C2C Day 6, Bampton Grange (≈Mile 61)—Getting Lost Is More Fun with Friends

Last night I have the best sleep I’ve had this week, with lights out by 10:00p, and I wake refreshed. The clouds look low, and over breakfast I decide to avoid the hilltops and take Beverley’s route south via Hartsop and Hayes Water to reach The Knott. She points me to the path that starts in the field across from her farm; getting there requires a dog-leg down the road and across the main street.

I start out around 9:30 and try to hurry, but am not getting my woolen toe cushions just right. They’re either too thick and jamming my toes or too thin and not giving me enough support. After the third stop within 300 yards to adjust them, I realize I’m hurrying because I feel scared about the route today.

I’m not going at all on the bona fide C2C, but taking a valley route to Bampton Grange that parallels the ridge walk of the C2C, follows the C2C path between The Knott and Kidsty Pike, and then veers off to follow the Roman Road “High Street” before going gradually down Bampton Common. It altogether avoids the Haweswater Reservoir, which Beverley says is miles of stony walking like at Ennerdale. Much of today’s walk and landmarks aren’t even in Wainwright’s book.

Looking back on Patterdale, I decide on a different route to Hayes Water even from the one Beverley suggested. It sends me through a lovely wild grotto with lots of singing birds that I record on Perry. An amazing gnarled filbert tree looks very old but is still bearing fruit on a few branches. Brothers Water shows up right on cue as a languid landmark.

Still following the details of my OS map, I get off track at Hartsop itself. The obvious footpath along a stone wall that I’m tracking peters out into a soggy cow path and dead-ends at another stone wall that has no stile. I can see my goal down the hill and its corresponding wiggly line on the map—the beck and gill beyond Hartsop—but I am way too high above it in reality.

OK. OS map rule #1: a 25000 scale really means that things are closer than they appear. I should be almost hugging the river, not this far above it. I resolve to attend to the map’s little stone-wall and fence lines more closely and turn to backtrack along the muddy cow path. A high-pitched cry comes from the sky—a golden eagle is soaring over the pasture I am in. She is heading me straight out like a beacon. I recall reading that golden eagles are returning to this area but stay in hidden places. I rejoice in her freedom and beauty, and in the chance to experience a sighting of this usually reclusive bird. I would never have enjoyed her flight had I not gotten off track.

Once again, the day is hot. A stop along Hayeswater Gill gives me a chance to rest from a steady uphill climb and soak my kerchief in the widest stream I’ve seen since starting the walk. Wide expanses of dry rock shows that this gill is still much narrower than it would be in wetter summers, though.

Getting to Hayeswater shortly afterward, I face what Elaine calls a “grunt” climb—easy for footing, but at a 35 to 40 percent grade that leaves me huffing and puffing and taking frequent breaks the whole way up. I finally reach the top to find seven cyclists resting and drinking water next to their laid-out bikes.

“My god,” I say, panting. “Don’t tell me you carried those up here.”

“Yeah,” they chorus, laughing at my expression.

I shake my head. “That’s like carrying your horse up a hill to ride it!”

They are headed to the High Street to bike all the way down along the ridge. Before I leave, another three climbers come over the crest shouldering bicycles. Loony. That’s what they are. Bloomin’ loony.

Beverley had told me that, after I pass The Knott, to watch carefully for the trail that turns sharply left so I don’t miss the turnoff to Kidsty Pike. “Follow the rock wall on your right. If you get to the big opening, you’ve gone too far. Look over your left shoulder, and you’ll see where you missed the turnoff. If you miss it, you’ll end up walking for hours south on the High Street and end up back where you started in Patterdale.”

Great. Don’t want to do that.

I decide to forego a visit to the knoll of The Knott itself and dutifully keep an eye on the rock wall, looking for the opening she describes. Only there are lots of openings. Fallen openings. Crumbling openings. Some deliberate-looking openings. And no corresponding path over my left shoulder. I begin to wish I’d mastered the trick of counting steps so I can gauge actual distance against a map when I spot another one of those bikers who has stopped to consult with a walker. They’re at the junction of a very wide gravel path that turns sharply left...rather hard to miss, actually.

“This the path to Kidsty Pike?”

“Uh, looks like it, yes,” they say, turning their own map around.

I let out a whoop and head up hill. Another tricky bit taken care of by available resources and support. Having canceled the idea of going to Kidsty Pike itself, I am just crossing a trackless field of heather and grass called Rampsgill Head when I catch long-distance sight of a couple wearing familiar-looking beige shorts, shirts, and outback hats.

The woman yells, “Audrey?”

I yell, “Elaine?”

Wow, what a delight to see familiar faces after a schlep like this morning’s. I’d given up hope of meeting any of my new chums today since I’d taken a different route from Patterdale. Heaven only knows where Michael and David are by now; they usually leave earlier than I do, anyway.

Elaine and John have already had a lunch break, and we discuss path options ahead. I relay what Beverley had said about Haweswater Reservoir, and none of us want to do the Kidsty scramble down. So we opt to follow my OS map and take the Roman Road down Bampton Common.

I pull out my sack lunch to eat en route, and we talk about our travels. “How was Striding Edge?” I am still happy I didn’t take that trail yesterday, and amazed that they had.

“Terrifying,” says Elaine. “Exposure on both sides, and some spots of real hard rock climbing. I’m glad I did it, and I don’t need to do it again.”

I heartily congratulate her success, for I know she has conquered a big fear. (Ask her about the time she crawled on hands and knees over boulders in Australia while her children skipped around her like gazelles, and you’ll understand the magnitude of yesterday’s accomplishment.)

John has done a lot of rock climbing in his time, some of it extreme, and agrees that Striding Edge is right up there in complexity and difficulty. He was particularly worried when he inadvertently dislodged a rock and sent it careening down the slope toward some hikers who had no business scrabbling up a particularly extreme side of the hill. “Look out below!” he cried. Fortunately, the stone bounced away from the climbers. John still looks relieved when he tells the story.

The Roman Road is less road now than a flat expanse of moors, and it’s blessedly gentle to walk on after so many days of stony ground and granite climbs. The path flows downhill, the hills are swells that expose peekaboo views of the lakes this district is named for, and instead of stones to jar every joint, padded peat cushions my steps.

The path is easy to follow until we get to Bampton Common itself, at the end of the Haweswater Reservoir. Then it becomes a fun challenge to find our way among the undulating hills and multiple paths that appear and disappear in the grasses. A landmark called Four Stones Hill proves most elusive—it’s supposedly four standing stones on a hill near the reservoir, but they’re nowhere to be seen.

We laugh a lot here, and I realize it’s far more fun to be lost with others than to be lost alone. We have plenty of daylight and three brains to put to the problem. We press on with John’s compass, our two maps, and everyone’s best common sense, and the trail still leaves us hanging at the outskirts of the first farmhouse we’ve seen all day. There we find a mound with four boulders all in a line—quite possibly the Four Stones Hill moved much farther north.

Civilization in the form of Bampton shows in the distance at last. On the very last slope of the very last sheep field before we reach Bampton’s road, I am reading my map and I step straight into a rabbit hole. Boom, down I go, face-plant into the grass before I even know what’s happened. Thank god I didn’t twist my ankle or knee, but my already-sore toes got jammed forward in my boot. Yeeowch.

OK. OS map rule #2: Don’t walk and read the map at the same time...


My hotel is at Bampton Grange, about 1/2 mile farther down the road from John and Elaine’s in Bampton, but that much closer to eventually reconnecting with the C2C trail around Shap. I take a welcome toilet stop at John & Elaine’s B&B (the proprietress panicks a bit when she sees three of us waiting on her doorstep, and had planned for only two). We reconnoiter with maps for tomorrow’s leg of the journey, and I am soon on my way to a shower, dry clothes, and an orange-passion fruit J2O at my hotel, the Crown & Mitre.

At the onsite pub, a five-year-old blonde girl in a pink headscarf is holding out a white plastic grocery bag to each patron: “Pea?”

Her big blue eyes are wide as she offers me her goods. I peer inside. A pile of sugar snap peas. I take one with thanks, and off she goes.

I eat supper at the pub with Jenny and Len, C2C’ers who are also from Australia, selecting a dish of venison in red wine/cranberry sauce, chips, broccoli, peppered cabbage, and carrots. Elaine and John, who met their fellow Aussies at Stonethwaite, join us for dessert. I order sticky lemon pudding with vanilla ice cream, but it’s not as good as regular sticky toffee pudding.

Turns out that John/Elaine and Jenny/Len live on opposite sides of Melbourne: John/Elaine on the coast, and Jenny/Len on the wine country side, 55 miles away. They’ve never met until this walk, even though they’re all avid walkers in Australia. They swap tales of the many hikes and walking tours they’ve done there, and I mentally move that country to the top of my list of places to visit someday.

By rough calculations and map checks, had I walked toward Shap instead of Bampton Grange, I would be at mile 61 of the official trail today. I’ve got four miles or so to walk to Shap tomorrow, which returns me to the trail at mile 61.5 and on the way to tomorrow’s nightly stop, Orton/Raisbeck.

Trail miles: 13; actual miles walked: 15

C2C Day 5, Patterdale (Mile 48)—Trail #1, #2, or #3?

Another 10 miles are ahead of me today, and the 12 steps from my bunk to the toilet have been a challenge all night long. My knees and ankles ache, and I can barely get my sorry body upright as I roll out of bed.

A shower and some moving around have helped a little this morning. It’s 6:30 now. Breakfast is at 7:30 and I’ve got a glorious hour of lazing around in bed now that I’m dressed. I’ll pack my toes and my bag after breakfast to be on my way by 8:30.

Having walked or fell-climbed an average of nine miles for each of four days, I’m at that in-between stage of wanting to rest (or quit) and feeling dejected over yet another two more days of Lake District hills. My body will hold up, but I’m definitely pushing its limits.

Last night Barry pointed me to an alternative path out of Grasmere that goes around a lump of land called the Great Tongue, which rises, well, like a big green tongue between two hills and gills (Little Tongue Gill and Tongue Gill—sometimes these place names make ridiculously simple sense). The trail to the right, Tongue Gill, has a gentler climb than the “official” trail to the left, and I have no hesitation in taking it this morning.

The day is bright and the walk easy over several stream crossings and through waist-high fern along the south side of Great Tongue. A few sheep are around. They run away from me, crashing through fern in startled, bleating leaps. I’m otherwise alone on the trail, although I can see two people, not necessarily traveling together, a ways behind me.

At quarter to ten, I’ve nearly reached the top of Great Tongue, and I take a break where the gill runs cold and clear over rocks and creating a small pool. I soak my kerchief and drink in the view of Grasmere in the valley below the deep fern green of the Tongue. I’m in the middle of making a voice recording about my progress when a familiar white hat and face come over the rise—it’s Michael, with David shortly behind.

“We thought that was you ahead of us!” says Michael as he sits down and stabs his trekking poles into the ground. “Those legs were like a carrot on a stick, leading us on!”

I am grinning, happy to see them both. David’s holding up well. We take a break together, sharing perspectives on yesterday’s walk. They had taken the low road through the valley to Grasmere.

“Awful, just awful,” says David. Michael agrees. It was more of the same rocky, rough terrain we’d covered the day before, plus it was hot and there was not much to look at.

A little after ten, we strike off together to the top of the Great Tongue, where I pause to take one last look back at Grasmere to say good-bye. The trail levels off a bit, then heads down to Grisedale Tarn (a small lake) where I yelp again with delight—there are John and Elaine, the couple from Australia.

We all make introductions and discover that John and Elaine are tackling a grueling string of hills that starts with a 1,000 foot climb to Dollywaggon Pike (I call it Dolly Parton Hill—that’s it behind me in the photo), goes another 1,000+ foot climb to the top of Helvellyn (3,118 feet), and culminates with a walk along the infamous Striding Edge, a popular, dangerous, wind-blown path that’s barely a few feet wide and has sheer drops of 2,000 feet on either side. (This is a two-way path, mind you, with people laden with backpacks trying to pass each other.) Their night’s lodging is on the other side of the ridge.

Michael, David, and I are all staying in Patterdale—they at a campsite, and I at a B&B that I hope is near the center of town. We’ve got three choices for route from where we stand at Grisedale Tarn: the same ever-uphill, harrowing track that John and Elaine will be taking to the left (no, thank you!); another ridge walk to the right along a saner-looking, long fell called St Sunday Crag (uh, think I’ll pass on that one, too); and a relatively straight shot down the valley of both ridges, following Grisedale Beck (stream).

Wainwright prefers, of course, a ridge walk, and recommends the less crowded St Sunday Crag, but all three of us opt for the direct valley route as quicker and easier on our bodies. We wave good luck to John and Elaine as they head for the trail up the side of Dollywaggon Pike, and I walk the rest of the day with Michael and David.


We eat our sack lunches at 11:30 at Ruthwaite Lodge, a former rest stop for travelers that’s now a locked clubhouse for a mountaineers group. By the time we reach it, every square foot of shade around the stone building is taken up by other trekkers and their packs. We park ourselves on a grassy knoll to rest, eat, and enjoy the stretch of valley ahead.

A beautiful waterfall is tucked away beyond the lodge, with a small pool. I hike down to it. Skinny dipping would have been lovely here. There’s also a cave entrance, probably left over from mining. I go into the tunnel about 150 feet, and it gets dark real fast. Lots of water is on the ground. Without a flashlight, I retreat quickly.

Wainwright laments that this part of the Lake District is heavily trafficked—Helvellyn is purportedly the most frequently climbed hill in all of England—and it is here that I begin to see many more people traveling the trail in both directions. Some jounce by on mountain bikes. Most are on foot carrying packs. I saw a few tents set up at the tarn.

Michael points out a faint, unending line of walkers coming down a footpath from Striding Edge to Patterdale on this side of the ridge. “The bus people,” he calls them, referring to how they get dropped off by tour bus at trailheads and travel in packs on their way down.

The walk today is gentle and easy, but without shade until the end of the valley. I’ve had too much sun again, and I start to feel headachy and nauseous once we reach a farm road. David goes ahead and Michael stays with me while I rest at the roadside and down the rest of my water. I make a mental note to buy aspirin to carry with me.

Nearly to Patterdale, we come upon a sheep and a lamb that’s barely larger than a small dog. It’s a very late birth, considering they’re usually born in spring. All the other lambs I’ve seen are nearly two-thirds the size of their mums, round and puffy with new wool. This one looks barely old enough to stand.

We pull into Patterdale at half past one and sit at an umbrella’ed table outside the Patterdale Hotel for a cool drink—J2O orange-cranberry for me, beer for Michael and David. We look over tomorrow’s plans. There’s one more steady, heavy-duty haul uphill to reach a ridge walk that passes The Knott and goes to Kidsty Pike. Michael has never done Kidsty Pike and is looking forward to putting a tick mark next to it on his list of places he has trekked in the UK. From that high point, there’s a pretty severe-looking descent to Haweswater Reservoir, for a four-mile waterside walk before we go several more miles to our respective towns for the night.

Michael and David are staying overnight tomorrow at Shap, I think, which is directly on the trail. I’m headed for Bampton Grange, which turns out to be farther off the C2C trail than I expected—so far, in fact, that it’s not even on the Footprint map. Thank god I bought the OS map that can get me there.

I’m disappointed that tonight’s B&B, Greenbank Farm, is also almost two miles beyond Patterdale’s town center, and therefore two miles away from where the C2C trail picks up near Michael and David’s campsite tomorrow morning. We say our goodbyes for the day and agree to look for each other tomorrow.

En route to Greenbank Farm, I stop at the post office/general store for aspirin, bandaids, and electrolyte drink for tomorrow. After today’s trek, I plan to carry three liters of fluids instead of two.

I am greeted by a lovely black horse on the way to the farm—he nickers and comes up for nose pets. I give him the apple left over from my packed lunch.

Greenbank Farm is very welcoming, and I immediately note it as the best lodging, alongside Low Cock How farm, that I’ve come to so far. Beverley, the proprietress, is talkative, friendly, and helpful. She’s walked the fells and knows their many trails, and begins telling me of alternative routes to Bampton Grange. I’m too brain-weary to take in the details, but I grasp that there’s a way back to the C2C path that doesn’t require me to return through Patterdale. And that she recommends taking something called High Street instead of going along Haweswater Reservoir.

It’s nearly 3:30p, and I’m feeling very tired. I sprawl out in my upstairs room with the window open. Wool is burning outside in the farm yard—the leftovers from shearing. It smells like burning meat and burning hair at the same time, both pleasant and unpleasant. Sheep are bleating and baaing in an incessant chorus. Two young neighbor boys are playing in the yard, romping here while their mums are on errands in town. They’re laughing and traveling around in a plastic-wheeled cart of some kind—it makes that grindy sound of plastic rolling on gravel. The farm’s many hounds are hot; I can hear their panting from up here. I fall asleep for a much-needed nap.

I am the only guest for dinner tonight, and Beverley serves me an absolutely huge and luscious meal of melt-in-your-mouth beef slices, whole fat baby carrots, and small whole white potatoes, steamed broccoli, followed by hot apple pie wallowing in cream. I could have second and third helpings on that dessert, were I not so full.

After dinner, I retire to my room to study tomorrow’s maps and try to remember what Beverley has told me. If I keep going south to join the C2C path, instead of doubling-back north to Patterdale, I estimate that, right now, I’m roughly in line with mile 48 of the official trail. I can see the top of that ridge walk straight across from my bedroom window.

Beverley has suggested that I go south through Hartsop, follow Hayeswater Gill (stream) to Hayes Water (a small lake), and then go up one steep hill to meet the C2C trail shortly before The Knott.

“It’s an easier trail than going all the way back through Patterdale and around the top,” she had said. “And don’t take Haweswater Reservoir from Kidsty Pike, either. It’s as bad as that road along Ennerdale—rocky and hard to walk. You’ll want to go down High Street, the old Roman road that goes along the ridge, to Bampton Common. It will lead you straight down to Bampton Grange for the night. Just be sure not to miss the turnoff onto the High Road after The Knott.”

Nine to ten puppies are playing in the garden. Their yapping antics pull me away from my maps, and I delight in watching their energetic pounces and tumbles. Three of them play a game of tug-of-war with a frayed rope, and one growls over the possession of an empty plastic garden pot. One of the mom-dogs overlooks it all; occasionally an uncle or aunt dog joins in. There are two sets of pups—wire-haired border terriers and Rottweiler-looking Australian herding dogs in black and chocolate versions. I didn’t catch the breed when Beverley’s husband told me. They’re bred here. All for sale. There seem to be twenty dogs all told, adults and pups included.

Returning from the window, I fold up the maps and name some photos from the last two days before going to bed. I need to do that daily, else things become a blur. Even the coast of St Bees feels weeks away, and it was only Tuesday, five days ago.

Trail miles: 10.5; actual miles walked: 10.5

C2C Day 4, Grasmere (Mile 37.5)—The Agony and Ecstasy of Ridge Walks

I sleep more poorly than I hoped, given how tired I am. It is warm in my room, and using the fluffy duvet—the only bed covering available—leaves me too hot, and going without it leaves me too cold. This is one of those times when having a top sheet and blankets works better than this British way of having only a bottom sheet and a duvet on a bed.

This morning I do TTouch on my legs and feet to ease tight muscles and sore ankles. I recall Tracy’s warning at St Bees—it’s not each day’s trek that’s the challenge, it’s the daily repeat of it that’s the thing.

I am off at 9:20a after the typical full English breakfast and a last-minute repair to my trekking poles. The foam handles have lost their glue and slide down whenever I push on them for support. Some Elastoplast wrapped below the grip solves the problem. I’ve also remembered to request a sack lunch today, and I load myself up with water and Tracey’s ample meal of sandwich, crisps, biscuit, fruit, KitKat, and juice. As I leave, I sample a ripe raspberry from a vine stretching over her garden wall.

The bridge that leads to the C2C path is just outside Tracey’s B&B. I am onward to Grasmere by one of two routes: a high walk along the ridge, or a shorter, more direct route through the valley. The decision point comes later, after Lining Craig. Not sure yet which trail I’ll choose.

This part of the walk—a two-day jaunt to Patterdale—is one of Wainwright’s favorites. Rather than go directly over a wall of fells that run north-south, the track requires a jog south through Grasmere and then back north to Patterdale along footpaths that follow ridge lines or go through valleys. The eight-miles-as-the-crow-flies trip to Patterdale is doubled by this detour.

I meet Barry from Manchester along the lovely Greenup Gill (a river, now very low because of the hot summer) that flows through Borrowdale outside of Stonethwaite. He’s on a few days’ walk, not the C2C, and is going to Grasmere for his last day. I quiz him about the two trail choices ahead, and he recommends the high road. We’re staying at the same hostel in Grasmere—there are two there, the place is such a popular stopover.

He becomes a dot ahead of me on the way past Eagle Crag, and two fellows in their early twenties later puff by me carrying packs large enough to hold camping gear. They, too, become dots near the top of Lining Crag, even when I’m at the bottom of it.

The day is turning warm, and the prospect of Lining Crag, that hill to the left in his photo, daunts me. It is steeper and longer than yesterday’s Loft Beck, and looks like it’s full of scree and those ankle-breakers I dealt with yesterday. I start up the hill, one foot in front of the other, trekking poles at the ready, winding left then right then straight up, and frequently finding blessed sets of stone steps that hardy C2C volunteers have installed to help keep down erosion.

I am again pausing every hundred feet or so on the ascent, winded and panting, which I find utterly appalling, and I use each stop as an excuse to look back upon the dale, the gill, and how far I’ve come from Stonethwaite. A 30’s-something couple passes me about two-thirds of the way up. We don’t expend the energy to say more than hello. I stick a pole to the next rock and keep going.

I finally reach the summit of Lining Crag and take the detour to its very top for a rest rest rest and to take in the well-earned spectacular view. I am breathing hard, pink in the face, and ready to fall down on the spot. There I meet the two young guys who had passed me, packs on the ground, sweat on their shirts, sitting on two boulders.

One is on his cell phone. The other is smoking a fag.

I laugh outloud at the absurdity of it all. They are David and Wessel from Holland, out to walk the C2C in 10 days (the average is 14) before going south to meet David’s family, who still live in England. They need to make it to Patterdale tonight—over 16 miles from Rosthwaite, traveling the most grueling part of the trail and carrying full packs. They’re already thinking about hiring the Sherpa Van for the rest of the trip.

The route from Lining Crag to Grasmere requires going over a pass called Greenup Edge toward a place called the head of Far Easedale, and then following a stream straight down to Grasmere. The fact that Wainwright warns that it’s easy to fall into the “Wythburn trap” (to mistake the Wythburn valley stream as the Far Easedale path and thereby end up on the wrong side of the ridge from Grasemere) does not ease my mind. I ask to join David and Wessel over this next tricky bit of Greenup Edge.

This time I’m the one with the OS map, and David, who did this walk two years ago, has a vague idea which way to go. The top of the Greenup Edge is squishy peat and tall grasses. No signage is to be found, and the only waymarkers that Wainwright lists are landmarks such as “old fence,” “the remains of a wire fence,” and “an iron stile incongruously standing in isolation.” About as much help as the names of the locales themselves. (Why do people even bother to refer to geographical names at all on walks like this; I mean, it’s not like I’m going to find a sign up here that reads, “Welcome! You are at Greenup Edge. The Head of Far Easedale is that way. Turn left for Grasmere.”)

Fortunately, the weather is also with us, and the glorious, mist-free day allows us to see Grasmere in the distance as we, miracle of miracles, actually do spot a bit of rusting iron stile sticking incongruously from a nondescript pile of granite and grasses.

With the lake of Grasmere in sight almost five miles away, I practically skip down the rock-strewn gully of a now-dry stream, stepping on the big stones and letting gravity take me to the next one. It becomes almost a dance—balancing and falling forward to catch the next rock instead of trying to pick my way around and between them. I skim down the hill the entire way, gleeful as a child tripping across a river on stepping stones.

The boys and I soon reach our split-off point: the junction of the ridge walk to the left and the valley walk straight into Grasmere, with the sweep of Grasmere Common banking the right side. They take the shorter, direct route in hopes of getting there for lunch. I decide to try my hand and feet at the high-rise walk along Calf Crag, Gibson Knott, and Helm Crag. I can follow the ridgeline visually from here, three summits that will afford some great views of where I’ve been and where I’m headed. Wainwright says it adds a mile to the walk and an hour to the time, and is worth the additional effort.

I take inventory. So far my feet and legs are holding up well. Water supply is good. I’m hungry, so I eat my sandwich and get going again before 12:30. Just as I am climbing along an old fence line to the ridge, four ravens come soaring from beyond Calf Crag and fly around over me before heading off.

Calf Crag, at 1,800 feet, offers amazing views, which I video in a panorama using Perry. The walking is easy along this ridgeline, and very windy. A cairn is at the top of the crag, and I add a stone to it.

I sit here at the top of Calf Crag, looking ahead to Grasmere and to the third ridge for today, Helm Crag, and feel so proud of myself for doing this walk. I wanted to back out at the beginning, and I’ve had help and support all along the way, plus time to find my own way for miles.

Watching the trail ahead instead of the ground today has been pushing me to use my peripheral vision to guide my feet in all but the most sticky places. I’m trusting my body more too. I feel stronger, knowing when to rest, when to pause to deal with sore feet, when to eat, drink, or soak in the view. The tune of “My Boyfriend’s Back” runs through my head with different lyrics: “My vision’s back and it’s gonna stay forever. Hey now, hey now, my vision’s back.” It’s true, too—my distance vision is definitely sharper, the more I relax into my own self guidance in the day.

At Gibson Knott, I stop for a snack with Grasmere lake in closer view and take time to belt out songs to the hills. The same kind of joy is bubbling through me as when I was walking on Jura. I love this place, this day, this moment. Myself.

Two swallows speed by doing aerobatics like F-16s; they actually make a whizzing sound, they are moving so fast. A kestrel or similar bird hovers over the heath. Its outspread wings catch the wind, and it hangs motionless in the air. I find a large fluffy, air-worthy feather anchored to the ground by pellets of sheep shit. The analogy isn’t lost on me—lighten my load of unnecessary stuff, and I’ll be able to float on the breeze.

Two hours after first getting to the ridge, I reach the third hilltop, Helm Crag, also known as the Lion and Lamb. Thank god for volunteers who keep up this trail. There are stone steps on the steepest of most ascents, and their welcome regularity of stride makes for happier knees here at Helm Crag. By now, my body is beginning to feel the strain of the day’s continuous up and down. Looking back to the west, I photograph where I’ve come from. “I did that. I walked the ridge.” Some do Mt Everest. I did this fell range.

Grasmere and its lake are beautiful seen from Helm Crag. It’s an awful walk down to get there, though: punishing in its scree and rocks and steep pitch. “Please, level road!” my ankles and knees keep begging of every turn. It takes me forty-five minutes to make the descent, and every step shoots pain through my leg joints.

The last mile into the hostel is blissfully tarmac, albeit a bit uphill, and I reach the YHA at 4:00p, just in time to check in, get settled into a bunk, and go back out to wander around Grasmere in hopes of picking up a few things before stores close at 5:00. Weather reports look good for tomorrow—more sun, no rain.

I’ve been to Grasmere before, over 25 years ago as part of a two-week UK bus tour I took with my grandparents after I graduated from high school. I forgot how large the town is—and it seems to have grown. Lots of stores, hotels, restaurants, bookshops, side streets. A veritable metropolis after so many nearly one-street villages of the last few days.

Grasmere’s most famous son is William Wordsworth, who lived here most of his life and is buried just across from where I sit right now. I’m in a lovely garden that volunteers started two years ago from a waste area. It’s tranquil and shady and right next to the church Wordsworth attended and the cemetery where he helped plant a lot of yew trees that are now almost 150 years old. The town has planted 3,000+ daffodils in this park and they are slowly paving the walkways with stones bought by sponsors. Benches, too. They want to plant an oak tree in one of the corners—no one has stepped up to buy it yet.

There’s a Wordsworth Hotel and Restaurant in Grasmere. Lots of Wordsworth china, books, tourist trinkets, etc. I wonder what good old William would think of all this merchandizing in his name. He’d probably like the garden.

Lots of people are walking by as couples. How nice that would be to have at the moment. I feel sad that I didn’t connect with Michael and David today. I wonder if they took the short route in.

I find a walking shop and buy a second pair of shorts for my wardrobe. The weather’s been warm all day, with good breezes and some cloud-shadowed sun. The top of my thighs got sunburned. I can feel their heat through my black slacks.

I eat a popsicle, Hula Hoops, and a Snickers bar to replenish my energy enough to walk the mile back to the hostel. Physically, I am exceptionally tired—weary feet and legs. At my core though, I feel very fit and calm and pleased with myself. Walking, exercise, is good.

Waiting for dinner at the hostel, I meet up with the couple from Australia whom I’d met last night at the pub in Rosthwaite. Elaine and John. They are outgoing and easy, and I like them both.

John has made a huge project of the walk preparation—laminated, color-coded printouts of each day’s trek, with abbreviated notes about landmarks and interesting spots to see along the way, and enlarged maps of the route. Even punched holes in the sheets so he can wear them around his neck and refer to them as they walk. It took him months to research everything on the web and set it all up.

I’m both impressed and amused. That kind of detailed, organized groundwork is something I would have done years ago—and might have done still, had I not chosen to go more serendipitously on this trip. I begin to judge all that setup as anal, then realize that that kind of deep preparation is undoubtedly vital for safety and survival when walking in Australia’s wilds, as John and Elaine often do. Certainly it alleviates the fear factor of getting lost.

Barry joins me for dinner at the hostel, and John and Elaine, who often do their own cooking in hostel kitchens, join us for company. The hostel staff has taped balloons and a Happy Birthday message to the end of the table I’m sitting at. A little girl is celebrating her birthday with her family. Her little sister is going around with Daddy’s big digital camera taking pictures of everything in macro mode, from her own waving hand to the frosting on the cake to strangers like me eating rice and curry.

Three days ago, in the heat wave from St Bees to Ennerdale Bridge, I was beginning to question the wisdom of this trek, and reading Wainwright’s book in between hasn’t always instilled confidence in my decision to do it. Had I gone through Wainwright’s book before leaving the U.S., or done the kind of research that John did on the C2C, I probably would have bagged the whole idea. I’m glad I didn’t.

I’ve read that the first days on the eastbound walk are grueling ways to get in shape for the rest of the C2C. Looking back, the path hasn’t been hard per se, but it has been strenuous and rough going, requiring significant stamina—and sometimes plain old stubbornness—just to keep on track.

Until today, I’ve also felt an underlying urgency to get to each day’s destination on the map, to not dawdle too long, to make sure I don’t run out of time. Now I’m beginning to settle into the feel of the walking itself, and am finding a rhythm in which my body knows how many hours it takes to go a certain distance. This allows me to pace myself better and to take more time out to enjoy where I’m at.

Fell walking is not for the faint of heart, although it is growing on me. The hills aren’t as intimidating now that I’ve met them. As strangers, they were unreadable and frightening. But having walked them, viewed them, followed their contours, found them labeled on maps, I’ve made friends with them safely.

And their heights are manageable. There are no permanently snow-covered peaks that require special gear to climb, or that give me altitude sickness. The trails here lead me to places, instead of just being fresh-air loops or arduous climbs that I walk for the sake of walking. “Think I’ll go to Grasmere.” Snap. I can do it in a day.

Having seen them first-hand, I can see why Wainwright calls these fells and dales “delectable,” and proclaims today’s walk to be “a walk in heaven.” While I never expected heaven’s steps to be so hard on the knees, I agree.

Trail miles: 8; actual miles walked: 10