After our exploits on the Langdale tops of the 21st July we decided we'd do an easy Wainwright fell before heading home. Having done the Fairfield Horseshoe we decided on Stone Arthur as that kind of sticks out on its own a bit and therefore it made sense to get it knocked off.
Sound straightforward so far?
Well having parked up and walked up the road past the pub that marks the start of the walk, we were both thinking maybe we should've just gone home. Legs were tired and spirits relatively low. We decided to plough on for a bit up the stone staircase.
Walking up through the foliage was quite pleasant and as you turn to the right towards the lone tree the views open up and we realised that we'd made a great decision to carry on!
As you can see, no mist today. The lone tree sits in the middle of the path as it traverses the fell. Quite unmistakable.
On this picture, if you follow the faint, diagonal line past the tree you can see the route of the path. As you reach the far end of this picture you turn left and upwards almost along the ridge, and this takes you straight to the summit.
Now, as we got to the summit there were two sheep minding their own business right next to the cairn. We decided that we were close enough to call the fell as having been conquered but neither of us wanted to disturb them and so we took our obligatory pics from a few metres away.
Now you may say that we didn't reach the top because we didn't touch the cairn but we decided the sheep, as the true fell-walkers, shouldn't be disturbed by us.
So, Stone Arthur done. That is 34 Wainwright fells conquered now and 27 this year. I want to do 50 in 2018 so we'll see if time, money and leg-power allow for that.
I do want to do Haystacks this year as it is such an iconic mountain to all lovers of the Wainwright guides. Will that be next up or will we go for a tiddler instead - let's wait and see.
All I knew was that after a 7 week gap it had been wonderful to be back in the Lakes. No matter what the weather this place has beauty unsurpassed.
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