Day Five: Sunday, June 12 - Grasmere to Patterdale

The day began with sunshine, but ominous clouds in the distance promised rain by the late afternoon.  With several high altitude ridge walks and one valley walk as available routes, we opted for the shorter of the high routes over St. Sunday Crag.  First, the trail climbed out of the valley from Grasmere along a  stream, up to Grisdale Tarn, a lovely mountain pond. 

From there the trail climbed steeply up to a high ridge.  Looking back from the top, our starting point in Grasmere was lost in the distance.  Here's Laura, coming up to the ridge in her red rain gear.



Up on the ridge the wind blasted us and it felt like we would be blown right off.  Our rain gear flapped like sails in a gale, and we had to shout to hear each other.  It was exciting, and a little scary.  Laura loved it.

 In the photo above you can see the path winding up along the ridge until it reaches its summit at St. Sunday Crag.  We met a friendly Scot who took our photo on the top.  The weather was darkening, as you can see, so we headed down the mountain pronto to get to shelter.

The village of Patterdale is nestled between mountain ridges at the end of Ullswater, a very large lake.  You can see several buildings from the village in the photo below, taken from the ridge on our way down.

And here is the reward at the end of the day:  soft beds at the Old Water View B&B, and a hot meal and local ale at the White Lion Pub.

It was a challenging day with great rewards.  Another 8.5 miles in our march across England.  Tomorrow will be our last day in the Lakes District as we hike from Patterdale over the last of the mountains and into the rolling hills of central England.