A guided walk around the Coledale Horseshoe

I spent a delightful day guiding Howard, Simone, Russell and Penny around the beautiful Coledale Horseshoe on Friday. 

The weather was quite changeable with strong winds, clouds, sunshine but luckily no rain! We had plenty of stunning views but also walked in cloud on the summit of Eel Crag (or Crag Hill as Ordnance Survey name it on the maps).

Heather on the path up Grizedale Pike

The walk up Grizedale Pike is a long ascent, steep and rocky in places but we took our time and enjoyed walking through the heather in all its purple glory!  On reaching the summit we were hit by very strong winds and found a sheltered spot for a bite of lunch.  However, starting off from here on our way to Coledale Hause the wind hit us hard and almost had us off our feet.  We sat for a few moments to assess the situation and I thought about turning around and descending back down the way we’d come.  In the end, I decided to test the wind again and although it was still strong we soon became sheltered by a shoulder of the mountain and after that the wind hardly bothered us at all!

Our descent off the Coledale Horseshoe via Outerside

We reached the big plateau like summit of Eel Crag/Crag Hill, the highest summit on the Coledale Horseshoe for us today.  We didn’t linger long as there were no views because of the cloud.  The next summit of Sail was quickly reached, then on to Outerside and finally back down to the pretty village of Braithwaite where our walk has started.  The sun was shining by now and we finished the day off with a welcome drink in the garden at the Coledale Inn.

Thanks Howard, Simone, Russell and Penny for a lovely day out!

Kate

Views over to Skiddaw