Seathwaite, Stonethwaite, Langstrath cave, Cam Crag, Esk Hause, Sty Head, Cumbria.
[ 19.8 km] Wed 14 Apr 2010

NY 2355 1227
I arrived at Seathwaite just after 8am in fine weather and noticed a few cars were already there. I set off along the road to walk back towards Seatoller. I was surprised to see the campsite near the main road didn’t have any tents on it. I followed the road towards Stonethwaite an even the campsite there had only a couple of tents. Near to the Church I noticed a stone plaque in the wall listing the war dead. It seems such a strange place to put the memorial as you have to be standing in the road to read it.

Passing the school I was surprised to see some children playing football as I thought this was still the Easter Holidays. In Stonethwaite I carried straight on to take the stony track that follows the south side of Stonethwaite Beck. The weather was improving nicely and the early chill had almost gone. Even with the fine weather there were few people about. I wandered up Langstrath but had something to check on the way. I’d heard a couple of reports of the hidden bothy / cave having been damaged or trashed. It wasn’t on my planned route but I had to check it out. I reached the gate at Blackmoss Pot and looked up to Cam Crag where the cave is. It must be getting more popular as there was a definite path appearing up the fell side heading towards the crag. I followed it up to the Woof Stones and the base of Cam Crag.

The area a wonderful spot for camping although I haven’t camped there yet. The views up and down Langstrath are superb if the weather is clear. When I got to the cave entrance there didn’t seem to be anything amiss. I crawled inside and everything seemed just as I’d left it almost two years ago. The only difference was the high level sleeping platform where previously there had been an Osama bin Laden mask. I continued my walk up Langstrath. At the base of Stake Pass I continued up Langstrath as I wanted to check on the existence, or not, of a path that is shown on some maps.

At Angletarn Gill there is a path shown which does exist and runs up to Angle Tarn. Another path is shown on my map running up Allencrags Gill but I’ve never been able to see it when passing this way on previous occasions. So I headed up to try and find it. As the gill got steeper I seemed to be climbing on virgin ground. There was no obvious sign of a path. I continued up and it got steeper but with no particular problems. It’s an OK route to climb but I would definitely not want to descend by it. At the top I reached the main path between Angle Tran and Esk Hause.

I’d now lost the solitude and had to share the path with several other walkers. Over the top I descended to Sprinkling Tarn and thought back to only 2 weeks ago when the whole area was plastered in snow and blowing a gale. The only snow I could see now was high up in a few of the higher gulleys. There was a large crowd of people at Sty Head so I took a small short cut to join the path down to Styhead Tarn where there was one solitary tent pitched but nobody about. I continued my walk down Styhead Gill and met many people coming up but only two going down. Over Stockley Bridge I passed through Seathwaite and down the lane where I’d parked my car. The lane was packed with cars for almost half a mile.