Carrying a 15kg pack up gullies to Red Screes and a wild camp might have been tough but was just the start of my problems. Being knocked of my feet the next day, searching effortlessly for the Priest Hole cave and enduring that 3 mile walk up the Kirkstone Pass from Patterdale might have clinched it!
Red Screes with the Dovedale Round
Route Map and GPX
From the Kirkstone Inn, climb Red Screes by the steep eastern flank path, then head north to Middle Dodd. Return past Red Screes and continue east towards Little Hart Crag, then north again to High Hartsop Dodd. Return round to Dove Crag (unlike me), up to Hart Crag and continue over Hartsop Above How, descend to Cow Bridge (instead of Bridgend) and turn right up the path (instead of plodding up the Kirkstone Pass like a wally).
For the best ‘experience’ using the map, click on that box in the top left to go ‘full screen’ (Esc to come back). On mobile: Zoom by pinching and click to reveal names. Desktop: Hold CTRL and roll the mouse, hover to reveal a Wainwright’s name and see information.
Start
Summit
Water
Place of interest
Caution / Escape
Parking
Refresh
ToiletsReturn Route at a glance
- Distance: 19km (12 miles)
- Ascent: 1263m (4143ft)
- Time: 10 hours
- Start: The Kirkstone Inn
- Difficulty: Tough
- Map: OS Explorer OL5
- AW Book: Eastern Fells
Wainwrights
- Red Screes
- Middle Dodd
- Little Hart Crag
- High Hartsop Dodd
- Dove Crag
- Hart Crag
- Hartsop Above How
Field notes
- Terrain: A real mix: a steep and rough ascent on the eastern side of Red Screes, easier summit ground, ridge walking to Middle Dodd, then rougher high ground around Little Hart Crag and High Hartsop Dodd
- Navigation: Straightforward in clear weather on the main tops, but much less friendly in mist, especially around the head of Dovedale, my search for Priests Hole, and the climb back out toward Hart Crag (don’t do it the way I did!). This is not one to blag in clag without solid compass work.
- Parking: I parked in the big car park across the road from the Kirkstone Inn. You could park at Red Pit (half way down the road) or down at Cow Bridge.
Watch out for
The direct eastern ascent of Red Screes is steep and easy to drift off line on. Make sure you don’t end up at Fairfield from Hart Crag, the line to Hartsop Above How wasn’t clear, but it was very foggy. Cliffs and steep ground around the surrounding tops. Add strong wind and this round becomes a proper handful.
Why do it
This is a cracking way to turn Red Screes into something much bigger than a quick bag from the pass. You get a fine summit, the out-and-back to Middle Dodd, a wild and atmospheric traverse above Dovedale, and a round that feels adventurous even before the weather starts throwing cutlery. In good visibility the views over Brothers Water and across the Eastern Fells should be superb; in mist, you just need to love the ridges, crags and fell tops.
Dog friendly?
For most dogs, probably not ideal. The route has steep ground, rough and broken sections, tricky navigation, exposure in bad weather, and a long tiring finish. A very experienced hill dog in good conditions might be fine, but this is not one I’d badge as an easy dog walk.
Is this walk for you?
This one is for walkers who enjoy a big day in the hills and don’t mind earning their summits the hard way. At 19km with 1263m of ascent, it is a tough round rather than a casual wander, and the steep eastern climb on to Red Screes lets you know that early on. Add in broad, misty tops, some rough ground, and a long finish back from Cow Bridge, and this is best suited to people who are reasonably fit, properly equipped, and confident with a map and compass if the cloud comes down. If you like big views, a bit of adventure, and a route with more character than convenience, this is a cracking day out. If you want an easy bag of Red Screes, there are kinder ways up.
My Red Screes with the Dovedale Round hike
with a silly detour and an unnessesary plod
After my friend bailed I rejigged the plan, nothing is stopping me getting these fells bagged today, so the plan now includes a wild camp and cold food, instead of central heated comforts and a cafe.
Kirkstone
On Thursday afternoon I empty my tools out of the van into the entrance of the workshop and swap them for my camp, food and clothes boxes. My list of kit is already packed for whatever the plan throws at me into 3 blue crates. This all takes me half an hour but before I point the van north I have to take fish & chips round to my Mum’s, LOL.
I set off around 3pm and have a good, traffic free journey up the M6 and A591 to The Kirkstone Pass, parking at the Inn. I read on the sign ‘No overnight parking’ so I leave the van at Red Pit (the next car park down the hill towards Hartsop) just in case. They’re slowly but surely driving the freeloaders into either guesthouses or Scotland!
My plan is to do Red Screes, Middle Dodd and whatever else I can get done before camping the night up there, then finish the round with Little Hart Crag, High Hartsop Dodd and Hartsop Above How. I’ve already done Dove Crag and Hart Crag on my Fairfield Horseshoe walk so I have other ideas.
It should be a fairly straight forward one but as always, I’ve never been here before so I don’t know what to expect. Just so you know, this will be the toughest walk I’ve done so far!!!
History Lesson No. 1
I get my new 70 litre bag packed and head up the hill passing the big rock (about the size of my Transit van) that was left behind by a glacier 15000 or so years ago – the Kirk Stone. Some romantic Viking decided that it looked like the ridged steeple of a church and so called it the Kirk Stone, Kirk being Old Norse for Church. Hence, Kirk Stone Pass.
The Kirk Stone was probably carried only a short distance by local glacier ice, likely plucking it from the nearby Borrowdale volcanic rocks of Red Screes or the surrounding hills, before being left behind in the glacial debris at the pass – rather than hauled in from far away.
A steep ascent up Red Screes
It’s a good half mile before I’m back near the Kirkstone Pass Inn’s car park and I spy a path up the eastern flank of Red Screes. I’ve learned since, that the easiest ascent up this lump is from Ambleside – up the Scandale valley, but we’re not here for easy. The next easiest way is to come from Scandale up a gentle incline from the north. Even ascending the north face of Middle Dodd and continuing to Red Screes summit would be considerably less strenuous. Of course, I’ve chosen the hard route, purely because it’s the hard route.
It proves to be a really good tough ascent. The National Trust have provided a splendid little path of stone that you can’t possibly see from below, to get up safely, but somewhere along this path yours truly loses track and finds his way on a mini adventure!
I get up so far that I can hardly turn back now and the ascent turns into an amateur climbing expedition. I’ve never been climbing properly at this point, let’s be realistic about this, and the pack on my back is top heavy and really not sitting right for what’s ahead. The rock crumbles away in my hands, I wouldn’t advise you follow me on this one, go back and find the path. I do continue up anyway, and have to climb out of a couple of little eroding gullies, one of which I have to throw the bag over as it’s too heavy to carry. My route leads straight to the the summit and as I look to my left I see a perfectly good path.
Red Screes summit
On Red Screes summit you’ll find a couple of tarns, one bigger than the other, a few cairns, one the definite top and a shelter. My brain is already window shopping for a camp site, so works out that in an emergency the best place to set up would be in the shelter, problem with this is the strong wind – so not this time.
The sun’s threatening to go to bed but I really need to get on over to Middle Dodd first before I find a spot. It’s quite clear at the moment so Middle Dodd, almost orange in this tea-time light looks 20 minutes away and a simple wander.
Middle Dodd
Middle Dodd is a spur off Red Screes, pointing north looking down over the Kirkstone Pass, Brothers Water and Hartsop village. At ground level the two fells are easily identified after you’ve been up them. Funnily enough, the summit of Middle Dodd is the little bump at the end, the bit with the cairn, not the obviously higher bulge above it. Strange I think, but it is what it is and it has been for an age, so who am I? I love the colour in this unedited photo.
The wind is a real disabler on the fells. Not only does it suck the heat from you but it get’s in your eyes and stops you seeing much, blows you off your feet and on the tops you really can’t concentrate enough to do much but get a move on. Anyway, let’s get a move on, I still have to find a bed for the night.
I skirt around Red Screes on my return and head east for the col linking to Little Hart Crag. I can see Scandale Tarn over near my next top which may provide a flat place for a tent but at the col I discover a huge slab of rock called Broad Crag (not to be confused with the bigger one near Scafell Pike) and some rough rock that may offer shelter from this crazy wind. I find a small place flat enough to pitch and get comfortable.
A night on Red Screes
Up the tent goes, the pins eventually find a home and it gets anchored down pretty well.
There’ll be no sunset pictures, no night sky photography tonight and no sunrise in the morning due to the weather, but being out here, I just feel happy to be alive and present.
Time for my last bit of carbs before trying to sleep through the howling of the wind.
My 4 season Vango synthetic sleeping bag that took up half of the 70 litre rucksack keeps me warm but the wind gets a bit worrying in the night, I’ve never known wind like it, blowing up through these valleys and over these cols (like where I am camped).
There was no forecast for rain for the next morning until an 11 o’clock shower. It changed it’s mind and came at 7.
I stay put, I’m trusting the new forecast, shower at 7 and away it goes. And it does. What the BBC didn’t say is that it would be thick with fog all day. In fact, Red Screes is fine, it’s just everywhere I am heading that has mist. The cloud sneaks over the col at High Pike like sheep in an orderly queue and up along the eastern flanks of Dove Crag, past Little Hart Crag and flows away, down with Caiston Beck. I pack up and head off into the unknown.
Day 2 – The Dovedale Fells
On a nice sunny day, not only do you get the honour of the beautiful views the Lake District has on offer, you get to see where you are going. Today is not one of those days.
I set off to Little hart Crag in the best bit of weather I’ve seen all morning. Five minutes after setting off, I can’t see 50 yards ahead of me. By the time I get near Little Hart Crag, the little plastic thing I hold in my hand encapsulating a clear liquid and a needle balanced on a spike will assist me no end, and it’s like that most of the day. A working compass will always be true to you – having said that, Stuart Marshall’s guide book will mislead me and I’ll read the map wrong more than once.
I head over the col and away from the wall I’ve been handrailing to Little Hart Crag, I can’t see any of it but trust it’s all still there. I’ve never been to any of my future destinations, ‘walking the Wainwrights’, so the map is all I have and the memory of a couple of guide books I didn’t read properly.
Like the towering craggy island appearing in front of the ship in Peter Jackson’s film King Kong, here comes Little Hart Crag. Expecting an outcrop of rock or what you might call a hillock, it’s rather spooky when this massive mound appears ahead, towering above me, a photo would tell you nothing in this fog, you just had to have been there. A moment in time that will never be repeated. It’s dead quiet, there isn’t a soul in sight and you can’t see any further than you can throw your 15kg pack, it’s rather strange where you put yourself sometimes.
Little Hart Crag
It’s not long before I’m up on top, of course after taking my photo I do have to wander around a little to confirm that I was actually on the summit, now north and down the spur to my next Wainwright.
High Hartsop Dodd
An uneventful walk I suppose, when you can’t see anything you just simply spend time in your head. I need this time at the moment, just being present to the nothingness.
Now for an interesting diversion!
Do not follow me into this valley. I strongly believe that Stuart Marshall (may he rest in peace) was trying to make his route (which included Hartsop Dodd and Caudale Moor as well!) a tough hike for very experienced hikers.
His guide says, when following the old fence, and finding that it turns to the left, carry straight on. Following it left would take you up over to Dove Crag. Of course I don’t want to bother going to Dove Crag because I’ve been there before. I want to go down and see Priests Hole, the cave at the head of the Dovedale Valley, before toddling up and over Hartsop Above How. It’ll only add a mile so the only issue should only be ascending 1000m after skirting the Dove’s actual Crag.
Down Into Dovedale
It has to be done now, or come back another day just to find a cave, which is probably a 6 mile walk by itself, balls to that. What idiot would do that? I’ll answer that below.
Straight forward I go, and down, crossing becks as he says, mmm, he doesn’t mention anything about another old fence or the strange looking, what I assumed to be ‘Stangs’, a large rocky outcrop that just appears out of nowhere from the mist.
Looking north as I come down the re-entrant under Stand Crags, I get a faded glance at what must be Hartsop Above How now, or Black Crag I should say, the How’s exposed open scar. Again, and I’m wondering how I’m going to scale this. I see no upward escape from this valley because all I physically see, in gaps through the cloud, is Dove Crag on my left and Black Crag to the North.
If I were sat on a sofa in a central heated bothy, looking out, I’m sure I’d guess at there being an obvious way up but Mother Nature’s beasts are pounding me and pushing me and blocking my view. I’m a bit haggered after I spent a long night sliding down the tent on a ‘too steep a slope’ (say that 10 times) kept awake by the beasts again.
Finding The Priest Hole cave?
I’ve not even started to think about finding the cave with my concern for the looming crags. Right, why am I here? The Priest Hole.
How can I not see a hole in the side of a hill? I’ve worked out the grid reference and checked I am at those co-ordinates using OS Locate. I stop believing my iPhone is picking up my location properly. I’ve lost faith in the Ordnance Survey app because I don’t even get a map on the screen sometimes. Right about now I’m wishing I had a GPS unit. Those of you who have searched for the cave in fog might appreciate my plight.
I feel like launching Stewart’s book.
Finding the Priest Hole
Here’s the problem with finding the Priest Hole cave.
Firstly, where does Ordanance Survey actually say it is? That circle?
Secondly, when you did your research, who published the grid reference and how do you know it’s correct.
Thirdly, you’re knackered, the weather is mental and you’re concerned you’re not going to get out alive, let alone up on the ridge again.
After sheltering from the wind a few times and questioning the locations time and time again, I’ve lost faith, I’m taking over now, sod them all. To hell with the Priest Hole – up we go and onto the top, work out where we are and crack on.
Back up to the ridge – Hart Crag
It felt like a thousand feet from the valley up the side of this hill now (it actually was) and the wind get’s wilder as I climb. It’s a long hard slog, especially when your team mates, i.e. the map, the phone and the guide, have given up on you.
Eventually after navigating a steep gully, westerly facing at the head of the valley, Houndshope Cove I believe, I reach a cairn. This would be great but it’s not by a long chalk the highest point around here so I know this is neither Dove Crag or Hart Crag summit. Of course, it’s just a marker saying this is the top of the valley, I need more.
Let’s head north, it will simply lead me to Hartsop Above How. Heading North takes me to a cliff edge. I’m confused. I could find myself over on Fairfield if I’m not careful. I circle round for a while in an attempt to find something I can pair to the map. It was shocking how lost I felt. It’s times like these when I wished I’d done a Navigation Workshop!
Finding my bearings
What I do know is that I’m at the top of Dovedale. There’s a ridge crossing the aspect of slope, ooo! Fancy term for the line down a hill at right angles to the contours.
If I go west I should find the ridge. The map I’m carrying says there’s a wall or fence running along the ridge.
I head west, I find the wall and take a seat in heaps of sheep sh!t out of the crazy, crazy wind. A day with weather like this, and that scorching hot day back in May when I did the Kentmere Horseshoe – worlds apart.
Now, if this is the wall I’m seeing on the map – left would lead me to the Dove Crag summit while right to Hart Crag. I need to get up to Hart Crag to get orientated and take a bearing north west – I don’t do degrees yet! Then I’ll know I’m on the right track to Hartsop Above How and down to the calm valley floor, a brew, chocolate, clean clothes, warmth and fish & chips.
By the way, at this moment I haven’t seen a soul all morning, not one. I’m here all by myself, until I meet a couple coming down what they confirm is Hart Crag – it’s a welcome. Thank you. I’ve been here but it looks different coming the other way in fog. Iget to the summit, take a bearing and off we go.
Hartsop Above Hell
Another fella in a pair of lycra shorts!!! tells me that there are not many ups for me on the way over the How. I think he was tripping, it was a hell of a walk over Hartsop Above How. I’ve had enough, I just want to get to my nice red van and all the goodies it holds, shelter, talcum powder, the key that will allow me to drive to the pub.
I catch a glimpse of St Sunday. How I would have loved to get a proper view of what I think will be part of my next hike. What I see looks lovely but it really was one wee glimpse, and not enough time for a photo.
The howling wind blows over the cols along the ridge and the thick cloud with it. I was blown off my feet five times.
Over the summit, quick photo and on as quick as I arrived. It’s a long few miles down to the farm and Bridgend where I meet the road and start heading back up towards the Kirkstone Pass.
Proper Navigation
By the way, since I did this mental walk, I got a gold award in navigation and the Mountain Leader qualification, taught hundreds of people to navigate and wild camped more times than you can shake a stick at.
On my Private One Day Navigation Workshop in the Lakes, Peaks or Snowdonia you could learn how to use a compass, read a map, but most importantly, you’ll learn how to find your own way back to the car easily, and confidently take yourself to places you’ve not dared to before.
I’ve already made my mind up coming down that I’ll stash the pack in the trees at Cow Bridge Car Park, walk the 3 miles up the pass to the van and pick it up on my way to Keswick. I fill the two filter bottles up from the river and head up passing Hartsop village bus stop.
The route above takes you off the How straight down to the Cow Bridge car park, much more sensible. As is the nicer walk I’ve discovered since – getting to Red Pit via the path on the west of Brotherswater and up a track instead of 3 miles on the road.
I could document my walk up the pass like I have the last few miles – it was a tough slog, the rain by now was hard and driving, and my boots were stiff – but nothing else interesting happened. Nose down, march on.
Now – Keswick, chippy dinner and a couple of pints in the Dog & Gun before bedding down by the park – my second visit to the museum tomorrow and Clive’s book launch.
It’s been an experience, one that on hindsight seems much more of an adventure than it did at the time.
Can’t wait until the middle of November and another outing.
Read Next…
Finding the Priest Hole
The best time to go looking for a cave in a vertical crag is in the dark in the depths of winter – said nobody ever! However, it seemed challenging so we thought we’d camp as well.