Hopefully we'll find good going once we're across the river. Crossing the river gives us a bit of fun. I have had very wet feet ever since High Raise so I just wade through. Two lads coming the other way have spotted us crossing and just as I splash out, they reach the opposite bank. Their disappointment in obvious when they realise that I haven't found a drier way across than any other they'd seen on the way up.
Once across, we make a long, wet dog-leg along the left bank and then cut across on a traverse to the low col that will give us access to Moasdale. We manage a dry crossing of the stream above some waterfalls and refill with water on tte way over. It's cheering to see the long easy path down the valley, and we make much quicker progress once we're on it. All the time we're descending, the steep grassy slopes of Grey Friar are getting nearer, and Cockley Beck there's no blocking them out. Cockley Beck produces something else - the first cars since Wythburn. There aren't many, but even so they seem to have difficulty passing each other, and us. It does seem a stupidly cumbersome and limiting way of getting around the Lake District.
We disappear off into a wet field, and soon we're climbing again, at first on a delightful zig-zag track the ascends a ramp. We're sorry when it peters out after 300' or so, and leaves us to tramp up the soggy tussocks towards the crags, and not long after the crags, the fog. A long pull, and a bit of dodging between the outcrops, takes us up to a dip on the ridge, and miraculously, a cairn. Not long afterwards, we find the meeting of the ways on the southern slopes of Great Carrs, and traverse off right towards the southern end of the ridge and our last summit, the Old Man of Coniston. The fog thickens and the wind is blowing ever stronger from the west.Lindsay disappears completely at one point, and we're glad when we see her shadowy figure emerge out of the gloom again.
Our little traverse path runs out, but we find another. That one loses us height though, and when it begins to veer off towards where Dow Crag probably is, we cut up across the rough grass again until we reach the unmistakeably wide track of the main ridge. Just a few hundred yards later, we're up on the Old Man himself, soon accompanied by a couple, the first people we've seen since Cockley Beck. They're cold, and make themselves colder by stripping off their whole layers to put on different vests. We have the luxury of 15 minutes off before we take another 3-heads-in-the-gloaming summit picture on the top of the old county of Lancashire.
On the way back, we find a better line. We're getting wet now, and I wonder whether it's rain, or just fast fog. Whatever it is, it's blowing into my left ear! After a mile and a half, we meet our lone walker again. He's putting on a waterproof and seems in good spirits. He'll be finishing late, but he will definitely be finishing. From the Old Man, it's two miles back to the crossways, and I know it's about two miles back to Elterwater from the bottom of the hill, which leaves us a long descent of two and a half miles until we get there. The descent starts badly: it's uphill, but soon we do lose height, slowly, then quickly, which brings us a view. The unfamiliar backside of Lingmoor appears, above Little Langdale Tarn. It's a good job there's only one tarn - the nomenclature would be a nightmare otherwise.
Further on, the Langdales look big again, which is good news, it means we're well down the slopes and making good progress towards home. Over a bridge, we find a good, solid track. It leads over a shoulder, up a a short climb, the n onto the road, and before long we're back on out way down, over the loose cobbles and through the woods to Elterwater. We reach the car again at a quarter to eight, just as it's beginning to get dark. It's been a grand day out in the hills, in good company, another long dreamt-of long route completed. Sometimes I feel very blessed indeed.
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