Wansfell Pike is a fell to come back to. Maybe you climbed it as a child but, as you grew, the smaller fells lost their appeal and were looked down on, literally and metaphorically. Perhaps you later had children of your own, and it was you doing the cajoling and the bribing with Smarties. When they, too, lose interest in the lower heights, there’s no reason to return, is there? Unless you develop an inexplicable love of fell-running in middle age, in which case the lower fells are prized once more as manageable outings for a doddery afternoon.
Whatever your personal history, Wansfell is splendidly positioned overlooking Ambleside and Troutbeck with fantastic views down the length of Windermere and across the Brathay basin. In that respect, it is the epitome of "location, location, location."
Wansfell, great fell, done it a few times using various approaches including straight up from the lake shore through Skelghyll Wood. Surprisingly, for round there, it's CRoW access land all the way.
I rather love crossing over it from Tirril after setting off before light around midsummer down the Roman Road on the High Street range from Winder Hall above Tirril. Bus back from Ambleside to Penrith (then to Ullswater) via Keswick.
Wow, sounds like a really good midsummer's march, wercat. There's a route of mine, awaiting moderation, starting from the northern end of the Roman road. I love that there are signs in Roman numerals up there - I wonder if the distances are in Roman miles.
> Wow, sounds like a really good midsummer's march, wercat. There's a route of mine, awaiting moderation, starting from the northern end of the Roman road. I love that there are signs in Roman numerals up there - I wonder if the distances are in Roman miles.
When we were locked down I started walking the paths around me more and found out that one of them was aligned along a previously unknown Roman road. I had vaguely wondered why this footpath was lined by mature trees and seemed too grand for just a path through the fields. Most people had just assumed that the Romans used the line of the A6 (well, it is straight) to head up to Lancaster fort. David Ratledge had used lidar imaging to trace the line of the route and showed that it actually ran further west much closer to the coastline of the time and along the tops of drumlins which would have been above the marshland. I actually watched an amateur archaeologist group excavate a part to confirm this.
Further reading led me on to this https://www.romanroads.org/gazetteer/cumbria/M74.htm which suggests that High Street may not (shock!) actually be Roman. I've seen the lidar flyovers disproving the OS-shown line of the Roman road coming over Bowland towards their fort at Over Burrow (Calacum) in the Lune Valley and gone to see the evidence on the ground myself. There's a heck of a lot we don't know about the Romans!
Really fascinating stuff, thanks Lankyman. I've just spent a happy hour delving into those links. I've always felt, rattling down Scot Rake on the mountain bike, it seemed implausibly steep and zigzagging for Roman traffic.
The Lancashire stuff is really fascinating too. I live in Garstang and will rummage round some of those places on future morning runs.
> Really fascinating stuff, thanks Lankyman. I've just spent a happy hour delving into those links. I've always felt, rattling down Scot Rake on the mountain bike, it seemed implausibly steep and zigzagging for Roman traffic.
Yes, it's things like this which are pretty obvious when you think of it. I couldn't imagine a typically laden Roman auxiliary cohort being at all happy on a slope of that angle, let alone an ox cart of supplies. There is definitely an established route from the fort at Ambleside to Hardknott over the obvious two passes but would there have actually been one between Ambleside and the fort at Brougham? It does seem a long way for a Roman soldier on foot. Perhaps they went over Kirkstone and boated along Ullswater, who knows?
> The Lancashire stuff is really fascinating too. I live in Garstang and will rummage round some of those places on future morning runs.
I lived some years in Warton (the one under Warton Crag) and found out that the road north possibly used to pass outside our front window. Tracing the lidar flyovers round there was very interesting as the route seemed to be passing lots of places I was very familiar with.
