Bowfell - A Route I Cannot Name

A multipitch route on Bowfell, high above Mickleden in the Lake District. I do not remember which one - I never wrote it down. It was very hot, and the approach was long. Very nice all the same.

Bowfell, 902 m / North-east buttresses (Bowfell Buttress, Cambridge Crag, Flat Crags)

Multipitch trad from V Diff (Bowfell Buttress, ~110 m, 4 pitches) to E3 / crag base around 750 m, north-facing / Borrowdale volcanic rock - volcaniclastic sandstone with andesite

Approach from the Old Dungeon Ghyll via The Band and the Climbers' Traverse, roughly 650 m of ascent

The buttresses sit on Bowfell’s north-eastern side, above Mickleden, on the Borrowdale volcanic rock of the Seathwaite Fell Formation — volcaniclastic sandstone with andesite bands near the summit. Bowfell Buttress is the big one, a prow of slabs and grooves; Flat Crags with its Great Slab and Cambridge Crag, with the spring at its base, are just along the Climbers’ Traverse.

Which line we did I honestly could not say afterwards, so I will not put a grade on it. The crag’s multipitch trad routes run from V Diff — Bowfell Buttress itself, around 110 m and four pitches — up to E3 on the cleaner white rock further right. North-facing, which was the one mercy on a day that hot.

Logistics

Approach

From the Old Dungeon Ghyll, up The Band, then the Climbers’ Traverse contouring in under Flat Crags and Cambridge Crag to the foot of the buttresses at about 750 m. Roughly 650 m of ascent, and it feels every metre of it in the heat.