Causey Gills

We can't help oursleves! Many walkers are summit baggers. religiously walking all the Wainwrights/Munros/Birketts or some other list which has been put together by someone at some time. That has never been our thing. We prefer to walk where the mood takes us. Often making it up as we go and nearly always chosing our routes to avoid other people as much as possible. As the years go by this last point gets harder and harder and if you want to guarantee that you will bump into someone else, I highly heading for a summit.

We seem to be turning into Gill Baggers. Or at least, we seem to be drawn to walks which involve walking up or down Gills. It doesn't matter to us if we have been before, there is always something new to see

We parked at Rigg Beck Quarry

And walked up Rigg |Beck

Bracken Crusher

Running Spaniel

Fliying Spaniel

Rigg Screes

It's very warm up here

Looking back

The distant views are very hazy today - but that is the western fells in the background as we gain height towards the col between Sail and Causey Pike

We saw no-one up Rigg Beck, but as we started to get on to more well trodden paths we could see a few folk around. We hadn't decided where we would go until this point, but as most people seemed to be heading up onto the tops, we decided not to! So after lunch at Long Comb

We followed the path down to by Stoneycroft Gill 

Before joining the (closed) road past Rowling End Farm, back to the car

Just 5.5 miles or so today as time is short. But once again a beautiful day in our beautiful landscape!

Martindale with Ed and Gerda

Our friends Ed and Gerda are over from Holland and we would like to take them to see the Red Deer rut in Martindale. We know we are a bit early, but this is our only opportunity before they go back.

As expected, the rut had not started yet, but a few hundred red deer grazing happily was still a magical sight

Perfection, close to home.

For a number of reasons we don't seem to be getting much serious fell walking in at the moment and we had thought we would remedy that today. The heather is just about to go past it's best, so we decided we would walk somewhere where we could make the most of that. Hmmmm, where to go? 

There is one place near home where we walk over and over again. Short walks, long walks, flat walks hilly walks, pretty much any sort of walk and we can achieve it from here. We know this area very well yet there are still lots of things to explore. So off we go up the Cumbria way from Grainsgill Bridge.

After a little while we head off the cumbria way to find our own route, up Burdell Gill. It's a warm day.

We love exploring Gills and this one is turning our to be particularly pleasant

Lots of pools for Breeze to cool down

She is enjoying exploring the terrain, just as we are

Tumbling cascades all the way

Many of the Rowan trees are looking very frail. They are still suffering from the fell fire that burnt all this side of the fell two years ago - started by some ignorant itinerant with a bbq. 

It's breathtakingly beautiful and unspoilt 

and as usual in these places, we have it to ourselves

The last bit of the climb up through the heather. The smell was lovely

We had a leisurely lunch, sitting and relaxing in the sun

We had company

After lunch it was onwards and upwards

Leaving the heather behind

As we reach the summit of Knot

We had no set plan as to where to go from here so we started to head towards Great Calva

The Wiley Gill caught our eye. So having explored on gill on the way up, we decided to explore another on the way down

Such a lovely day, we stopped for a while part way down. It's hard work bouncing through heather all day when you are only 18" high

Power nap

We rejoin the Cumbria way at the bottom of Wiley Gill

And head back along very familiar territory

Past Breeze's favourite sheepfold. 

We arrived back at the car having seen no-one bar sheep and butterflies and having walked about 7.5 miles.