High Street and Ill Bell

Start: The Queens Head , Town Head, Troutbeck, Windermere, Cumbria (LA23 1PW)

(S/E) From the car park entrance of The Queens Head, cross the main road carefully and walk down the road opposite, with 20mph signs.

(1) At a junction, turn right onto a private road (Ing Lane) with a public bridleway sign (ignoring another bridleway on the right). Follow the lane for ¾ mile, bearing left as you reach the valley floor and passing a barn before crossing the beck at Ing Bridge.

(2) Continue along the lane, which bends left (ignore a right turning) and continues past another small barn and a gate and over a second bridge (Hagg Bridge).

(3) Leave the track here, turning right at a stile and keeping to the right of a hillock (Hall Hill) then climbing to a gate at the top of the field. Turn right along the track, which curves left up the valley. Just before a gate, pass (but do not follow, yet) a path on the right down to a footbridge.

(4) Continue along the track, passing a barn after ¼ mile and going through a couple more gates, until the accompanying wall on your right bends away to the right. Continue along the track up the valley, ignoring the oblique path climbing off to the left, and descend to the flat valley bottom. After following the stream for a while, the vague track bears off left; leave it to climb parallel to the stream to a gate.

(5) Follow the wall on your left until it bends left, then strike off diagonally up the right-hand side of the valley on a narrow path. Climb relentlessly uphill for about a mile.

(6) If you are omitting the walk up to High Street, when the main ridge path first comes into view on your right, cut across to it and skip to step 9 to avoid some climbing. Otherwise carry on until you meet the wide, stony path. Turn left and continue to a fork, where you bear left to the beacon on Thornthwaite Crag.

(7) Turn right at the beacon and follow the obvious path towards the broad top of High Street (A). For the trig point, you will need to divert right to the wall.

(8) You can either return to the Ill Bell path the same way you came or, to save a second visit to Thornthwaite Crag, pick up a narrow path from the end of the wall that cuts the corner, above the head of a couple of gullies. Walk southwards along the ridge path and then drop down to a small cairn in the dip below Froswick. Climb about 90 metres, rocky in places, to the top of Froswick.

(9) Descend again, then start the next rocky ascent to the twin cairns at the top of Ill Bell, followed by a similar descent beyond. The last significant climb is more gradual, to a gate by a small tarn, and then to the top of Yoke, beyond which the going is all downhill.

(10) Follow the ridge track beyond Yoke as it descends, steeply at first, to a kissing gate. The broad track beyond follows a wall then strikes out across open country, winding between and below low crags to meet the Garburn Road at a small triangular plantation.

(11) Beyond the gate, follow the track to the right of the trees, descending for a mile to a gate just beyond the partially wooded spoil-heaps of a disused quarry.

(12) At the next fork, take the lower, right-hand track, which passes below another patch of woodland and past a ladder stile on the left. At a grassy triangle, turn sharp right through a gate onto a bridleway that continues to descend, now heading north, towards the holiday chalets at Limefitt. At a tall deer-gate beyond a junction, turn hard left and walk downhill with woodland to your right.

(13) Beyond a metal gate, pass a small stone building then turn right and walk down through Limefitt Holiday Park. Cross the bridge over the beck and bear left up the entrance road to the main road. Turn left and walk down the main road towards the church.

(14) Turn right onto a footpath by a covered well on the right and continue past a churchyard gate. At the next gate, leave the main path onto a waymarked path on the right that follows a fence then crosses to pass an oak tree to a gate. Continue through a second gate and along a fenced path which meets a wall and continues as a farm track.

(15) At the next junction, turn right to meet the A592. Cross into the track opposite and turn immediately left onto a permitted path that runs parallel to the road along the top of two fields, back to The Queens Head (B). (S/E)

Start: The Queen's Head, Town Head, Troutbeck, Windermere, Cumbria LA23 1PW

Web www.queensheadtroutbeck.pub
Email info@queensheadtroutbeck.pub
Tel 015394 32404

Notes: A demanding fell walk with several long climbs adding up to almost 1000 metres’ total ascent. Walking boots and suitable clothing are essential. Take plenty of water. Can be shortened by omitting the there-and-back extension to the top of High Street.

Find more information on Walks From the Door.

(A) The summit trig-point of High Street (828 m) is at the centre of a broad ridge, so the best views are from the crags a little way to the east, overlooking Blea Water and Riggindale to Harter Fell and Haweswater respectively. The fell’s name comes from the Roman Road that crosses its broad summit.

(B) Refreshment available at the Queens Head:

OPENING TIMES
Mon–Sun: 11:30am–11pm

FOOD SERVICE
Breakfast: 8am–10am
Lunch, Mon–Sat: 12 noon–9pm Sun: 12 noon–7pm

The new Queens Head features a cosy drinking area with newly refurbished dining areas and 10 comfortable en-suite guest bedrooms providing the perfect base for guests to Cumbria and, of course, their four-legged companions.