River Esk

I enticed B out for a walk using the lure of Tongue Pot; he’s been campaigning for a return ever since his first visit, which was five summers ago. How time flies! My side of the deal was that he had to climb a hill with me first. We parked on the big section of grass verge just west of Brotherikeld Farm (you can make out the parked cars in the photo above) and then set off toward the Hardknott Pass, soon leaving the road for the path which cuts across to the remains of the Roman Fort.

20220717_103155 — *Arriving at Hardknott Roman Fort.*

B has visited the fort once before, when we climbed Harter Fell with old friend X-Ray and came down via Horsehow Crags and Demming Crag (Birketts which needed ticking off, of course), which, astonishingly, was twelve summers ago. How time flies!

20220717_103233 — *Beyond the wall: Horsehow Crags and Demming Crag.*

20220717_103236 — *Inside the fort. Border End beyond.*

We left the fort on a path heading towards the pass – I guess the old Roman road.

20220717_105719 — *The pass, the fort and Eskdale.*

By the time we hit the road, it was very hot. Fortunately, from the top of the pass it was only a very short climb to the Birkett of Border End, which turned out to be one of those Birketts which is well worth a visit, with superb views and nobody else about.

20220717_112956 — *On Border End, looking to the Scafells.*

20220717_113057 — *On Border End: Esk Pike, Bowfell, Crinkle Crags and Hard Knott.*

20220717_113125 — *Border End panorama.*

As we dropped away from the top of Border End I noticed this moth on the ground.

I think it’s a Garden Tiger, although it’s quite a way from any gardens. The wings usually seem to look more cream than yellow and the spots can vary in shape, but the general pattern looks right.

Since the moth was dead, I could and should have looked at the underwings which should have been a spectacular red, but unfortunately that didn’t occur to me at the time.

20220717_114146 — *A view down on to Eskdale Needle.*

I’d read that Border End has a good view of Eskdale Needle, and it does, although you may have to open a flickr copy of the photo above and zoom it to see it. One day I’ll have to come this way and drop down to have a proper look.

20220717_122021 — *Yew Bank Crag panorama.*

The tarn on Hard Knott was choked with reeds and looked extremely shallow, I soon dismissed any idea I’d had of an early dip there.

We diverted off the path to take in the rocky knoll of Yew Bank, another Birkett (and a Tump and a Synge apparently). Dropping slightly below the summit gave absolutely superb views of the hills and crags around Upper Eskdale and of the Esk and Lingcove Beck.

20220717_122902 — *Slightside, Scafell, Mickledore, Scafell Pike, Broad Crag, Ill Crag, Great End. The river Esk and Lingcove Beck below.*

20220717_124720 — *Descending from Hard Knott.*

20220717_125016 — *Another view of England’s highest – hard to resist!*

20220717_125842 — *Lingcove Beck and Bowfell.*

20220717_130242 — *Lingcove Beck and Crinkle Crags.*

When we reached Lingcove Beck we immediately came upon an inviting looking pool.

Me made our way down the beck, moving from pool to pool, B looking for places to jump in, whilst I settled for a swim. I think we found around five good spots. I thought Andy and I had made a pretty thorough exploration of the swimming possibilities of both the Esk and Lingcove Beck, but I don’t remember these delightful pools.

20220717_141207 — *Taking another plunge.*

Tongue Pot was busy, busier than it looks here. I jumped in from the wimps side, by the tree on the right, but B had only one thing in mind: the mega-leap having not done it five years ago.

20220717_150328 — *The ‘mega-leap’*. *This is a video. If it won’t play, click on it to visit the flickr page and view B’s feat of daring.*

No qualms this time.

Once he’d done it a few times, all that remained was the pleasant walk down the valley back to the car.

20220717_154026 — *Eskdale Needle from below.*

20220717_155442 — *The Esk and Bowfell.*

A longish post this one (by my standards anyway), there’s a selection of music at the bottom to sweeten the pill, should you desire, just don’t forget to mosey back up here.

Waterfall, Scale Gill from Scale Gill Bridge.

Yesterday, and days before,
Sun is cold and rain is hard,
I know
Been that way for all my time.

The Olympic Torch came to Kendal, Milnthorpe, Carnforth, Lancaster and on to Blackpool. The rain, seemingly a permanent fixture this summer, never-the-less discovered new reserves of spite and venom and fell ever harder. Cash-tills chimed in the emporiums of the purveyors of brollies. Here in the North Wet, we rolled back the brims of our sou’westers and fell to painting pitch on the clinkers of our new gopher wood boat.

A couple of days after the damp squib of the Torch relay, I had an opportunity to get out for a jaunt. It seemed sensible to seek out some waterfalls. I considered several options, but the forecast was for a wet start to the day, clearing later from the west, so a walk in the western Lakes beckoned. Eskdale then.

Eskdale

Stanley Force and Birker Force, on the South side of the valley, looked most impressive as I drove past and when I set off up the valley it had even stopped raining. There was a symphony of running water; from the low, loud bass note of the river below, to the gurgle and splutter of the rills, runnels and rivulets all around. Sadly, the patter of rain on hood was soon added to that music.

I passed a farmer and his sheep-dog riding the ubiquitous quad-bike. ‘Weir yu hidded?” he asked in a wonderful broad Cumbrian accent. I suspect that he thought that I was mad. I was beginning to think that I was mad. He was driving a flock of white sheep and black lambs from the in-bye fields out onto the open fellside.

River Esk

At Scale Bridge, where there are waterfalls in Scale Gill both above and below the bridge, I noticed a sharp contrast in the sound of the two falls; the lower one was producing a much deeper rumble. It occurred to me that this might well be the Doppler effect in action, and I was genuinely chuffed with the thought, in a ‘I could think of things I never thunk before’ sort of way. A warm glow of self-satisfaction made the driving rain and low cloud seem a little more bearable for, oh…several seconds, at least.

Heron Stones.

Eskdale Needle.

Despite the inclement weather, this had already been a fair bird-watching walk, with goldfinches in the bracken shortly after I left the car, the odd raven and a couple of sightings of buzzards. Of course, buzzards are not at all rare or unusual these days, thankfully. In fact, only today, I watched one through our kitchen window spiralling over the fields behind the house.

But in a mountain setting, they still have the power to make me marvel and admire.

Lingcove Beck Bridge.

My recent trip to Roeburndale with the ankle-biters had me recalling one particularly memorable previous visit. By contrast, almost every spot in Eskdale is freighted with the associations and happy memories of countless walks, picnics, swims, scrambles, camps….

This is where they walked, swam, hunted, danced and sang,
Take a picture here, take a souvenir

I’ve camped here many times, swum in many of the pools, scrambled up the waterfalls of the Esk gorge and up some of its tributaries too.

The river was running very high this time, but I have photos from many years ago showing the waterfalls in the gorge here in spate, brown with silt, and encroaching on either bank.

The path on the western, left-hand side, of the Esk, traverses the slopes of Green Crag, which the river seems to have cut-away leaving a half-hill. As a result, the slope is steep and in places loose and/or rocky.

The path is a scratchy one; not difficult, but care is required.

The cloud had been lifting, the rain had stopped. The unmistakable pyramid of Bowfell had even put in fleeting appearances. Patches of sunlight had flitted across distant hillsides. All good. And now…

The Esk, Scar Lathing, Low Gait Crags, Long Crag

,,,the top of the gorge and Great Moss is not too far away.

Also, unexpectedly….

…a cormorant perched, rather forlornly I thought, by the river below.

A first view of Great Moss.

Great Moss is aptly named: ‘tis exceedingly boggy. I had thought that I was pretty sodden anyway, but reached Absolute Wet when an apparent island of terra firma in the midst of a submerged bog turned out to be a floating sod. On the plus side: the water wasn’t quite as cold as I’d anticipated and only my right leg was fully immersed.

I stopped for some soup in the shelter of the monolithic boulders at Sampson’s Stones.

Next objective – more waterfalls…

Now I’ve always assumed that the waterfalls pouring down the side of Cam Spout Crag would be Cam Spout, which I’ve also always thought was a perfect fit for this tumbling ribbon of water. But I see on the map that it’s marked as How Beck. So make of that what you will.

Likewise, the OS have the imposing crag on the left of this picture as Dow Crag, but I notice that in the scrambles guides, Brian Evans calls it Esk Buttress, which seems more appropriate.

Pen above Dow Crag or Esk Buttress.

On another long ago visit to Great Moss, the Shandy Sherpa and I walked down from Esk Hause and I drove him to distraction taking photos of every bend and cascade in the river. This was in the days of 35mm film, 36 shots at a time and extortionate processing costs. I was barely solvent and could ill afford to shoot a whole roll of film, on a overcast day, all of very similar scenes. But I fell in love with Great Moss that day (my first visit I think) and my critical facilities were temporarily suspended.

How Beck or Cam Spout, from over by the river.

This visit was no different. I shambled around taking photos with abandon. I know that I could, and probably should, prune a few more photos from this post, but to get down to this few has been a painful process: personally, I think that the views in Upper Eskdale are unparalleled anywhere else in the Lakes.

I followed How Beck down to the river, thinking that despite the high-water, just maybe I would be able to cross the river upstream of the confluence. And I did. I got a bit wet in the process, well – a bit wetter – but it wasn’t too bad.

Now I was in the heart of the bog. I’d crossed over so that I could descend by the other bank, but now decided to head upriver to take a peek into Little Narrowcove. I didn’t get that far: I decided that discretion was the better part of valour when the onward route threatened to become another opportunity to practise bog-snorkelling.

I didn’t save myself for long: a poor choice of route further down had me tramping through the black stuff. “How deep can it be?” I wondered dismissively. Thigh deep it transpired. Not to worry: it was only my left leg that was fully immersed. Ho hum.

I didn’t think that I could get any wetter now…

…so might as well take some photos whilst standing knee deep in the river.

Bowfell, Crinkle Crags, River Esk.

The weather was decidedly improving, even Scafell Pike had cleared. I was tempted to seek a higher vantage point from which to watch the sunlight and shadows sweep over the hills: perhaps the summit of Pen.

But I had started late, the European Cup final was beckoning, and I suspect it might be considered a bit off in some circles to not be at home to play host when you’ve invited friends around to watch the match.

Scar Lathing and Crinkle Crags.

Without B’s sharp-eyed help I didn’t see such a wide variety of bug-life as I might have. I did spot a small heath moth and several dor beetles…

This one was on it’s back when I first came across it…

…I’ve included this photo, despite the lack of sharpness, due to the glorious metallic, electric indigo of the beetle’s undersides.

And I feel like a beetle on its back
And there’s no way for me to get up

(10 points available for that one Pop Pickers – which song is it from?)

One advantage of coming back down the opposite bank of the river was the opportunity to take a closer look at the waterfalls above Lingcove Beck Bridge.

This is the first.

This is some sundew growing near that first waterfall.

And this is the third.

There are many great places to swim in the Esk, but this, Tongue Pot, is surely the best. The water is very deep in places, deep enough so that a jump from the ash tree on the right or from the top of those rocks on the far bank (the mega-leap) will not carry you to the bottom. The sun was almost shining and I have to confess that I was sorely tempted, but I’ve swum here before after rain and I know that, in these conditions, I’m not a strong enough swimmer to make much progress against the flow of the river. Another time.

The remainder of my walk was enlivened by the bird life.

A male wheatear with a grub.

Esk valley, Bowfell behind.

A meadow pipit, perhaps.

Common sandpiper.

The common sandpipers I saw by Langden Beck were extremely elusive, but I did get some views and a good chance to tune into their strident calls. So when I heard them this time I had a fair idea what I was listening to. What’s more, whilst one of the pair made itself scarce, the other sat atop a dry-stone wall not too far away and continued to harangue me.

The Esk from a footbridge.

Finally, this last part of the post is for Danny who has an entertaining knack of finding elaborately carved gateposts (and who is having a, hopefully temporary, break from posting).