Long Side is a

fell A fell (from Old Norse ''fell'', ''fjall'', "mountain"Falk and Torp (2006:161).) is a high and barren landscape feature, such as a mountain or Moorland, moor-covered hill. The term is most often employed in Fennoscandia, Iceland, the Isle o ...

in the English

Lake District The Lake District, also known as the Lakes or Lakeland, is a mountainous region in North West England. A popular holiday destination, it is famous for its lakes, forests, and mountains (or ''fells''), and its associations with William Wordswor ...

, it is situated six kilometres north west of Keswick in the northern sector of the national park and is part of the

Skiddaw Skiddaw is a mountain in the Lake District National Park in England. Its summit is the sixth-highest in England. It lies just north of the town of Keswick, Cumbria, and dominates the skyline in this part of the northern lakes. It is the ...

group of fells. Long Side which reaches a height of 734 m (2,408 ft) is located on Skiddaw’s north western ridge, the middle section of which is known as Longside Edge. Strictly speaking the actual summit of the fell is nameless with the name Long Side applying to the south western slope below the summit and is so marked on maps. The fell is often climbed by walkers on their way to the summit of Skiddaw, the route up the north west ridge which passes over Long Side is regarded as being the finest and quietest ascent of that mountain by guide book writers.

Topography

Long Side falls away steeply on its south western flank towards

Bassenthwaite Lake Bassenthwaite Lake is one of the largest water bodies in the English Lake District. It is long and narrow, approximately long and wide, but is also extremely shallow, with a maximum depth of about . It is the only body of water in the Lake ...

, these slopes are clothed in the

coniferous Conifers are a group of cone-bearing seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the division Pinophyta (), also known as Coniferophyta () or Coniferae. The division contains a single extant class, Pinopsida. All extant ...

woodlands of Longside Wood below the 400 metre contour. To the north west the fell descends in steep broken crags to the quiet and unfrequented valley of Southerndale. To the north west the fell connects to the adjacent fell of Ullock Pike by a path that runs for 600 metres along the rim of Longside Edge. To the south east the edge continues from Long Side to link to the higher fell of

Carl Side Carl Side is a fell in the English Lake District, forming a part of the Skiddaw "family" near the town of Keswick and prominently visible from its streets. It is listed in Alfred Wainwright's '' Pictorial Guides to the Lakeland Fells'' as one ...

, 800 metres distant.

Geology

In common with much of the Northern Fells the Kirk Stile Formation of the Skiddaw Group predominates. This is composed of laminated

mudstone Mudstone, a type of mudrock, is a fine-grained sedimentary rock whose original constituents were clays or muds. Mudstone is distinguished from '' shale'' by its lack of fissility (parallel layering).Blatt, H., and R.J. Tracy, 1996, ''Petrology. ...

and

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility.Blatt ''et al.'' 1980, p ...

with

greywacke Greywacke or graywacke (German ''grauwacke'', signifying a grey, earthy rock) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness, dark color, and poorly sorted angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments or lit ...

sandstone and is of

Ordovician The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and System (geology), system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era (geology), Era. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period million years ago (Mya) to the start ...

age.British Geological Survey: 1:50,000 series maps, ''England & Wales Sheet 29'': BGS (1999)

Ascents

As mentioned ascents of Long Side are often done by walkers en route to Skiddaw, this route starts at the Ravenstone Hotel on the A591 (grid reference ) and climbs Ullock Pike first by its northern ridge before continuing along Longside Edge to the summit of Long Side. The route to Skiddaw keeps on the ridge to Carl Side before ascending a steep loose path through the scree to the summit of Skiddaw. A direct ascent of Long Side is possible from the Old Sawmill car park (grid reference ) on the A591 using the

Forestry Commission The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the management of publicly owned forests and the regulation of both public and private forestry in England. The Forestry Commission was previously also respon ...

way marked trail to find a way through Longside Wood to the open fell and then ascending the steep fell side to the summit.

Summit

The summit is marked by a pile of stones. There is a fine view of Bassenthwaite lake. To the east Skiddaw is seen as a massive bulk blocking out much of the view in that direction.

References

* A Pictorial Guide to the Lakeland Fells, The Northern Fells, Alfred Wainwright * Complete Lakeland Fells, Bill Birkett, * The Mountains of England and Wales, John and Anne Nuttall {{Northern Fells Hewitts of England Fells of the Lake District Nuttalls