Our last day of Bank Holiday Camping in Glenridding and after packing up the tent we headed up Ullswater towards the National Trust Car Park for Aira Force. The plan was to have a wander up to the waterfall and then onwards and upwards to Gowbarrow Fell, another wainwright to tick off the list.
Car parked and boots on we ventured up through the beautiful forested area with all sorts of trees throwing light all about and giving the feel that you were in some magical mystical land.
Unfortunately I wasn't feeling very magical and mystical and had no energy whatsoever. My legs felt like lead and I think the past few days were catching up with me.
The falls were beautiful and we didn't hang around as we had a wainwright to bag. Following the map we made our way up and out of the waterfalls and wooded area onto the soft ground of the hill. The main path was up the side of a wall but true to form we took the harder route and went straight up for a bit. It wasn't that steep but it certainly made things interesting. I think I saw a stoat!
Soon enough we met with the path by the wall and continued up that until we reached a newly laid path of rubble and rocks. There seemed to be a lot of work going on with the paths as big bulk bags of rubbly stuff were dotted around and the good news was I'd found my legs and some extra energy from somewhere and started to enjoy this walk.
Up a little bit more and we saw the trig point which indicated the summit and what a lovely summit it was. A nice trig and 360 views from Blencathra right round all the fells in the area. Stunning!
Back down the path it wasn't long before we were back at the waterfalls and had time this time to stop and watch as the water cascaded down all the beautiful rocks.
9 wainwrights, 3 hewitts, 1 force and mouse and a wee stoat and it was a brilliant Bank Holiday Weekend.
