Our last walk (apart from the Christmas walk in Yorkshire) was back in October so we were long overdue. I put the walk off a week as my knee has been painful for a couple of weeks now without any walking.  It was still painful this week but not wanting to put if off again I strapped it up and headed for the hills.  It was my turn to drive so I picked Peter up at 6.30.  We had already decided to do Seat Sandal, parking at Dunmail Raise which already had a little height to make the walk easier.  We arrived just before 8.30, got the boots on and armed with the breakfast pies crossed the road and over the style.

The path on the maps was by Grise beck to our left but there was a more direct, clearly marked path straight ahead of us so we took this.  We immediately started climbing, quite steeply, very tough on the calves.  The route was very direct heading straight for some small crags where we stopped for a breather and watched a couple of farmers on the slopes of Dollywaggon Pike herding their sheep.  We had a quick cuppa and then carried on.  We couldn’t see the top from here but we knew it was straight ahead.

I was pleased I had strapped my knee up as it was fine at this stage.  This was going to be one of the quickest tops in a while as the summit came into sight.  There were great views from here of Dollywaggon Pike, Fairfield, St Sunday Crag and it was quite clear now.  We arrived at the summit around 10.30 and got a few photos.

Right in front of us was the imposing sight of Fairfield, close enough to touch but with a massive descent and then ascent it was going to be too much for my knee today.

However it was doing fine still and obviously keeping it compressed is the way forward for future walks.

We dropped off the top slightly heading for Grisedale Hause and had a little lunch.  As soon as we began to drop the wind completely disappeared and it was very peaceful sat having our lunch above Grisedale Tarn.

It was a very steady descent or at least it felt like it was and I was very pleased that my knee had held out after a painful 2 weeks.  We arrived back at the car just before 1 pm so plenty of time for a pint at the Sportsmans Inn.  This was top number 47, only 24 left to do now and hopefully with the right physiotherapy I may avoid surgery on the knee and complete these quicker.

See you on the next one.