Last Friday was Sarah’s birthday and we had made a weekend of it. A meal out at our favourite Indian restaurant, a cycle ride and an evening with friends on the Saturday, and a day out to one of Sarah’s favourite places – Keswick – on the Sunday. Sarah reckons this post should have been given the title “It’s my party and I’ll walk if I want to”, for this formed the majority of our day as we enjoyed some wonderful panoramas, the lake, and some sylvan splendour. We had walked a small part of this walk on my birthday a few years ago.

We began by making our way through Keswick to Derwent Bay. It was a lovely sunny day.

We took a track away from the lake and made our way through Cockshot Wood.

  

We crossed over Borrowdale Road and into Castlehead Wood.

  

The path here was quite steep as we climbed up to Castle Head. This gave us our first viewpoint looking out over Derwentwater.

From here we picked up Springs Road. Continuing past the farm and picked up the track which initially followed the stream.

Soon we were climbing again. We followed towards Castlerigg and then past Rakefoot.

There were more fabulous views.

From here we continued climbing towards Walla Crag.

On the way we stopped for some lunch.

Eventually we reached the top of Walla Crag. The views over Derwentwater and Keswick were superb.

Then it was down the other side.

The path got gradually steeper.

We made our way down into the gorge of Cat Gill.

Eventually we dropped down to Calfclose Bay.

We took another rest here.

After the rest we followed the bay for a short while before making our way through Ings Wood.

The final section of this route saw walk to Friar’s Crag, with a view described by John Ruskin as one of the most beautiful scenes in Europe.

Finally we walked back to Derwent Bay.

The Lake District is a fabulous place for walking and this visit to Keswick was a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend a Sunday on a birthday weekend.

You can view our Keswick walk route below:

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