Cumbria Ways Day 17 - Staveley to Milnthorpe

Distance: 17.3 miles
Ascent: 480m
Weather: hot and sunny
Hot in sun, midge in shade, high pollen, headache. Big fish, buzzards, wood pigeons, haymaking, posh goats.

We'd (half seriously) joked that today's walk would be on overgrown footpaths with missing footbridges, but as it was it was very picturesque, through parks and National Trust land, well signed and clear.

It was already warm when we set off, blue sky and very hazy. We crossed lanes and heaths, passing a busy campsite, and people heading into Staveley. Ratherheath Tarn is a small lake in the woods, with massive monster fish. We left before we got et.

We crossed some dry grassy meadows, filled with grasshoppers, with little pokey gates up in dry stone walls - small gates seemed to be a feature of the day, I had to take my rucksack off at least three times - although I have eaten some big dinners lately I don't think it was entirely down to that.

With lots of huffing and puffing, we went up to the top of Cunswick Fell, which is a Wainwright outlying fell. It has wide grassy paths with some big cairns, quite rocky with bird's foot trefoil and saxifrage growing in the short grass.

A small gate led through the edge of Scar Woods up to Scout Scar. This is a NT beauty spot with a high bench density. We stopped at the mushroom observatory shelter at the top, which was built in 1912 as a memorial for  King George V on the top of the escapement edge, with a map of the fell tops and places visible on the horizon drawn around the edge, although it was a bit too hazy to see much detail.  Normally we sit in shelters to get out of the wind, it seemed odd to be using one to get out of the sun.

To the south we had views down to the River Kent and Milnthorpe Sands. To the north, indistinct central Lakeland fells, with cumulonimbus clouds bubbling up.

The route led around the escarpment edge to Helsington Barrows (too warm for wights) fringed with stunted twisted hawthorn trees, amongst the cedars and larch.

Crossing a quiet lane, we went into Sizergh Castle's parkland,  and we stopped for lunch and ice cream at the cafe. Leaving the grounds, via a handy underpass under the A590 we went down Nannypie Lane to the river, crossing by the foot suspension bridge, which dates from 1872 built for workers at the nearby gunpowder factory.  There were lots of people enjoying a paddle in the river, including some ducks and cows. We'd thought it would be nice to walk along the bank a bit, but there wasn't much river to be seen, we headed over to the Lancaster canal, now just a footpath with random bridges in fields, and the Sedgwick Aqueduct built in 1817 and falling into decline after the railway opened in the 1850s, it is now mostly uses by bunnies.

At Levens Park we came through the deer park along a grand avenue of oak trees, under which some of the rare breed Bagot goats were resting.

Outside Levens Hall we walked along the same section of pavement that we'd used two weeks ago on the first day of our walk, but we turned off to take a different route through farmland and lanes around Heversham and into Milnthorpe.  We are staying at the Cross Keys Hotel, and it is too hot to think.