steady climb with plenty of walls to cross we had a couple of navigational slip ups, signage is sparse and the path is prone to fade away. At Whincop the path becomes a track. Looking back there were some cracking views over to Scafell and in the distance I think the Langdales.

As we walked down the track towards Devoke water we could see it sat in a bowl and we knew we were in for another day of wet feet. Here we met a couple walking six or possibly eight Border Terriers all on extending leads, including some that split so there two dogs on one lead. We stopped to chat and make a fuss of the dogs, the dogs were friendly and loved the fuss.

Devoke water is a beautiful spot, ideal to stop for a brew but the wind was cold and unremitting as we pushed on hoping for a bit of shelter for lunch. Most of the way around the path was clear and not too wet, in other places it was pure bog.

At Barnscar we met a group of four girls on DOE, the third and last walkers we had met over five days.


On reaching the enclosure wall we assumed the worst was over, the DOE girl’s had said they struggle to get up, which we dismissed as a kids thing. How wrong could we be, those girls deserve a medal, it was horrible the first field was a morass we went knee deep in mud tripped and tumbled over massive tussock grass found little correlation between the route of the map, possible routes on the ground, the relationship of gates and stiles and the path was non-existent. Other than in jungles in Hong Kong and Belize this K and a bit was the worst piece of ground, below 250m I have ever walked through. I have worked with Rights of Way guys and the OS and respect them but someone has got this little bit of Cumbria horribly wrong.

We finally got lunch in the Tea Room at Muncaster Castle, highly recommended as is the walk down the long ridge walk from the Castle to Newton. At Ravenglass the tide was out and we were able to walk along the shore as we did so I noticed that the elevation on my GPS was -4, never seen a minus on it before.

Our B&B at Ravenglass was the place we stayed at the start of our Cumberland Way Walk in 2007,  Rosegarth , once again it was absolutely first class, thank you to Neil and team.

We had a super meal in the Ratty Arms on Ravenglass Station followed by an end of walk celebration in The Holly House Hotel there was a good crowd in which made for a lively evening See here for both places