The Old Man is very popular, but we’ve been doing a less crowded route up for twenty years or so. As judged by today’s walk however, it is getting more popular, which usually means it is in some new book. Which people read! We can’t remember where we got it from, but not Wainwright. From the north end of the car park just up from the Sun pub, go up the side road and take a path right, currently nearly blocked by a salt bin. This leads on the left of the stream gully steeply upto a dog-leg in the road to the Walna Scar track. There is an alleged plan to upgrade the car park here, with charges and shutting the gate at some ungodly early hour, no use for those of us who climb on Dow Crag till nightfall. Keep going. At Boo “Tarn”, dry now, take the path to the left of the quarry track up and follow it leftwards up and across Little Arrow Moor. Relatively gentle. A while after curving north it takes a right turn and ascends more steeply onto the South Ridge of the Old Man. Thereafter the round needs no description, but I should say that if you haven’t descended the south ridge of Wetherlam recently, the old path which turned left down to Hole Rake is now little used, the path continues to turn down more pleasantly further on, and there has been some attempt to improve the annoying track round the corner going SSE towards the quarries. Cross the bridge and follow Church Beck’s south bank, then the track which leads unerringly to the Sun, what better place to end a superb round, of 8 miles and 3,500ft of ascent?
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