PATTERDALE is in a perfect position at the head of Ullswater, an example of what makes Lakeland close to so many of our hearts and I have it on no less an authority than A Wainwright that "on a first visit to Patterdale, Place Fell should be an early objective, for no other viewpoint gives such an appreciation of the design of this lovely corner of Lakeland".
So Place Fell it had to be. The great bulk of this extensive hill dominates the eastern approaches to Ullswater with a commanding presence. It actually seems more like a mountain range than a single hill with its numerous subsidiary tops and outcrops and the highest point at 2154ft makes it a substantial massif by any standards.
Parking is quite limited in the village and because of this the spaces are taken quite early in the day. The only public car park is opposite the Patterdale Hotel where you can leave the car all day for £3.50. If you fancy a coffee or bacon roll before setting off the Post Office enterprisingly serves both. Long may it continue to do so.
There's a toilet block just to the left of the Post Office in the car park of the White Lion Hotel. Patterdale takes its name from Saint Patrick who, so the legend goes, walked here from the sands of the Duddon Estuary where he had been marooned. The earliest name was St Patrick's Dale and other associations are an ancient well on the roadside near Glenridding and the church, founded in 1853 named after the saint.
Wordsworth was a frequent visitor to Patterdale where he had friends at Side Farm and he was given a cottage in Rooking by Lord Lowther although he and his sister Dorothy don't seem to have taken to it and he sold it to a local resident. Our walk leaves the village heading south and takes the first turning on the left, crossing Goldrill beck by a pretty bridge. Stay on the lane to the cluster of cottages known as Rooking and keep left at a sign to Boardale Hause until we are confronted by two gates of which we take the one on the right.
We will later return through the one on the left. Take the path on the right ascending the fell and a little way up you find a green-painted bench, a good place to pause to look back at the village spread out below and the Helvellyn group of hills away to the west. Continue climbing and when you see a lone hawthorn tree, keep left on a path that zigzags up the fell. A more obvious path keeps ahead and indeed leads to Boardale Hause and on to Angletarn but a better option for us is to take the zigzag which is more direct for those intending to climb Place Fell, like us. Where our path levels out you will notice a ruin, no more than a few courses of stone which is known as the 'Chapel in the Hause', its origins unknown.
If you look carefully you will see that some of the stones have been shaped, suggesting that this was once a building of some kind and not just a sheepfold. From here, the attempt on the summit really begins. The path we want is to the left and soon becomes obvious due to erosion caused by the passage of countless boots. In places streams have cut through the turf making deep runnels which you can walk in or make you way on grass.
Some hot work begins, eventually rewarding us as we step onto the summit rocks. An average walker should have got to this point in less than two hours. There are fine views from here although the cold wind did not encourage us to hang about and we quickly moved on, waiting till we were lower down before stopping to appreciate the length of Ullswater, the second longest of the lakes after Windermere. You can also make out Penrith in the distance, looking north-east, in line with the end of the lake and this is in fact the direction we take to get down off Place Fell.
At a hause or col we come to a ruined sheepfold where the path divides, ours forking left and curving away down towards the shore of the lake. After passing through the remains of some mine workings, we go left at a second split in the path then, at a large boulder we drop sharply down left again to join the path from Sandwick to Patterdale. Once on this well-used path our way is left, crossing the footbridge over Scalehow Beck.
The path from here back to Patterdale is clear and provided that you keep the lake on your right you are unlikely to lose your way. Our old friend Wainwright describes this path as the most beautiful and rewarding walk in Lakeland, quite a recommendation! As we get nearer to Patterdale we pass Side Farm where in summer refreshments are sold. There is a path that runs to the main road from here but I prefer to continue on the main path and return via Rooking, in other words on the lane by which we left the village on our way out. Either way will do.
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