Day 3 – Ennerdale YHA to Seatoller – 8.5 miles

Today was one hellova slog 😱. We had a lovely English breakfast and a late start at 9am thinking it was quite an easy walk today with one high climb to Red Pike and a ridge walk.The climb up to Red Pike was long, slow and hard. We were quite exhausted at the top, but after a rest we were able to fully appreciate the beautiful 360 degree views.We thought we had a fairly easy walk after this, after all most of the time a ridgeline is long and flat. But, no chance of that!!!The aforementioned ridgeline is actually a succession of hills to climb. It was arduous, tiring and the descents were even worse as the path, if you can find it, is full of stones, shale and scree. I even went slightly mardy when we got to Hay stacks, and wanted to avoid it, but the alternative was probably worse, so I had to grit my teeth and climb 😱😁.We were only able to walk 1 mile per hour, which was disheartening, but the terrain was really hard, so after some thought we decided to try a more direct route to Rosthwaite to shorten the day slightly. We all had very sore feet, toes and ankles by the time we got down!!At Honister Pass we had a coffee and after a chat with the locals, discovered we could catch a bus from Seatoller to our accommodation for the night. Thank goodness!!!!As our bags had arrived this time, a lot of medical applications were made as well as a change of clothes, and being able to shower and brush our teeth felt heavenly 😂😂.