đ§ââïž IT WAS PERHAPS PRETERNATURALLY PREORDAINED; it’s always difficult to tell with Thirlmere things.
On a glorious Lakeland morning, I felt the moment was right; my boy was ready for the Big H, and me, too. It had been a wee while. And as I was poring over Wainwright’s Eastern tome, my mother moseyed in with Just An Idea, as is her wont.
It turned out her suggestion also involved that most magically named of Cumbrian fells, Helvellyn. And so it was decided, and LĂ©o and I set off for the Keswick bus stop and the trusty 555 bus, kitted out for everything this mighty Lake District mastodon might muster to throw at us.
Having said that, we almost didn’t make it past the soggy bracken heading up from Thirlspot Farm. The boy’s legs were still suffering from our Skiddaw hike a couple of days earlier and you know how the beginning can be particularly tough before getting into your stride? Well, it was.
We pushed through, though, making it up and away past Fisher Place Gill, around the northern end of Brown How and Brown Crag, bidding a friendly ‘How now?’ to a ruminating brown cow… OK, I made that last bit up.
I cite these places not lightly but not as an intended hiking guide either. There are plenty of fearnest folks who lay down detailed, bog-by-bog, slippery-stone-by-treacherous-tree-trunk itineraries for diligent trudgers and I’m not one of them.
Nay, these names deserve to be swilled around the mouth like a good green smoothie or lingered over lovingly by a languorous eye that doesn’t need a magnifying glass to extract them from the frayed folds of a well-wandered OS map.
So, awaiting more detailed pieces on individual Wainwrights, suffice it to say that we then rattled off Raise, White Side, Helvellyn itself, Nethermost Pike and even Dollywaggon Pike in brisk, sandwich-interspersed succession.
It was good, excellent, even, with glorious weather conditions, but none of those worthy peaks were the high point of the excursion for me.
Before leaving, my mother mentioned something that made me more determined than ever to do this walk today.
As we descended into the dip between White Side and Helvellyn, I indicated a puddle to the boy and told him I’d share a family secret when we got there.
With his usual impatience, he proceeded to bug me every five seconds on the way down, wanting to know what it was, so that worked…
Looking down Helvellyn Gill echoed my mum and dad looking up it many years before. My nan had cycled past Helvellyn 70 years ago on a rare holiday. She told my mum that she’d seen an enticing Path to Helvellyn fingerpost pointing up the gully and was sorely tempted to follow it. It was late in the day, and legs were tired, and she never did.
When she finally left us, my parents decided to let her make her way up this mystical mount herself, and scattered her there.
I told my boy that she had gone back to the earth, had become one with the hillside, had had her wish granted. He said that perhaps she’s a flower now, and I said he was probably right. I couldn’t have put it better.
Walking up fells is much more than just counting paces and ticking off summits for me. I have my best reflections on life while doing so, as I have some of my deepest insights into death when strolling through Parisian cemeteries.
Sometimes it’s about every little step contributing to the greatest journeys. Or how the humblest daisy or dandelion can be as much part of our days as the smartphones and cars and computer systems we think we rely on.
Let’s meet up on a hillside near you sometime. Maybe I’ll be swaying in the breeze gently, whispering: “Pick me, pick me!”
Happy reflecting!
The Laggard of Lakeland đ
đ§ (Lakeland Chronicles No.38)
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â°Â Wainwright Log: 54 of 214 Fells Felled / 0 Books Bashed / Visit
