Helvellyn via Swirral Edge: the perfect Lake District scramble for beginners

Leave the car park, walk to the main road and turn right. Turn right again along a surfaced lane immediately after the bridge over Glenridding Beck. Beyond the last building, bear right at a fork. Reaching a minor road, turn left and, almost immediately, step up on to the gravel path to the right. This joins a wider track heading uphill. At a path junction at a gate, keep left. In another 110m, bear right at a fork.

After a gate, turn right to walk with the wall on your right for 320m and then bear left at a fork, climbing again. After a stony section, reach a crossing of routes. Turn right here, contouring the hillside for the next 1km. After drawing level with the Greenside mine buildings on the other side of the valley, you’ll see a footbridge to the right. Ignoring this, bear left, climbing a pitched path. A long, slow uphill plod begins now, the view of Catstye Cam providing motivation at this stage.

About 1.3km after crossing two wooden footbridges in quick succession, leave the path by striking off west-north-west along a broad, lumpy ridge. There is a faint, grassy trail, but it’s hard to find; you should, however, be able to locate a more eroded, stonier path higher up. As you climb, Red Tarn and Striding Edge – Swirral Edge’s partner in crime – come into view.

From Catstye Cam’s spiky summit, follow the ridge path south-west, keeping right when it forks. A path joins from the left and the ridge begins narrowing. This is now Swirral Edge. The first rocky section can be avoided on a bypass path to the south, but the scrambling can’t be avoided forever. The next tower has to be tackled head on, with hands on rock. The loose, stony exit from the ridge rises to a cairn. Head left to reach Helvellyn’s trig pillar and the true summit 100m further south-east.

Return to the trig pillar and continue heading north-west. passing the point where About 350m beyond the point where you joined Helvellyn’s summit plateau from Swirral Edge, bear right, staying close to the high ground’s eastern edge. Beyond the top of Lower Man, the path descends steeply. It drops into a dip, climbs Whiteside and then drops into another dip above Keppel Cove.

Keep left at a fork in this second saddle to climb Raise. From the summit cairn, a stony path descends north. It levels off, reaching a path junction at Sticks Pass.

Turn right, soon descending with Sticks Gill. Nearing the bottom of the valley, keep right at a faint fork and then, at a second split among some spoil heaps, keep right again, following a cairned route. This winds its way through disused mine workings and crosses Swart Beck.

Bear left, not on the beckside trail but on a path about 35m south of the beck. After a sharp bend to the right, it begins a switchback descent of steep, stony ground. (Ignore a narrower path to the left on an early bend.) Nearing the valley bottom, bear left at a junction marked by a waymarker post.

Dropping to a broader track, continue downhill, past the buildings of the old Greenside Mine. The track now becomes driveable. It later bends right at a 30mph speed limit sign and then swings left, entering Glenridding. Immediately after passing the Fairlight Guesthouse, turn right to re-enter the car park.