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We were in Ambleside for 3 nights over Easter celebrating Mrs D's 50th, staying in a little flat right on the main road south out of town heading to the pier at Waterhead, right next to the Langdale and Ambleside Mountain Rescue base. She was keen to do some Fell walking while we were there and I suggested the Langdale Pikes (with the obligatory visit to the Old Dungeon Ghyll afterwards). However when I provided a little more detail about the route (she is fairly sketchy about minor details like names!) she said that she had done it with her mum when they had been staying in Hawkshead back in 2009 for her mum's 60th while I was in Australia for my cousin's wedding. I was keen to get some Lakeland Fell walking under my belt for the first time since I spent 5 days in Ambleside with my friend Robin back in 2018. I suggested a couple of alternative routes but in the week before we travelled south, the forecast was suggesting pretty poor walking weather for the duration of our stay. We agreed to head to our accommodation in Ambleside on the Sunday and play things by ear.
A walk down to the pier on the Monday morning resulted in a Double Whammy - a drenching and the discovery that the Waterhead Inn was closed for refurbishment. I had visited on a few occasions on my last visit and had been keen to frequent the place once again. Oh well, there's still The Unicorn on North Road I thought to myself, scene of a fine afternoon session 5 years ago after a morning drenching on Hard Knott. We headed back to our accommodation and had a spot of lunch before deciding that a swift ascent of Loughrigg Fell was probably as good as it was going to get.
Debbie and Ailsa went ultra-Alpine style while I threw on a little day pack and we headed across the road and down the lane opposite the Low Fold car park and the Fisherbeck Hotel that leads through some fields and pops out at the big junction at the top end of Borrans Road. We nipped over the junction and the bridge over the River Rothay beyond that and turned off onto Under Loughrigg Lane.
Setting off down the lane, target straight aheadRiverside B&B - a fixer-upper on Under Loughrigg LaneRiver RothayJust past Miller Bridge and the point where Under Loughrigg Lane bends left, we took a left onto a ridiculously steep windy road that lead up past a few large houses before turning into a gravelled track just beyond Brow Head Farm.
Brow Head FarmAmbleside and Wansfell Pike through the bushesIt was fairly busy (even although the pictures don't necessarily show it). It was Easter Monday after all. It was the Lake District. It was a small, easily accessible Fell slap bang next to the honey pot that is Ambleside. It was always going to be busy.
C'mon Dad, before it gets too busy!It feels and looks more autumnal than spring-like!North towards the Fairfield HorseshoeScoping out a good climbing opportunity for the descentNorth towards Fairfield againWe eventually left the last of the trees behind and emerged onto open moorland. The path dipped before turning right and heading up through an optional scrambly section which Ailsa loved and said she would love to do more stuff like that. Mental note made! Forcan Ridge? An Teallach? A long overdue second traverse (first for Ailsa) of Am Fasarinen on Liathach?
Boggy path and open moorland FellNow That's What I Call A Stepping Stone - Volume 50!Is it just me or does it look really autumnal!?Ailsa leading the scramble - Windermere in the backgroundOnce up the scrambly section, it was a more leisurely, gradual ascent to what appeared to be the summit but my OS map and Google Maps both indicated was not the actual summit, this being some distance and a bit more ascent further. There certainly appeared to be a few people dotting the skyline ahead and as we got closer, we could hear that one figure was barking directions out to an unseen audience somewhere off the other side of the hill. It turned out he was a shepherd giving instructions to his colleague and their dogs from an aerial vantage point.
Silhouetted shepherd above Skelwith Bridge and Elter WaterSome of the workers taking a breather and hoping to cadge a liftWe chatted to him for a minute or two as he kept his eye on movements on the hillside below. He said they were rounding the sheep up and taking them down for lambing before the ticks could get at them and potentially kill the lambs. We let him get on with his task and continued our way through a wide depression and then up a sloping gully to the summit.
Loughrigg Tarn and up Great Langdale to Lingmoor Fell and the Langdale PikesAilsa contemplating a cloud shrouded WetherlamDebbie looking across Great Langdale to the distant Coniston FellsThe girls contemplating the route to the summitThe knobbly summit of Loughrigg Fell with the Langdale Pikes beyondSouth down WindermereShowers rolling over WetherlamPhallic symbolism in the hills - is it a Lakeland thing!!!???By the time we reached the summit with its trig pillar, which has clearly succumbed to the elements since some of the reports I read on this hill in advance of our visit, the weather had decided that it was done being cooperative for the day and started threatening to make things difficult. We snapped a few photos to prove we had been here and made tracks back, retracing our steps back to Miller Bridge before cutting through Rothay Park and into town.
Don't look at me, I didn't knock it over!To Ambleside, Wansfell Pike and WindermereLingmoor and the Langdales with the Coniston Fells brooding in the low cloud beyondMaybe that person over there is responsible for flattening the trig!!!??? Grasmere behindAilsa pleased with herself at having bagged her first WainwrightThe grey skies continued to threaten doom all the way down but we still managed a decent stop for a spot of tree climbing, which Ailsa has always been a bit partial to.
Ambleside and Wansfell on the descentWeather still in the balanceThat tree needs climbingShe's getting a bit big for this - gonna need a pint in The Unicorn to recover!The rain started with a vengeance just as we were getting back into town near the Jintana Thai restaurant, scene of that infamous post-Unicorn pre-Langdale dinner 5 years ago almost to the day. We had to nip into a clothes shop, partly because it had Closing Down Sale signs in the window, partly because the rain was now bouncing off the tarmac! As if these two things weren't bad enough, the tin lid was put on things when we eventually braved the conditions to head to The Unicorn, only to be met with Closed signs. Not Closing Down Sale signs unfortunately. Just Closed. As in Already Closed. As in No Beer Here!
The signs indicated it was due to some sort of dispute between the brewery and the lease holders, and that legal proceeding were ongoing. We retreated to the Ambleside Hotel - any port in a storm as they say - before heading back to the flat to get ready for a birthday meal out at The Priest Hole restaurant. Nice it was too, but probably not as nice as the meal we had the following evening in Bar eS, a wee tapas place tucked down a side alley off the main road. It was there that we learned from a waitress that the story goes that The Unicorn closed down because the lease holders were, how shall I put this, diversifying the business away from the normal business of a public house into other areas and that the brewery had taken a dim view of this business plan! I will leave it up to your imagination if you are not familiar with the story, but suffice to say it is not what I would have expected from a place like Ambleside. Just goes to show, you never really know a place.
