Carlisle & District Rambling & Fellwalking Club

Walk & Event Reports

Sunday 15th June 2014

A Walk

Whitehaven to St Bees

8 Miles Grade 3

Leader: Kathryn Bowstead

Reports by John McKay & Kathryn Bowstead

Photos by John McKay & Fred Bell

John's Report

Twenty nine on the coach this morning and one other who made their own way to St Bees. Everyone was in good spirits, despite England losing their opening match in the World Cup to Italy only a few hours before. The Scottish contingent amongst us was in an exceptionally buoyant mood. The A/B party were dropped off in the centre of Whitehaven and the coach carried on to St Bees with the C party. We set off through the very nice harbour heading for the coastal path. As it was likely to be a fairly easy walk, which would be completed with plenty of time to spare, Phil and I decided to start the day with a coffee break at the Harbour Café. We let the others carry on and sat in glorious sunshine enjoying our coffee. Suitably refreshed we set off on the coastal path. This was a very different type of walk from normal, no mountains but a wonderful coastal path with great views of the sea and cliffs. We eventually caught up with the main party at the lighthouse but having just finished their lunch they were setting off again so we let them carry on and had our own lunch. As we sat there the C party came along in the opposite direction. We had a chat and Joe told us that not far ahead was a viewpoint, overlooking the cliffs, where we could see lots of wonderful Shags. Phil and I set off along the path at a brisk pace, full of anticipation and excited by Joe’s news. He wasn’t wrong. After spending a short spell at the viewpoint we set off and finally caught up with the main party in St Bees. Most of them were in the café or sitting outside eating ice cream, Phil and I joined them. A very different but wonderful walk, a wonderful day all round, fantastic weather and great scenery. Many thanks to Kathryn.

Perhaps one of the main party will let us know how they got on.

John

   Kathryn's Report

“A total of 23 combined A & B walkers set off from Whitehaven on a warm, sunny morning – the party was so large that I asked Anne & Ken Halliday if they would help out by being “back markers” to make sure we didn’t lose anyone, although this didn’t work too well as we “lost” John & Phil who couldn’t resist the lure of coffee at The Beacon.  Ian Watson decided to have a bit of an adventure on the way up to The Candlestick by scrambling up some rocks & climbing over a wall rather than going the easy way up the footpath.  We had plenty of time so we carried on along the cliffs at a leisurely pace & I was given a lesson in some of the colourful flowers lining the path.  We passed a man in a boat on the cliff top who must have been very hot as he was overdressed in waterproofs & we then passed a sandstone quarry before arriving at the Lighthouse just before midday.  We had our lunch overlooking the endless blue sea while waiting for Fred (a.k.a. David Bailey) to catch up.  Just as we stood up to leave we spotted two heads appearing over the horizon which turned out to be Phil & John speeding along the cliffs fuelled by their earlier caffeine intake.  They decided to stop for lunch while the rest of us set off, binoculars in hand, to spend some time in the RSPB enclosures watching the birds crowded on the narrow cliff ledges while the experts among us gave us a wonderful bird-spotting lesson.  We passed the 6 members of the C Party coming along the cliffs in the opposite direction on their way to the Lighthouse where they planned to turn inland & return to St Bees along the road but they were thwarted by barbed wire across some of the stiles so they ended up re-joining the cliff path at Fleshwick Bay instead.  We took a short detour to see the caves at Fleshwick Bay where some people demonstrated their skills at skimming stones.  It was only a short distance from there back to St Bees - we arrived at 2:00pm & the bus wasn’t due to leave until 4:00pm so I decided to extend the walk as far as the Golf Course.  The majority of the party decided to call it a day & went off in search of refreshments as it was such a beautiful afternoon, but 6 of us set off along the cliffs behind the café.  When we reached the Golf Course the group split into three: 2 went back along the cliff, 2 went back along the beach & 2 followed the footpath across the Golf Course to the centre of St Bees, so I wonder if this is a record of how much a party has split up into “breakaway” groups?  We then had the unusual situation of the A/B party waiting for the C party to return before we could set off home after a very enjoyable day.  Thank you to everyone who turned up & for keeping me up to date with the latest World Cup news!”

Kathryn