Is the Lake District still idyllic when you can’t see it?

In the latest in his series recalling memorable walks and pathways, Will Gore doubts his sense of direction

When the mist rolls in, beware (PA)

If it wasn’t for the tourist hordes, and the rain, the Lake District would perhaps be the most idyllic of all walking locations in Britain.

The hills are pointy in all the right places; the lakes are – under blue skies – a delight; it is the kind of landscape a model railway enthusiast might create for his (almost definitely his) little trains, if he were to pluck something from his imagination. It has more than its fair share of natural wonders.

No wonder it was here that William Wordsworth discovered the “loveliest spot that man hath ever found”.

Such is its toy-like perfection, it is easy to take the region for granted; to assume that nothing can possibly go wrong when the water and earth appear to be bound together in such harmony.

On my last visit there, in May time, the weather was mixed (“fair to middling” as a Yorkshireman friend of mine might put it).

Views from the Old Man of Coniston had come and gone as clouds rolled in and rolled out. When the sun emerged, however, it scorched any skin left unwisely bare.

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One morning we set out from the Great Langdale Beck heading for Bowfell and the Crinkle Crags, the two hills barely a stone’s throw from the more famous Scafell Pike. It was hazy, then cloudy; the peaks of the mountains ahead were present but unseen.

Just below and to the north of Bowfell the misty shroud was shunted aside momentarily and we were hit by warming rays from above. But it was a brief respite only; the cloud redoubled its effort so that by the time we were on Bowfell itself, visibility was no more than six or seven metres.

Often when we walked together our group became strung out, sometimes half a mile apart from the first person to the last – but now we stuck together out of necessity.

On Crinkle Crags we somehow lost the path. Two routes run almost side by side but the unforgiving terrain meant they were not as well-worn as some. We staggered about a bit, probing this way and that, before finding the way once again.

But which way, exactly, was the way? There was a path, but which direction to travel?

I had always believed smugly that I had an excellent sense of direction. For years I eschewed satnavs in the car, sure I knew best. “It’s definitely this way,” I said, utterly and completely convinced.

In a dense fog on the top of a mountain, it doesn’t always do to trust the conviction of one individual. We unpacked the rarely used compass from my father’s rucksack. I was out by 180 degrees. So astonished was I that for a moment I thought the compass must be broken.

Fortunately, we followed the needle point, not my instincts – which would have had us wandering into the steep valley towards the River Esk and Scafell.

The Lake District is perfect, if you can see it, and perhaps even when you can’t. Perfect too are the travelling companions who bring the right kit for all weathers.