In between the walking days in our week in The Lakes, we had a couple of days off. One was spent pottering around Ambleside in the rain. The second was a trip to Keswick to buy a few presents and have some lunch up there. Considering we were staying in Grasmere, it is normally is a very simple drive up the A591 of no more than 20 mins. Well that’s not the way we do things so we decided to take a longer route around. The boys had never been to Wasdale, so that was on the agenda, as was the Hard Knott pass. So around Red Bank road we went and dropped into Langdale, marvelling at the Pikes and the valley of Oxendale. We then headed up and over the Wrynose Pass and dropped into Wrynose Bottom, before we then set course for the Hard Knott pass. We stopped on the downward section to take a look around the Hard Knott Roman Fort, as well as the views along Eskdale to the Scafells. It was a short drive then around into Wasdale to look along the lake to the well photographed view of Yewbarrow, Great Gable and Lingmell. After that we jumped back in the car and head up towards Cockermouth, before heading east along the A66 to Keswick and our lunchstop. It was a fine drive with the cloud only down on the highest tops, giving some fine vistas.
| Start – Grasmere |
| Route – Langdale – Wrynose Pass – Hard Knott Pass – Hard Knott Roman Fort – Wasdale – Gosforth – Cleator Moor – Cockermouth – A66 Keswick |
| Distance – Many miles Start time – 10am Time taken – 2hrs Highest Point – Probably the top of Hard Knott Pass 393metres |
| Weather – Some cloud down on the tops |
The boys at Hard Knott Fort. Eskdale beyond the fort
Just outside the fort walls is this fine viewing spot, which gives you a good look down into Eskdale and across to the Scafells which were in cloud. Esk Pike is clear over on the right though
Selfie as Slight Side starts to reveal itself from the cloud behind us
Brotherly love at Wasdale and the classic view behind
Yewbarrow looks a great climb from here. I still have this one to do
One more look at the Wasdale view
Ice creams in Keswick
treksandtors 
Awesome views!
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Just stunning. And perfect to finish your trip with icecream. 🙂
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It was very, very good
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Nice post. You are braver than me driving over Hardknott. Done it once as a passenger and that was bad enough! I’m not sure the clutch on my elderly mini would survive it either.
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Its not too bad coming at it from the Wrynose side, you just need a bit of momentum and the road to be clear ahead. The road up to the top of Wrynose is a lot longer and ramps up just after half way to a pretty steep gradient, I found that just as tricky
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