Country diary 1974: A simple fell walk becomes a minor Arctic adventure

THE LAKE DISTRICT: The day after the snows came the fell country, from a distance, looked like a fairyland of icing sugar and marzipan but, on the tops, it was a different story. In a two-hours escape from the typewriter – so entrancing seemed the sunlight on the snow – I went up Cawdale Moor from Kirkstone top and found the simplest fell walks in the Lake District a minor Arctic adventure. There was nobody about and the wind was the sort that seems to seek you out, apparently directing its strongest gusts against your person and nowhere else. Strong enough to stop you in your tracks, and freezingly cold. There are many kinds of snow and this was powder snow – crystalline stuff, of the consistency of flour, that has neither thawed, frozen nor consolidated, the sort of snow that skiers dream about. But I was not skiing and it was hard work ploughing through drifts knee or thigh deep – like climbing a staircase of cotton wool with steps two feet high. The main annoyance, however, was the blown snow – the top layer of the powder – that filled eyes, mouth, ears and clothes and reduced visibility, on a day of bright sunshine and blue skies, to a few yards. The blown powder raced across the fell side, built up the drifts to the top of the stone walls, and converted me into a snowman within minutes.

From the summit I could see snow plumes on the Helvellyn tops and what looked like a maelstrom above the cornices on Red Screes, but down in the dales it just looked a sunny winter’s day. But the wind moderated on the descent and, when I got down to the pass, the first skiers were out on the lower drifts and well wrapped-up youngsters were careering about on sledges and tea trays.