I caught the 6:35am bus to Chorley and headed for the Railway Station. The bus station notice board for the railway station was working but the railway station one wasn't. My train was the 7:15am to Barrow but when I bought my ticket yesterday I was advised to change at Lancaster for the Sellafield train, which was my final destination. Instead I decied to continue to Barrow and wait there. In retrospect I would probably have been better sticking to the original plan of waiting and changing at Lancaster as they have some facilities. Barrow had no cafe or proper waiting area. There were some seats in the entrance foyer but all the doors were open and no heating. The 9:58 to Carlisle arrived on time and I enjoyed the slow ride along the coast until I arrived at Sellafield station. It was about 11am when I arrived and I set off walking in warm hazy sun.

An interesting plaque in Barrow Railway Station.

Calder Abbey.

I had a long walk along the road before I got to the fells so I put my head down and kept going. There were no proper facilities for pedestrians for quite a while. The road was quite busy as it takes the traffic to the main entrance to the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant. When I got to the visitors entrance things improved and the final stretch of road to Calder Bridge was on a footpath. I turned left at the Church and followed a lane towards Cold Fell. My map showed the site of Calder Abbey and as I passed I could see what quite substantial ruins through the trees.

A man on a bike passed me and further ahead he got off to walk up the hill towards Abbey Flatts. He stopped at the top of the hill and I caught him up. We chatted a while and it turned out that he was from Ennerdale Bridge and was heading that way. I asked him if he knew anything about the stone circle at Kiniside and he said it was a fake as his Grandfather worked on it's construction in the 1920s. It was to provide labour for men on the dole. He went on ahead and I continued north as well until the road entered open fell. It was still warm and sunny but a lot of haze had spoiled any views. I passed Cold Fell and arrived at a road junction. I turned right down the track and continued to the river Calder. I crossed the main bridge but wanted to find another. To the north the map shows Monk’s Bridge.

Monk's Bridge

I wanted to have a look at it before leaving the area so headed north a while. I found it and had a close look but it wasn't signposted so isn't too obvious. I was now looking for a tent pitch so headed east following the small river of Caplecrag Beck up onto the fell. I reached a prominent rocky outcrop which would’ve made a good pitch but there was no mobile phone signal. I continued to a prominent high point which had some ancient settlements nearby. There was a good view of the Sellafield plant as I pitched my tent