A good day today climbing Red Screes and Little Hart Crag from Ambleside, despite a little cloud on the summit of Red Screes we had a good day with some great views.
Today's route climbing Red Screes from Ambleside included four summits, as well as the summit of Red Screes we also took in Middle Dodd, Little Hart Crag and High Hartsop Dodd, a great walk with very few people around on the tops today.
We were lucky with the weather as well, despite the cloud coming in as we reached the summit of Red Screes we had clear views from the other three summits including the great viewpoint of Little Hart Crag.
We set off from Ambleside at 10am and headed up through the old streets of the village to climb up The Struggle for a little way until we reached the footpath leaving the roadside above Roundhill Farm.
A good track leads up from here climbing onto the ridge and following the ridge-line up a steady slope towards Snarker Pike and the summit of Red Screes.
The views were great as we climbed the ridge, first over Ambleside and across the top of Windermere to the Coniston Fells and as we climbed the opened up to give us great views all around, south over Windermere to Morecambe Bay and across the Langdale Valley to the Langdale Pikes, Crinkles and Bowfell and north across Rydal Water to the Central Fells and across the Scandale Valley to the Fairfield Horseshoe.
We made good time climbing the ridge past Snarker Pike and were soon approaching the summit of Red Screes. A few minutes before reaching the summit of Red Screes the clouds blew across us, blocking our views from the summit. We weren't too far from the base of the clouds though and there were a few brief glimpses of views, south over Windermere and north across Brothers Water in particular so we were hopeful of some views from the lower tops today.
As we descended north over Smallthwaite Band towards the summit of Middle Dodd we soon dropped out of the cloud and had some great views from Middle Dodd down into the valley towards Hartsop and Brothers Water as well as east over the High Street range.
From Middle Dodd we took the path skirting around to the west to meet the main path down from Red Screes towards Scandale Pass. It was a little damp underfoot at times here but we were soon down onto the more trodden path descending to Scandale Pass.
From Scandale Pass we climbed north to the summit of Little Hart Crag, the views now were great, the cloud had by now cleared of all the higher tops and we found a good spot for lunch out of the breeze just below the summit with views across to Red Screes and down the Scandale Valley towards Windermere.
After lunch we descended north east from the summit of Little Hart Crag following the grassy ridge down to our final summit of the day, High Hartsop Dodd, with yet more great views down over Brothers Water and Hartsop.
From High Hartsop Dodd we followed the ridge back up to Little Hart Crag, skirting around the summit this time to pick up the path back down towards Scandale Pass.
We followed the track down from Scandale Pass into the Scandale Valley and were soon down at Scandale Bottom, there is a huge amount of tree planting going on here at the moment, from the looks of it all oak trees.
We followed the track down the valley, now in sunshine past High Sweden Bridge and through the woods back down to Ambleside.
