Getting all my stuff ready seemed to take much longer than usual. The last few walks have been a case of shorts and T shirt and set off walking. Now it was a case of waterproof jacket and a decision about whether to wear waterproof over trousers at the start or not, I guess that the summer is finally over! With all of my clothing sorted out I now had to figure out what to do about cameras. I have invested in a new Canon Power Shot S1 IS digital camera, I have done this mainly due to the 10 X optical, image stabilizing lens, great for taking pictures of horses and distant objects but what would it be like on the fells? The only drawback that I could find so far was that it was much larger than my trusty Canon Ixus V ! That could easily slip into and out of any pocket. The new one was a tight squeeze into the map pocket of my jacket! I decided to take both cameras, that meant two cameras, loads of batteries, the Power Shot uses AA batteries, and a couple of memory cards as well. I must have looked a right sight with all the bulges and bits sticking out of my jacket pockets! I was now ready, all I had to do was try and interpret a 30 year old guide book, compare two laminated print outs of maps from people who had done this walk more recently and juggle my own two maps of the area at the same time as not trying to trip over all of my gear as I attempted to do some walking, no problem!

Heading along the “back road” I soon came across the road that headed to Side House, so far so good! Up this road I went and soon realized that it was either very steep or I was having a really bad day as far as feeling fit was concerned! As the gradient started to ease a gate came into sight that had a few notices attached to it, knowing my luck they would say something along the lines of “turn back and try another way”! When I reached the gate I was relieved to see that was not the case and I could precede, the only thing I had to worry about was a “bull in the field”, thank god for small mercy's then! Making sure that I closed the gate behind me I carried on walking along the track, I did not want to be accused of letting a rampaging bull out into the real world! Not long after I came across a strange sight, a gate and posts in the middle of a field. Looking around I noticed another down towards the stream away to my right and a few “manhole covers” I suddenly realized that these marked the aqueduct that ran below. Much more information can be found out about these strange sights from a link on my links page, fascinating reading!

The track I was walking on wound its way into some trees and soon I was confronted with Side House, by now I was calming myself down and starting to enjoy the walk. At Side House I came across a small sign that had a yellow arrow on it and a laminated paper notice informing me that “This Public Right of Way has been diverted by Statutory Order” this looked official! As the arrow was pointing in the general direction of where I wanted to go I was quite happy to follow it. I was to come across quite a few of these yellow signs during this walk, for some reason they always pointed in the direction that I was not walking, very strange! I am not sure where the old right of way went but the signs pointed the way up a nice track that obviously led towards the open fell side, so far so good!

As the track left the trees and came out onto the open fell side I came across a sign pointing in the direction of Potter Tarn. Just up the path was another sign that I had to walk up to and read. If ever I had seen a dodgy, made up sign this was it! I am sure that if the LDNPA had a close look at this sign they would have a case for copyright infringement or something! Getting my four maps out I looked at where I was and where I wanted to be and decided that I would go with the flow and follow the path towards Potter Tarn for a while, this I did following the path upwards until I reached a wall. The effect of having no breakfast, or was it last night's beer, made me struggle up here! By the time I reached the wall I decided that a stop for a cuppa was in order. As I sat here and read AW's walk description I felt really bad that I had not reached his suggested stop for a well earned rest, in fact I was about 500 feet and a mile short of it, oh well!

Studying the maps I decided that if I kept following the nice yellow signs I would be walking away from where I wanted to be, as I was thinking this my eyes were drawn towards the signs of a path that followed one of the walls. This led directly towards a path that AW had marked on his map; it looked like the best way to go so I turned my back on the yellow signs and followed the wall. The end of this wall joined another wall at right angles to it. This new wall had a lovely track that ran right behind it and beyond that was the open fell side. I decided not to climb over this wall but to carry on following it in case I came across a gate or a stile. Looking back I must have come to this wall by walking on the right hand side of the other wall, I cannot remember having to climb over it so I must have passed through a gap or a gate, I just cant remember doing so! (Lack of breakfast and too much vitamin Stella!) I eventually found myself in a corner of a field with Potter Tarn at the bottom of it, with no sign of a stile or gate I had to climb the wall. I did this in the corner and was very careful (honest!)

I now found myself on AW's path just below the crags that AW drew on page 10. The route I had taken had basically just cut the corner of AW's route and for the life of me I can see no reason for the path to be closed off. I decided to give the crags a miss and carried on around the corner. Now the weather was starting to turn worse, I could see bands of rain coming in and the wind started to pick up. For the first time in ages I got out my compass and took a bearing on the unnamed summit that I was heading for. No paths and the odd sheep track meant for an interesting trudge uphill across what was now open moorland. About half way along the rain caught up with me again and I decided it was time for the waterproof over trousers. By the time I got them on I was wet and it of course stopped raining! I felt much warmer though as the wind was getting very gusty, to complete my outfit the silly hat came out and I felt much better! About five minutes later I found myself on top of the "nameless summit at 1262'".

It seemed strange that this summit did not have a name. I checked my four best resources on the lake district before I had set off on the walk namely AW, the FRCC book ”The Lakeland Fells”, Bill Birketts “Complete Lakeland Fells” and of course the OS. Plenty of mentions about “access problems” but no names. In that case I was going to give it a name and in the best of traditions I decided to name it after my daughter Charlotte. So the " unnamed summit at 1262'" (such a long and boring none name!) will from this day forwards be known as Charlotte Crag! I celebrated the naming ceremony with a cup of coffee and some nicotine whilst looking at the way forward to Brunt Knott.

The way towards Brunt Fell looked relatively easy until I actually tried to do it. Again no path, a combination of tussocks, bracken and then burnt heather made for hard work. I seemed to disturb lots of birds that lived amongst all of this not to mention the sheep that did not hear me approach, how they managed that with me swearing and cursing every time I tripped or stumbled long here I don't know! Eventually I reached the wall and saw AW's wall in the pool. It was a strange sight. Just by the pool a break in the wall and a loose barbed wire fence indicated the way upwards. I was definitely not the first person to come this way, access problems or not!

Once over the gate the ground underfoot gradually improved until I was walking along stuff that you could have played cricket on. The local sheep seemed to be enjoying keeping the grass nice and trimmed! All good things must come to an end and this soon did as the ground steepened towards the summit of Brunt Knott. Again no path and it was a case of trying to find an easy way up the steep grass. Thankfully this did not last too long and the summit soon came into view. Five minutes later found me huddled behind the trig point trying to get out of the wind. It was time for some food and as I sat here and looked around I started to play about with the new camera. I realized that every time I took the camera out of my pocket I was accidentally turning the “mode” dial, so instead of it being set on landscape mode, a few of the photos I had taken had been done in other modes, something to watch out for in future! The optical zoom and image stabilized lens had proved really good at horse shows but I guess that I needed better visibility to test it properly on the fells.

Here I was at the highest point on the walk and it was time to start a return journey. I thought about my uncle David and sort of said my final goodbye to him here, for some reason I kept wondering what he would have thought. Perhaps he would have preferred something like a Great Gable or a Scafell or more likely something bigger and unpronounceable in Scotland or Europe or even further away, who knows, but so far this walk had definitely been a bit of a wild one and I think he might have seen the funny side of it! So finishing off my lunch and saying my goodbyes I headed off towards the "unnamed summit at 1266'" (another long and boring name that needed a change!) For some reason I felt much better in myself now, the weather was still rubbish but I don't know whether it was some food in my belly, saying my good byes, or just starting the homeward leg, whatever the reason I was happy and smiling to myself! I was quite shocked to meet a couple and their Black Labrador dog on my way down, I really did not expect to see anyone else today! The bloke said something about the weather and I expressed my surprise at seeing someone else up here.

I felt like I was a man on a mission now and carried on past them at a fair pace, occasionally tripping and stumbling across the pathless moorland. This feeling lasted until I came across a barbed wire fence that I could find no mention of in AW's book or on any map, damn! I choose a sturdy looking fence post that also had two supporting legs on it for my crossing. I thought I had done this without incident when I heard the lovely sound of my waterproof trousers being torn at the knee by the fence, great! The only consolation was the sight of a stone wall with a proper honest to god ladder stile over it, civilization at last!

Just before I reached the stile I came across another of those yellow signs, again for some reason pointing not where I wanted to go! Up on the horizon of my intended target I could make out two people, again I was surprised to see anyone up here and even more surprised when they headed straight down towards Longsleddale, where were they going then? Once over the stile I ignored more yellow signs and started to follow the wall until I felt I was nearing the highest point, I then started to look for a safe way over it. These walls were solid and I had no difficulty in getting over.

Heading towards the highest point I managed to see some birds on the skyline before I disturbed them. I got out the camera and started to fiddle with the settings and zoom and just managed to snap a photo as they took flight, I still don't know what they were, I could never have taken such a photo with my other camera, not that this was a good photo but at least you can tell it was a bird! Anyway a couple of minutes later and I was at the top. Since I had received no complaints about renaming “a nameless summit at 1262' to Charlotte Crag I decided to rename “a nameless summit at 1266' to Mount Matthew after my son! Of the two I have to say that Charlotte Crag was more interesting, but only just. Both had a very small cairn, well just a couple of rocks really, both had views that made everywhere else seem more interesting but at least they now had a name each!

It was too windy and cold to hang around here so I headed back towards the wall and set off towards Ulgraves. At least by the wall there was a sort of path, probably made by the sheep as they explored the limits of their enclosure. I came across two sheep carcasses and this made me thing that it could be a reason for all the walls and fences, to keep the foxes away, not doing a good job by the number of carcasses I had seen so far today! At one point along the wall there was a very small rocky outcrop, this gave me about two seconds of scrambling, by now I was thankful of the diversion! I soon came across a wall that ran perpendicular to the one I was following. According to my calculations and navigation this meant that I had only this one and two others to cross before I game across Ulgraves. There was a sheep looking at me on the other side, it gave me a look that said something like ”come on then, try it!” I think it was referring to the wall. It was old and just about still standing but had a barbed wire fence on both sides of it, a tough proposition! I was not worried by this as AW's map showed a gap in the wall just along there, maybe back then in the 1970's, but certainly not now!

I followed this wall all the way until it changed direction, there was no way I was going to get across it and keep my wedding tackle intact! I checked the print out I had of Sean's route and decided that he had made it up, either that or he is an acrobat or a high jumper that should have been at the Olympics! Checking the map I realized that the wall I was following turned a corner and headed towards a track, I had no option but to carry on along the wall. Apart from the stream that I had to jump and the bog I had to walk around the only interesting thing that happened along here was the sight of some small birds sitting on a fence, that is if you don't count that sheep following me on the other side of the fence laughing at me, perhaps that is what happened to the other sheep carcasses that I had seen, they had all killed themselves laughing at people walking up here! I got the camera out again and spent five minutes trying to get a bird to stay still long enough for me to press the button, in their defense the wind was strong enough to blow them of their perch even if they did want to stay in one place for more than a minute!

The bog I had to detour around was highly camouflaged; I only noticed that it was a bog when the horizon stated to rise above me as my feet started to make a strange squelching noise! I hurriedly retreated and found a slightly drier way around. The bog turned into a small stream that ran by the wall and soon I came across a bridge thing across it. I stopped to look around and realized that I had joined a rarely used track. This led to a gate and a well guarded gate! This gate as well as being padlocked had an army's supply of barbed wire rapped around it and the fence along it. I was amazed at how much barbed wire there was. Fortunately for me on one side of the gate the fence was barbed wire free and I managed to get over it without any problem.

Once past this gate I managed to walk without tripping, stumbling or sinking into the ground for the first time in ages! I have to take my hat off to the farmer or whoever who had put up all of these obstacles, I kept having thoughts that he might be more gainfully employed as a security consultant to Buckingham Palace or the Houses of Parliament, I am sure he could teach the current security people a thing or two! It was such a relief to walk along the track now, I soon came across a steel gate that invitingly was open; going through that gate would have meant just one more wall between me and Ulgraves. The temptation was strong but by now I was getting into the mind of the person who had built the obstacles, the open inviting gate no doubt had an elaborate alarm system that would ring bells and flash lights if I passed through it, not to mention the landmines and guard dogs that he had up his sleeve, no thanks!

I resisted the obvious trap and carried on walking, soon Gurnal Dubbs came into view. I was feeling happy that I had managed to avoid all of the traps that had been set me, that was until my mobile rang, how had the farmer managed to track my phone number down! Luckily it was only the wife, ringing up to give me a telling off for not being home by the time I had said I would be as well as listing all of the the jobs I had forgotten to do! Then she proceeded to tell me about all of the clothes shopping she had done mainly it has to be said for the horse! Is it me or do most wives put you on the defensive before they tell you about the unplanned shopping trip they have just done ! This phone call gave me enough time to reach Gurnal Dubbs without taking any diversions off the track. Once I had said my goodbyes I started to take a few photos, at least the old building at the end of Gurnal Dubbs was not moving and I was able to zoom in. It was not until I got home and loaded the photos onto my PC that I realized that there a few tents next to the building, the zoom on my new camera is much better than my eyesight!

As I was walking I was keeping a constant check on the map, by the time I started to walk past Gurnal Dubbs I realized that I was now heading away from Ulgraves and I should start to be worried about finding a way over there. To be honest I was enjoying the walking (proper walking along a level surface) that I just carried on! I eventually came across what I had been searching for during the last few miles, access over the fence! A step stile led across the fence in front of an old stone post with a metal tablet mentioning things about the four acres between the enclosure being set aside for recreation and exercise for the residents of the parish. All this was due to the Enclosures Act of 1838 apparently, how kind was that then! Even so there was no public right of way beyond the boundary line according to the tablet, damn! Even so I was going to take a chance and try my luck at finding a route this way.

On the other side of the fence a path led towards the small tarn of Low Taggleshaw. Once there the path disappeared and I was back to following sheep tracks. I followed the sheep tracks and decided that I needed to head for higher ground to see if I could see a route. Once at the high ground I could see Ulgraves and the wall that surrounded it. Checking AW's book I saw that he noted an awkward stile and a sheep crawl, by now I was prepared to use a sheep crawl if it would let me get to Ulgraves, in fact I would try anything!

Needless to say when I arrived at the wall I could see no sign of any stile and the sheep crawl had been blocked up on the other side, why had I expected anything else! I walked along the wall for a while but saw no sign of easy access so I retraced my steps and walked back along the wall and around the corner. I thought I saw a couple of breaches in the walls defenses ahead but when I reached them they did not seem all that easy. Eventually I reached a spot where I thought I could get over the wall, by now I was really frustrated by the whole walk, it was getting beyond a joke now!

Now I had nothing between myself and Ulgraves apart from a grassy slope, not at all like the “daunting sea of bracken” as described by AW. In fact all I could see as an obstacle was the cow pats! Now I not an expert in animal dung but I know the difference between the small round “malteesers” that sheep leave behind and the large flat pats that cows seem to prefer, so I knew that this pasture had been changed since AW was here even though I had not seen any cows, knowing my luck today I would probably come across an irate bull wanting to know what I was doing here! As I looked around to make sure I did not stumble across any bulls out looking for me I spotted a tractor in another field, that was all I needed! If I could see the tractor the driver could see me! I started to give a good impersonation of a school kid stealing apples from an orchard now as I tried to find a way upwards without being seen! I managed to reach the large summit cairn of Ulgraves without further incident. I was glad that it was all over now! I was also happy that Ulgraves already had a proper name or I would have been tempted to call it Difficult Dodd or Protected Peak or Annoying Alp or Foolish Fell. I did think of much more colorful names that seemed to slip off my tongue much more easily but as my kids read this diary I will not put them here!

Taking the time to take a few photos I then started to retrace my steps back to the wall. I managed to do this without spotting any farmers in red tractors and even though I seemed to cross the wall at a different place I felt much better now I was away from Ulgraves. I kept thinking that my Uncle David had something to do with all of my frustration today as a sort of penance for not walking up Great Gable or the like in his memory, this brought back the smile to my face as I imagined him looking down on me and laughing his socks off! So I retraced my steps back to the stile, according to my GPS track log I did not manage this exactly but at least I was back somewhere I was legally entitled to be! It was quite strange how I felt now, it was as if a great weight had been lifted of my shoulders, I was back on public rights of way and once again legal!

As I neared the track I could see a couple of walkers at the stile, they seemed to take an interest in the post and old sign, perhaps they were after the illusive Ulgraves as well. Perhaps not, because they soon lost interest and walked away towards Gurnal Dubbs. Also the white van plus tents that I had managed to zoom in on before drove past on the track, obviously heading home after a night wild camping ish! I walked along the side of Gurnal Dubbs and soon came across the two walkers I had seen before; they were sat down having a brew behind the old building. We exchanged waves and I carried on past them following an obvious track that led towards a stile and a wall. Once over this stile I was confronted with the sight of Potter Tarn.

Potter Tarn was soon reached and I followed the outflow along a track that led through a couple of fields until I reached Gyhll Pool. As this walking downhill thing had now started to hurt my feet I spent a while looking at the dam wall and signs of pipe work below it to give my feet a rest! Yes after all the trouble free walks as far as feet problems go I am back to aching toes and stuff! The only thing I can think that causes the problem is my boots, during the summer months I had been wearing either a pair of Brasher AT 20 shoes or the Merrell multi activity shoes without a hint of any problems, now back in my Salomon boots I am suffering again! Time for a plan B!

Once my feet settled down I carried on. This part of the walk led down a track that followed the outflow of Gyhll Pool. It was a nice track to walk on with something of interest to see every few minutes. These things could be one of the gates of the aqueduct or a pumping station or a swing that some local kids had erected from an overhanging tree branch! Eventually the track ended and a sign post indicated the way forwards, this was down a path that was enclosed by walls that came out at some old farm buildings. Thee old farm buildings must have been a hive of activity in years gone by but now looked derelict.

After the buildings around Hundhowe it was a short distance back to the road and then on to the car. I came across some fallen “conkers” and filled my pockets with them; at least Matthew would be pleased with them! As AW said in his book “If you parked a car you can reasonably expect to find it a third of mile west” and so I did! I changed into some dry clothes and sat there a while thinking about the walk. I had enjoyed THE walk (the act of being out on the fells and walking) but I had not enjoyed THIS walk (too many obstacles and the thought of being somewhere where I was not supposed to be) It makes sense to me!

Doing this walk had seemed like something that I needed to do at the time. I needed to get out into “solitary fell walking mode” once again, I felt like I needed to say goodbye to my uncle David in a way he would understand and I needed to get past my mental block as far as doing Potter Fell and the rest of the Outlying Fells was concerned. I had achieved all of these things but I can honestly say that I would not want to do this walk again, ever! Reading other peoples views on the subject of this walk I have to applaud the FRCC and Bill Birkett who have put into print the fact that some of the area surrounding Brunt Knott is private and has no public right of way. It will be interesting to see how the new “right to roam” laws will affect this area. I have recently read that in the peak district some 400 new gates and stiles and 250 new signs indicating “open access” have been erected because of the new law, perhaps Ulgraves will be “legal” next year! Until than it is up to the individual, I decided and walked the walk as near as I could to AW's description, that was my choice and I guess that if any one wants to follow in the footsteps of AW they will have to make their own decision, and remember that the "unnamed summits at....." are now Charlotte Crag and Mount Matthew!