Black Fell

Start at Tarn Hows. The National Trust car park there is the largest nearby and has toilets, and there is more parking at Glen Mary Bridge and Yew Tree Tarn on the Coniston road. From the tarn, follow the signed path towards Arnside, then turn up a rough track marked for Iron Keld. It climbs steeply through the plantation at first, then levels off and comes out on the open top. Other ways up start at Skelwith Bridge, High Park, Oxen Fell and Knipe Fold, and a bridleway known locally as the mountain road crosses the fell between the A593 and Knipe Fold.

The fell is roughly a mile by two, mostly rough grass and small outcrops, with broadleaved woods on the lower slopes. Walk Lakes grades the going as rough with some soft ground, and warns that a few signposts have gone missing.

Maps mark the top as Black Crag, which flatters it a little. A trig pillar carries a National Trust sign, and a big cairn about 200 yards east has the best view down Windermere. At 323 metres you look across to the Coniston and Langdale fells on one side and over the southern lakes and lowlands on the other. For the view north, walk over to Great Cobble.

James Marshall laid out Tarn Hows as a piece of landscape design in the 1860s. The land passed from the Marshall family to Beatrix Potter and then to the National Trust. Holme Fell is just across the main road, and the two make a longer loop.