[Gutenberg 43968] • The Book of Coniston

Our first walk is naturally to climb the Coniston Old Man. By the easiest route, which fortunately is the most interesting, there is a path to the top; good as paths go on mountains-that is, plain to find-and by its very steepness and stoniness all the more of a change from the town pavement and the hard high road. It is quite worth while making the ascent on a cloudy day. The loss of the panorama is amply compensated by the increased grandeur of the effects of gloom and mystery on the higher crags, and with care and attention to directions there need be no fear of losing the way. About an hour and a half, not counting rests, is enough for the climb; and rather more than an hour for the descent. From the village, for the first ten minutes, we can take two alternative routes. Leaving the Black Bull on the left, one road goes up past a wooden bridge which leads to the Old Forge, and by Holywath Cottage and the gate of Holywath (J. W. H. Barratt, Esq., J.P.) and the cottages of Silverbank, through a gate opening upon the fell. Turn to the left, past sandpits in a fragment of moraine left by the ancient glacier which, at the end of the Ice Age, must once have filled the copper-mines valley and broken off here, with toppling pinnacles and blue cavern, just like a glacier in Switzerland. Note an ice-smoothed rock on the right, showing basalt in section. Among the crannies of Lang Crags, which tower above, broken hexagonal pillars of basalt may be found in the screes, not too large to carry off as specimens. In ten minutes the miniature Alpine road, high above a deep ravine, leads to the Gillhead Waterfall and Bridge.