Gareth Jones Walks: Parlick and Fair Snape Fell

Route: Startifants Lane - Parlick - Fair Snape Fell trig - Fair Snape Fell true summit - Saddle Fell - Saddle End Farm - Wolfen Hall - Startifants Lane

Distance: 6.2 miles

Classification: Marilyn

Weather: Warm, dry, welcome breeze

We started this climb from the car park on Startifants Lane. A steep climb up Parlick followed which allowed us great views of Longridge Fell and the 'other side' of Pendle Hill. Growing up in Burnley I'm used to seeing Pendle Hill from the east. It's not often I get to see Lancashire's 4th highest peak from the west.

Once on top of Parlick the views really started to open out. Unfortunately my camera which really struggles when it's hazy doesn't do justice to the views we encountered on this walk, but we could clearly see Black Hameldon, the hill I climbed a week before which struck up my interest of climbing Parlick and Fair Snape Fell. From Black Hameldon I had great views of these two hills behind Pendle that I had not recalled seeing before. Their shapes had me searching on the internet to find out what these two were, and born was the idea of climbing them the week after, particularly as we had arranged to visit my Mum in Lancashire the following weekend.

From Parlick we then made our way towards Fair Snape Fell, which presents a fantastic walk along the col offering more great views over Lancashire. It wasn't long before we reached Fair Snape Fell's southern summit with its trig point, storm shelter, and the cairn of Paddy's Pole.

We took lunch here and the binoculars came out. The binoculars allowed us to pick out Winter Hill to the south, Preston to the south-west, and Blackpool to the west. We could clearly see the Big One roller coaster on Blackpool Pleasure Beach and Blackpool Tower.

We then left to make our way to Fair Snape Fell's true summit. This year's Ordnance Survey map indicated that the quickest route here from the trig point has no clear path. It was a nice surprise to find a fairly clear path back to the fence that leads to Fair Snape Fell's true summit, and it was here that we made out Whernside and Ingleborough on the horizon to the north.

Next we made our way to Saddle Fell over peaty, barren moorland. Again we were surprised to find how clear the path was which eventually turns south for the descent back towards our car on Startifants Lane.

It was on the descent that we saw the lush, green eastern slopes of Parlick, it looked great. Up to this point on the walk Parlick had the usual light brown colour of moorland lacking heather so to see this this lush side of it was a surprise.

We ended the walk with a low level return to our car through farmland at Saddle End Farm and Wolfen Hall.

This was a really enjoyable walk. It wasn't the longest but we certainly felt like we'd had a good workout. The views were fantastic all day and a lot of the time we had the place all to ourselves. We found it strange that on such a nice day there were more hang gliding enthusiasts about than walkers, still, let's keep it a secret eh?

Thanks to Bowland Walks and My Pennines for the routes and advice on this walk. Have a look at their great sites for routes covering the Forest of Bowland, the Pennines, and walks in many other areas too.