Stybarrow Dodd (843m), Watsons Dodd (789m), Raise (883m) and White Side (863m) - 16/12/2018
Distance: 10km; Ascent: ~850m; Time: 6h (in very icy conditions)
After a wet and windy day yesterday, we woke to find it relatively calm and with fairly extensive stretches of clear sky. We headed for Thirlmere to do a couple of hills in the Hellvelyn range that had not been taken in on routes we have recently done in this area, namely Watson's Dodd and White Side. We started at the Thirlmere end of the road through St Johns in the Vale, where there is parking for a few cars by a public telephone. From here a footpath ascends quite steeply to Sticks Pass. Once on the main ridge path, we turned North. Thus far the going had been easy, but once we got to ~800m altitude the whole ground was covered in a layer of ice. Initially, we could crunch through without difficulty, but as we got higher the ice became harder and increasingly treacherous. On the way north we took in Stybarrow Dodd and then descended out of the ice to make the much easier lift up to Watson's Dodd. The path continues north to Great Dodd, but we returned south, bypassing the ice-rink like summit of Stybarrow Dodd and descended back to Sticks Pass. Continuing on to Raise we encountered even more difficult icy terrain, and we were now also hampered by a strengthening wind and intermittent visibility. Once at the summit cairn we paused and sheltered while we had a quick snack lunch. Icy conditions continued for the whole section from Raise to White Side, this being all above 800m - making for very slow and cautious progress. From the top of White Side we went across pathless icy terrain, marked by a few scattered cairns, making for the obvious rocks of Brown Crag. Near here we found the footpath for return to the car. Although this walk was challenging in these conditions, the patterns the ice made on the ground and the challenge itself made this a far more memorable walk than it might have been on a warm summer's day.
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