Abraham’s Tea Round

Running Abraham’s Tea Round with my friend Jade, was a great way to spend a Saturday, and I definitely recommend it to anyone interested in venturing up lots of the North Western Wainwrights.

I’m not interested in running fast, I’m more focused on the distance and the adventure, which means that the local areas of the Forest of Bowland and the Lake District are the perfect playground!

After a series of solo runs, around 50km in distance and 3000m in elevation, I knew I was ready to try some rounds in the Lake District. I prefer completing ‘rounds’ in comparison to entering races for a range of reasons; they are logistically easy to plan and don’t require any support, this means that you can also be spontaneous when choosing to complete one, perfect for waiting for a good weather window. There are some great mountain running challenges and rounds in the UK with a range of distances and elevations, famous rounds include the Bob Graham, the Ramsey round and the Paddy Buckley round

I heard about Abraham’s Tea Round from a friend, Jade, just a few weeks prior to running it. When the weather looked wet for our planned climbing day, we decided to have a go at running the Tea Round instead! It features all the hills visible from the Abraham’s Tea Shop on the second floor of the George Fisher shop in Keswick. It is roughly 47km in distance with about 3400m of elevation, and the challenge encompasses a list of fells you have to reach, leaving the navigation and route up to you. The fells included are:

1. Catbells
2. Robinson
3. High Stile
4. Grisedale Pike
5. Hobcarton Crag
6. Eel Crag
7. Sail
8. Causey Pike
9. Rowling End
10. Barrow

Most people, like us, complete the route clockwise, which means heading up Catbells first, dropping down into the valley before heading up a slight scramble and steep ascent to Robinson. After Robinson, it’s a lovely decent down into Buttermere, before heading straight up to High Stile (one of my least favourite hills in the Lake District).

I really valued using a GPS heading up High Stile, as further up the ascent it becomes more of a scramble and the path harder to follow. As is typical Lake District weather, we spent most of the day in hill fog, however when we got to the top of High Stile, the wind and rain really picked up and running along the ridge was rather miserable. We decided to run along to Red Pike for a nicer decent, however the rain had made the stone steps in the lower third quite slippy, and I was definitely glad I was running with poles.

Back down into Buttermere and just over half way into the round, it took a bit of motivation, and a swarm of midges to get ourselves up Whiteless Pike, where we were rewarded with a lovely stretch of grassy trail which was a delight to run down. This is the first moment you get signal again after being in the valley, so it’s worth checking the weather and letting someone know how the day is going. From here you have to head up to Hobcarton Crag (not Hopegill Head like we mistakenly thought we had to go to), and Grisedale Pike.

Doubling back, you can then complete the short scramble up Eel Crag, which was much nicer to head up than it looks, before continuing along the ridge line along Sail, Causey Pike and Rowling End. At this point we had lots of rain, wind and nightfall to contend with, and my partner Jade was not nearly as excited as I was to get to do some night navigation and run past midnight. Our friend John was nice enough to meet us at Causey Pike and run the last hill up Barrow with us. It was mentally tough descending, to then have to get up Barrow, even though it is such a small hill!
After this, it is just a run on the path back to Keswick, where we returned to the George Fisher shop at 02:15am. The round took us just over 17 hours, and was made up of relaxed uphill walking and downhill running.

A brilliant route, and a top recommendation if you are looking for your next Lake District running adventure!