A few weeks ago, at the tail end of October, the missus and I spent a weekend photo-trekking up in the Lake District.  Having had a taste of hill walking from our previous visits, we decided we would step it up a gear and tackle some bigger walks than our last visit up Cat Bells (or is it Catbells?)

In preparation for some more heavy duty walking action, we invested in a bunch of new kit including:

• walking boots
• walking socks
• waterproof coats
• waterproof over-trousers
• a well-ventilated rucksack
• waterproof OS maps
• compasses
• emergency whistles
• gloves
• neckwarmers
• thermal base layers
• hats
• hiking poles
• wind-up torch

Phew!  It looks like a lot, but it was all pretty much essential kit.  If we were going to be stuck up a mountain in freezing temperatures, we wanted to be sure we were prepared!

We were, in fact, incredibly lucky with the weather as only the week before, Keswick got into the news headlines when freak storms stranded participants of the Original Mountain Marathon.

The temperature at ground level was about 3-degrees Centigrade during the days which meant that we could expect it to hit freezing a few hundred metres up.  The sky was clear most of time apart from some isolated clouds.  Due to the mild autumn we’d had so far, there were plenty of golden leaves still on the trees.

We booked ourselves into a nice little B&B in the village of Thornthwaite which was just a few miles outside of Keswick.  The accommodation was perfectly nice and the owners were friendly enough, but we didn’t really spend much time there as our intention was to be out and about as much as possible.

Day 1

On our first morning there, we woke up before sunrise and headed off to Cat Bells.  As the sky was starting to show some light and we could reasonably see what we were walking on, we ascended about half-way up and took some photos.

This panoramic of Skiddaw is made up of a few stitched exposures:

If you click on the image, you can see the bigger versions of Flickr and really see the fantastic colours of the trees as well as Skiddaw with it’s frosty top coating.

I was trying to get a good sunrise shot, but we just weren’t high enough to see over the surrounding hills.  So, I took a few more shots before we headed back to the B&B for breakfast.  After breakfast, we went back to Cat Bells and scaled to the top.  This time, it was starting to get quite busy rather than just the solitary runner we’d seen earlier.

That evening, we had an absolutely amazing dinner at Middle Ruddings.  The older gents provided great service, but the young girls acted like they couldn’t give a shit.  Fortunately, everything else more than made up for it.  I had the most fantastically cooked scallops that just melted in my mouth followed by a mouth-watering steak and ale pie with perfectly cooked vegetables (and chips!)  The pastry was nice and flaky and the pieces of beef were cooked better than most steaks I’ve had.

A great, warm atmosphere along with their own hand-pumped beer and cider made for one of the best meals out I’ve had in a long time.  The next time I’m near Keswick I’ll be sure to pay another visit!

Day 2

After breakfast, we headed into Keswick town and I got myself a pair of Lowe Alpine convertible mittens.  These were ideal for photo-trekking as they were warm, had a grippy palm for holding onto hiking poles and had exposable fingers and thumbs.  These were a big improvement over the fingerless gloves I’d used the day before as my fingers didn’t go numb with the cold!

After Keswick, we headed to Buttermere.  I wanted to return to the spot where I’d taken this,

to try to get a shot in the same direction, but from higher up.  Unfortunately, the light wasn’t helping and the sun spent most of the time sitting beneath the level of the mountains on the right of this photo.  Still, I did get a few nice shots which I’ll upload at some point.

We missed lunch, but made up for it by having another great dinner this time at the Keswick Lodge.  After dinner, we finished the evening with a fireworks display at the local rugby club.  Again, more photos to come.

Day 3

Having been a bit disappointed with Buttermere the day before, we took advice from our Thornthwaite host and after a sunrise breakfast headed back to Buttermere to climb Haystacks.  This was to be our biggest trek yet.  Bearing in mind that we are newbies to hill walking, Haystacks was promising to be quite an adventure.  I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but just to give you an idea of what was involved, Haystacks reaches 597m from sea level.  This makes it:

• 6-times as tall as Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral,
• almost 4-times as tall as Blackpool Tower,
• almost twice as tall as the Eiffel Tower in Paris,
• 1.33 times the height of the Empire State Building spire

Click on the image above and see the embedded notes for a better idea of the scale of Haystacks!

We started our ascent about 9am and finally reached the summit around midday after making many stops for photos along the way. We bumped into a few people along the way and one thing that never ceases to amaze me on our walks is just how friendly other walkers are to complete strangers.  90% of the people you walk past will smile and say hello.  How nice is that?!

Reaching the summit of Haystacks was a big accomplishment for us and a wonderful experience.  The views from the top were stunning to say the least.  Not only could you see for miles, but you also got to see the (partially frozen) tarns at the top of Haystacks which aren’t visible from the ground.

We completed our tour of Haystacks after about 7-hours, taking a circular route from and to the local car park.

Haystacks proved to be a high point of our weekend, but also a low as I had a little incident with my camera.  Let’s just say that I’m glad I changed memory card during the climb and that my equipment was insured!

Another lesson I learned on the trip was that using a polarising filter together with an ultra-wide angle lens isn’t always such a good idea as the polarisation of the sky can vary greatly across the frame making it look a bit odd.

All in all, it was a fantastic long weekend and I’ve still got a ton of photos left to process and stitch.