Scafell Pike via Piers Gill

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Route: Wasdale Head, Burnthwaite, Moses' Trod, Lingmell Beck, Piers Gill, Corridor Route, Lingmell Col, Scafell Pike, Lingmell Col, Corridor Route, Sty Head, Moses' Trod, Wasdale Head

Date: 23/05/2019
From: Wasdale Head

Parking: Wasdale Head
Start Point: Wasdale Head
Region: Southern Fells

Route length: 8.4 miles (13.5km)
Time taken: 07:28
Average speed: 1.3mph
Ascent: 971m
Descent: 968m

Wainwrights on this walk:
Scafell Pike (978m)

Additional summits: None

Other points of interest: Piers Gill

Everyone knows Scafell Pike and, like all popular mountains, there are popular routes - the Corridor Route or the direct route up from Wasdale for instance. If you're fed up sharing the main paths with the crowds then Piers Gill is definitely for you.

Piers Gill itself is quite infamous - it is the location of numerous MRT call-outs as people descending from Scafell Pike inadvertently enter it thinking it to be a viable way down. Its entrance sits astride the Corridor Route and does look inviting.

It was pretty cloudy when we left the car park at Wasdale Head

A small inscription can be found on the window of St Olaf's 

It should be noted that a route up or down the ravine is not possible for the average walker - there are a few serious, vertical sections and no mobile phone coverage should there be any problems. Instead, the Piers Gill path actually follows the rim of the canyon as it climbs up from Wasdale Head.

The path at Burnthwaite Farm

The Napes of Great Gable loom overhead

Looking back along the valley towards Wasdale Head

Getting to Piers Gill first involves a walk along the valley leading towards Sty Head as if we were making our way to Sty Head Tarn. After passing through Burnthwaite Farm, we left the main walkers track (which becomes Moses' Trod), remaining in the valley bottom, following Lingmell Beck. Crossing the stream where Piers Gill meets Spouthead Gill leads onto open fellside. There is an unobtrusive arrow etched onto the rock which helps guide the way.

Great End at the head of the valley

Looking back towards Wasdale Head

The plunge pool where Piers Gill joins Spouthead Gill 

The arrow directs you towards the Piers Gill path

We began climbing along a vague path that climbs up towards Piers Gill, which remains largely hidden. It wasn't until we reached the entrance that the drama of the gill was revealed. As I mentioned, Piers Gill is essentially a canyon that carves a path across the crags of Lingmell, forming a very distinctive L-shaped gash. A path follows the eastern side, right up to the point where the Corridor Route crosses the gill.

Flass Knotts below Lingmell Crag

Piers Gill below Lingmell

Piers Gill

Piers Gill gets much more interesting

The entrance to the canyon

Piers Gill

There are two features of note that are worth mentioning following the initial climb. First is the rock step around halfway, an easy and enjoyable short scramble. The second requires a short detour from the path shortly after the step to the point where Piers Gill turns through 90 degrees. Here the view of the canyon is immense.

Climbing the Piers Gill path

Clouds cap Great Gable

Piers Gill

The short scramble

Lingmell Crag across Piers Gill

Looking down Piers Gill

The view of Piers Gill from the 'corner'

Lingmell Crag

Piers Gill

We climbed the path further still as it begins to level out alongside the upper part of Piers Gill, below Middleboot Knotts. While cloudy, the Scafell range was laid out in front of us.

The head of Piers Gill

Looking down Piers Gill from the Corridor Route

Great End

Looking down the length of the Corridor Route

We joined the Corridor and made the climb to Lingmell Col, joining the motorway-like path which climbs from Wasdale to the west. We entered the cloud as we made the final climb up the steeper path to the summit.

The summit is actually owned by the National Trust after it was donated to them in 1919 by Lord Leaconfield as a memorial to the men of the Lakes District "who fell for God and King, for freedom, peace and right in the Great War".

Climbing from Lingmell Col

The final push to the top

Scafell Pike's summit

The trig pillar on Scafell Pike

One of me at the very top....

...and another at the pillar

We backtracked from the summit, descending the slabs and making our way back to Lingmell Col and, eventually, the top of Piers Gill and the Corridor Route. The Corridor Route is a superb way either on or off Scafell Pike. The path cuts across some impressive mountainside while the view over Wasdale to Great Gable is immense. A short, technically easy scramble is required shortly after Greta Gill but other than this, there are no difficulties.

Ill Crag makes an appearance

Clouds part around Scafell Pikes summit

Descending back to the Corridor Route

Piers Gill once again

A pair of US jets over the Corridor Route

The Corridor Route

Great Gable

Wasdale

Wasdale and Great Gable

Sty Head

Skew Gill

Great Gable

Styhead Tarn

The clouds had almost cleared completely by the time we reached the stretcher box at Sty Head. Sty Head is a very popular mountain pass, surrounded by paths that access many of the most famous fells of the western Lakes. Great Gable, Great End, Lingmell, Esk Pike, Scafell and Scafell Pike are all readily accessible from this high-level meeting point. Paths from Wasdale, Eskdale, Borrowdale and Langdale all converge at Sty Head Tarn bringing with them a multitude of mountain walkers and runners. Such is its strategic importance amongst probably the most popular mountains in the Lakes, the local Mountain Rescue team have a stretcher box based there ready and waiting for the next unfortunate passenger.

The Sty Head stretcher box

Great End

Moses' Trod

Looking back to the high fells

Moses' Trod

From Sty Head we descended back towards Wasdale Head along the path known as Moses' Trod. The supposed path owes its existence to a quarryman known as Moses Rigg. Before the establishment of a proper road network in the district, he devised the route as the shortest way of conveying slate from the quarries at Honister Pass to Wasdale Head from where the valley road leads to the port of Ravenglass.

But slate was not the only thing his pony-drawn sled carried. Hidden among the loads, he concealed his own illegally distilled whisky, which he smuggled for sale on his travels. The remains of a hut high on Gable Crag have been linked to Moses and suggested as a site of one of his stills - it is located in a very exposed position midway up the buttress. The site is known amongst climbers as 'Smugglers' Retreat'.

The Great Napes on Great Gable

Lingmell

Piers Gill

Great Gable, Great End and Lingmell

Some interesting clouds brew up over the Scafells

Moses' Trod returned us to Gable Beck where we retraced our morning route through Burnthwaite farm to the inn at Wasdale Head.

Great Gable

Mosedale

It's a little shame the clouds hadn't cleared by the time we arrived on Scafell Pike but it was nice to see Piers Gill after our last outing was totally shrouded in mist. Despite the dire warnings on entering the canyon, I think it would be an interesting place to explore, at least as far as the first impassable section.