This was the first of a 2-day backpacking trip with my one-year-younger sister. After driving up to the Lakes on an unusually busy Thursday afternoon, we stayed at the youth hostel in Grasmere and then drove down to the National Trust car park at Dungeon Ghyll the next morning. From here it was a nice stroll down the valley to the Band, and a straightforward ascent with the views of Harrison Stickle and Pike of Stickle took us up to Three Tarns. I'd done this route many times before, so there's very little to say other than from Bowfell we carried on to Esk Pike while enjoying the views of Scafell's west-facing slopes. Esk Pike is one of my favourite viewpoints, because not only do you get the airy drop down over Great Moss and Eskdale itself, but also across to the Scafell-Great End massif and the imposing lump of Great Gable further to the northwest. It's always a pleasure to stop here and admire the surrounding fells on a clear day! After the descent to Esk Hause, its a pretty easy-going path straight up onto Great End and then more easy walking across the massif past Ill Crag and then the final 'down' to the top of Little Narrowcove before the last 100m climb onto Scafell Pike's typically over-visited summit. We took the route down to the northwest which follows Lingmell Gill and ends up at the northeastern end of Wastwater. My sister got a little stuck crossing one of the streams, maybe it was a river I can't remember - but I thought, being a kind and thoughtful sister that I would go back and give her a hand to get across. Well, in the end she did get across without a problem, but I lost my footing and ended up with water over my boots, whicb I'd managed to keep remarkably dry for the whole walk until then!
But we got quite a pleasant stroll back down along the shores of Wastwater in the summer evening sunshine in order to reach the southwestern end of the lake where the youth hostel is located. After throwing together the bed sheets with as little effort as we could possibly find, and a refreshing shower, we enjoyed a well-earned dinner in the dining room and had a nice mingle with some of the other lovely people staying there.
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