Stottie Walks

I left Helen waiting for her taxi to Appleby station and strode through Dufton. The day was cool and clear. It’s a long climb to Knock Old Man, the tall cairn that was my first landmark of the day. There’s no point rushing a hill, especially when the day will be long, and I plodded slowly upwards, happy in my thoughts and memories.
In the gullies and stream channels, residual snow banks several feet thick testified to the severity of our late spring snowfall and its accompanying easterly blow. Cross Fell wore a long snowdrift below its plateau edge. The wind was fierce on the path to Great Dun Fell, and my progress slowed: against the gale, every step was hard work on the uneven rising ground.

Worse was to come on Little Dun Fell. Standing like a pointed rock in the middle of a fast flowing stream, the hill was battered by the strongest wind I’d experienced thus far, blowing hard on my left shoulder. I grabbed two minutes’ rest in the lee of a crude stone shelter before struggling to my feet and jamming my trekking poles into the ground to avoid being blown over. After descending to the col as quickly as I could, I took a breather and wondered what awaited me on Cross Fell, the highest point in the Pennines and infamously windswept.

Slowly I began my climb, pausing for breath a couple of times, just for a few seconds. Before I realised it, I found myself on the stony plateau, walking easily towards the cruciform shelter, untroubled by the wind. I stopped and looked all round me, but the distant views were hazy so I made my way down the wet and grassy slope, past holes filled with snow, to the old Corpse Road that would eventually lead me into Garrigill.

Way back then… We made it over Cross Fell with no difficulty in 1963 and found our way to Garrigill and onward to Alston. We achieved that without a map. Although the West Riding of Yorkshire County Library Service had loaned us maps for our adventure, they didn’t have a map of the Cross Fell range. Neil broke the news to John and me in Edale YH. On the day we simply headed north, hit the old Corpse Road, and found our way to Garrigill. We stayed at the Victoria Hotel in Alston, where I tasted my first whisky and dry ginger.
I’d met Neil Spencer around the same time I met John. Neil towered over us young Scouts. I found myself at the same school, where he was in the Lower 6th Form, what we now call Year 12. I came to know Neil better through Youth Club, where he was our charismatic leader. He organised day hikes, night hikes and Youth Hostel trips until his work took him to Cardiff. To me it seemed natural that he would organise the YH bookings for our Pennine Way, and that’s what happened. Neil’s involvement with Scouting continues as I type these words. He has raised many thousands of pounds for charity by taking on tough challenges such as the South West Coast Path in twenty-eight days. For health reasons, his agenda now excludes long walks, but we hope to meet in September, and entirely by coincidence the likely date will be exactly fifty years after we first walked together into Kirk Yetholm.

Plodding along the rough road, I heard golden plover and curlew, and I saw my first black grouse, a bird encouraged on the northern moors. Two farmers and several busy Border Collies drove a flock of sheep and lambs towards me, heading for their spring feeding grounds. In Garrigill all was quiet and closed – I could have murdered a pot of tea – so I marched straight on through the fields beside the pretty South Tyne, reaching my well appointed B&B after nine hours on the trail. That evening I walked to the Victoria Hotel, which was on the point of reopening as a bar and Indian restaurant. There I sat amidst the newly polished tables with a pint of Woodpecker cider, an unusual drink for me, and I ate a very acceptable curry.

Daffodils at Dufton

Remnants of snow in Swindale Beck on Knock Fell

The Long Green Trail on Knock Fell

River South Tyne between Garrigill and Alston

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