"What do you want to do for New Year, Charlotte?" asks Pete.
"Lakes?" I reply.
And so it was we found ourselves spending a gloriously wintery January weekend in the Lake District. The Lakes in winter are wonderful: sure, winter presents more challenges when you are faced with potentially lethal weather, but who cares when you get the hills mostly to yourself?
It's blissful. There are no tourists. No-one but the serious hikers bother to venture out.
And we are serious hikers now.
I mean look how nonchalantly I'm tucking my hair behind my ear on the top of a hill nowadays...
I'm standing at the top of Wansfell Pike, technically not a Wainwright but a cute little craggy-topped hill overlooking Ambleside and Windermere. Note the lack of people: January, I'll say it again, it's bliss.
There seems to be some debate as to the true top of this fell. The pike has the better view but is a little lower than Wansfell itself, which stands at 488m. There's only 6 metres height difference in it though, and we went to both just to be sure. Wikipedia says (rather mysteriously) that Wansfell has strong connections to Ambleside ... I mean, it's literally connected to Ambleside because it physically rises up out of the town so, well done Wikipedia. Apparently Bill Birkett once said that 'Wansfell is to Ambleside what St. Paul's is to London'. Again, not sure what he meant by that but it sounds good doesn't it?: makes me think of one of my favourite afternoon films The Englishman Who Went Up A Hill And Came Down A Mountain, in which Hugh Grant helps a Welsh village to raise the height of its hill so that it can be declared a mountain by the ordnance survey (based on a true story).
The connection between Ambleside and Wansfell starts in the centre of the town with this sign, which I hope they never replace because it's so rustic. Urban hipsters would pay hundreds of pounds for something like this to hang in their £2000-per-month Hackney bedsits.
Climbing through the woods you'll find Stockghyll, which was very picturesque on a steely cold January day:
Taking the road out of the forest, you'll come to a gap in the wall on your right with steps jutting out of it to help you over. These are by far the best stiles in the Lake District and I forgot to take a picture of them, sorry. If you've done any kind of walking in the Lakes you'll know what I mean.
The gradient gets a little steeper here and the view towards Windermere opens up as you climb out onto the open fell via a stoney path.
I should mention right now that Pete bought me a GoPro for Christmas. This was its first outing and the best thing about it is that it's waterproof, so I can film underwater. It took us a long time to summit Wansfell Pike due to my tiresome stops to dunk the camera into the beck. I'm writing this a year later and the novelty of doing this has not yet worn off. You'll be seeing some of the footage in future posts for sure.
I should also mention that I was wearing about 800 thick layers of clothing the day we went up to Wansfell and that I ended up carrying most of them and turning a deep shade of beetroot as my body temperature reached dizzying heights. A lesson learnt. Layers are great but make sure they are thin, light and high quality.
I also slipped on some unexpected ice and almost broke my new GoPro an hour after unboxing it. With my face now very close to the ground, I noticed that water was running under the surface of the ice and so, of course, I stopped and lay there for a bit to film it - further irritating Pete, who thought that my prolonged time lying prostrate meant that I had seriously injured myself. I have since lost the footage but here's a close up pic.
Pretty cool, right?
As you near the summit of the pike, the path gets a little more rugged and there's the option for a little scramble (which I always take now that I am a serious hiker).
I made Pete wait whilst I climbed up to the top so I could film him coming up. I am so annoying.
Once you reach the summit of the pike, you are treated to some amazing views across Windermere to the Coniston Fells.
But we weren't done yet.
Onward we traipsed alongside a drystone wall to the top of Wansfell. The route was boggy but iced up: I imagine it can be pretty squelchy on a very wet day and, save for the wall, is pretty featureless.
Here's Pete near the summit. He's drinking coffee out of a thermos with owls on it whilst he waits for me to fanny about with my GoPro in this awesome puddle. The ice was an inch thick and made a delicious cracking sound when I broke it.
We didn't see a soul for the entire walk. It was so wonderful.
After lunching at Esquires in Ambleside, we headed to Grasmere to skip stones.
(and so I could dunk my GoPro in the Lake - this time with epic consequences ...)