Cat Bells & High Spy is 9 miles of pure walking bliss & that’s why I chose to this walk less than 4 months since the last time I was up here, reason being today I had my mate Ste with me again ,now here’s a bloke who loves the lakes maybe with not quite as much enthusiasm  as I do but was daft enough to be up at 6.30 to be with me today ,thing is Ste has been doing renovations to his house which has took all his spare time up & every weekend probably since last Oct or so .So we got our heads together & came up with two old favourites ,High Street from Patterdale or this one, bearing in mind Ste has never gone as far as Maiden Moor ,There was only one winner today

Wainwright Guidebook

Starting the walk from the car park & its more or less lock the car & hit the climb & if your names Paul & Ste that means for absolute no warm up & gagging for breath almost immediately.

Swinside & Bassenwaite Lake & Broom Fell just under cloud to the left in the distance.

Cat Bells summit comes into view with Hindscarth & Robinson to the right.

This time with Ard Crags  far right making an appearance .

A close up of Small Town ,& If you look to the left half way up the picture is the wall we would eventually follow back down along the side of Cat Bells, but for now lets reach the summit.

Cat Bells Summit & Cairne with Maiden Moor beyond .

Don’t know what’s happened to the cairne its in a right sorry state .

Maiden Moor & next High Spy.

Hitting the cloud & snow base as expected, but what was unexpected was no rain! if I had a pound for every time they got it wrong id be in my Aston Martin in the south of France by now!

A close up of Castle Crag, Lakelands smallest fell & yes I’ve yet to get to the top of this fell ,Its on my to do list ok.

Snow cornice ,& yes footprints it beggars believe just how stupid some people really are .

High Spy summit comes into view & more snow cornice on the approach .

High Spys impressive summit cairne.

Ste looking pleased with himself at the cairne

Next Dale Head Tarn for lunch.

A semi frozen Dale Head Tarn & sheepfold ,.perfect place for a rest up before we hit the Newlands valley.

A personal favourite view of mine ,the Newlands Valley from Dale Head Tarn .

New Lands Beck waterfall , & for my camera this is the last picture I managed after failing to recharge the batteries fully so the next few pics are camera  phone only ,Idiot!!

Nearly at the valley floor now but still along way back to the car yet!

Climbers cottage & next stop is Little Town .

Scope end & Hindscarth nearing the end of the valley.

And again from a little further up the track .

Approaching the aptly named Little Town, where we take the path to the right which will take us along side Cat Bells .

I’m not quite sure of the cause of the erosion seen here, beit all the water these paths have had to cope with or maybe the hard frost but I’m almost certain it wasn’t here the last time I was up here.

Looks lie this small wooden bridge had taken some damage in the recent flooding ,You can jus make out the yellow warning tape .

And you can see why ,..all these boulders have come crushing down the fell with such force  knocking the bridge out, lots of erosion on the river banks to .

Back at Skelgill & just around the corner the car park , Tired yes, sore limbs yes, but today was one of the best with a much favoured walk of mine ,worth every ache & pain & for once in a long time arriving back at the car park while its still light.