This morning there was mist again when we got up – but we were fairly confident that it would clear up – the luck of the Irish you know! We were packed and ready to go by 10.05. It was a steep climb up Black sail pass. We made fairly steady progress. In fact we got to the top of the pas by 11.30 and that was nearly 2000 ft. Our destination today were 3 formidable sounding peaks: Pillar, Steeple and Haycock and a total of over 10 miles. Pillar the highest of the three is 2,927 ft high. We managed to make the first and highest, Pillar by 1.00 and we had an hour for lunch on top. It was quite misty but we occasionally caught glimpses of the very pretty lake of Ennerdale.
After Pillar we had a sharp descent into Wind Gap (it lived up to it’s name) and then a climb to Scoat Fell where we left our packs and trotted over and back to Steeple in 20 minutes. On the top of Steeple there was a very appropriate steeple-like carn. Then after Steeple we had a gradual descent and fairly gradual ascent to Haycock, we were on top of it by 3.30. Then there was the long descent into Ennerdale through the heather. We sang all the way down and that passed the time. We found lots of Blueberries on the way down. When we got down through the forest into the valley we met a Dutch guy doing the coast to coast. Ennerdale Hostel was full, we were glad to be booked and not like the poor Dutch guy who wasn’t! The hostel was very nice – we had a big feed of spaghetti and a few games of cards (cheat – which Martin the arch cheater won!) and a walk to the lake. We also met a very nice couple also doing the coast to coast. And nice comfortable beds.
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