Cold Pike - Topography

Topography

When travelling clockwise Crinkle Crags is the last of the high cirque of fells forming the head of upper Eskdale. It sends out a trio of ridges to the south, running parallel like the prongs of a trident. Working from the west these ridges culminate in Hard Knott, Little Stand and Cold Pike. The Cold Pike ridge begins indistinctly in an area of rocky knolls and small tarns beneath the Fifth Crinkle. Gradually gaining definition it descends to a broad grassy saddle before rising again to the summit plateau of Cold Pike. To the north of the saddle is Great How (2,283 ft). This top is considered by most guidebooks to be a subsidiary of Crinkle Crags rather than the nearer Cold Pike. Beyond the summit the ridge continues for another half mile south eastward before falling steeply over the many tiered crags of Wrynose Breast.

Wrynose Breast stands above the nascent Duddon and the Wrynose Pass road, which provides the only vehicular link between central Lakeland and the Duddon Valley. Together with Hardknott Pass to the west, Wrynose is the latest incarnation of the Roman road from Ambleside to the port of Ravenglass.

To the west of Cold Pike is the Gaitscale Beck, the watercourse separating it from Little Stand. To the east across a wide low col is Pike of Blisco, a conical fell with its footing firmly in Langdale. The source of the River Duddon flows south from this col, curving westward around the foot of Wrynose Breast. To the north is Red Tarn, a feeder via Oxendale of Great Langdale Beck. Red Tarn is an elongated pool whose stony bed can be seen through clear shallow waters, reputed to hold trout. It forms a focal point for walkers as the wide path from the summit of Wrynose Pass down to Stool End runs beside it, a further path branching off across the outflow to Crinkle Crags.