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I slept in a 6 bed female dorm at the Grasmere YHA and no-one snored, it was unbelievable!!

Howard, Dave and I decided to walk together and had a terrific time chatting all the way. This day was the shortest stage that I would do on the c2c, but it still came with a nice ascent to 600m and what goes up must come down – unfortunately for me and my knee the down was a slippery track made up of slate and rock. The views were of mountains covered in cloud and green valleys on all sides, with a couple of lakes, waterfalls and lots of streams to cross. The views were picture postcard stunning.

I had now been following the guidebook descriptions for 4 days now and was learning lots of new and interesting English vocabulary. For example:

Bridleway = a thoroughfare originally made for human transport on horses

Beck = stream

Dale = valley

Crag = rocky mountain peak

Fell = mountain

Garth = enclosure

Ghyll/gill = ravine

Hause = narrow neck of land

Pike = peak

Tarn = lake

Thwaite = clearing or meadow

Cairn = pile of stones used as a marker

Apparently most of these words are old Norse words from the Vikings. A typical description in my guidebook from this day’s walk was, “The bridleway soon divides at the foot of great tongue alongside little tongue gill… You arrive at the pretty Grisedale tarn with the trail zigzagging up dollywagon pike.”

Tonight’s accommodation was at a pub called the White Lion in the very small village of Patterdale. The next day was supposed to be the hardest stage and it certainly appeared tough looking at the elevation plot…

White Lion Pub, Patterdale

Day 4, Grasmere to Patterdale