Oversharing: Buttermere Loop

Thursday, June 4, 2015

Buttermere Loop

Bothy with a view

up on Red Pike. Rannerdale Knotts, scene of Wednesday's run below with the mighty Grasmoor behind.

Gamlin End from Haystacks summit with the two lakes of Buttermere valley on the right

Paul on the last bit of scree

My plan on Saturday was to complete a high level loop of Buttermere, along the High Stile ridge, over Haystacks, crossing over Honister Slate Mine, up Dale Head and along to Robinson before returning to Buttermere Village.

I chose Buttermere as it was the headquarters for the Lakes Charity Classic & Buttermere Bash paragliding event. I thought we would see some paragliding action as we circumnavigated the lake.

There were a few paragliders out, including a few who took a very scary line down the cliffs of Fleetwith Pike, twisting and falling at quite a rate. I'm not sure if the conditions were too challenging or if we timed it wrong though as we didn't see as many as I thought we would.

Rather than the usual route, steep and direct through the woods on the far side of the lake from Buttermere Village, we went around Crummock Water a bit and headed up Scale Force.

This was further but more gradual and made a difference to the usual huffing up the steep path. We continued across the rough ground on the High Stile range, exploring a little bit before taking in the scree descent off Gamlin End.

Paul ran down with his phone in his hand taking a video, only his video stopped recording after a few seconds.

We climbed up to Haystacks summit, after passing the famous tarn, and then decided to take the track down to Warnscale Bottom past the beautifully situated bothy.

We ran along the village/road side of Buttermere, there is a nice enough track here but it is always really busy. More so today with people from the Buttermere Bash event.

Back at Buttermere village and we had covered 12.5 miles and a significant amount of climbing. Nice day out.