Humphrey Head
Humphrey Head at 53m (174ft) is a small Outlying Fell on the limestone headland projecting into Morecambe Bay near Flookburgh, its rocky limestone cliffs dropping to the sea. Wainwright included it in his Outlying Fells guide.
Summit conditions on Humphrey Head
On the summit on Tuesday 27 October: 15° to 10°C, gusts to 43 mph, 1.4 mm of rain forecast over the whole day, midnight to midnight.
The forecast figures are Open-Meteo’s, worked out for the summit’s height. How we check →
Routes up Humphrey Head
Hand-mapped, with GPX to download — full maps further down.
Distance and climb are measured from the route’s GPX track, and the time from them by Naismith’s rule; the route page says what each grade rests on. How we check →
How hard is Humphrey Head?
The shortest way up we hold is Humphrey Head from Kents Bank station — 5.33 km, 54 m of ascent, ~1–1¾ h. On our scale its hardest axis is navigation — Moderate.
All axes: navigation: Moderate · length: Easy · steepness: Easy · terrain: Not assessed · exposure: Not assessed.
These are the route page’s grades, set by the rules on how we grade: length and steepness measured from its GPX track, the others set on the ground, judged from the map or estimated from OpenStreetMap. The route page says which. How we check →
Conditions and 7-day summit forecast
Modelled for the 53 m summit (Open-Meteo). Check the Met Office mountain forecast and MWIS before you set off.
Full 7-day forecast
Taken 27 October 2026, 20:59 UTC; the live forecast replaces it when it loads. Weather data by Open-Meteo.com (opens in new tab)
Parking & buses for Humphrey Head
Parking
2 more places to park near Humphrey Head
Positions are approximate.
Vehicles are left at their owner’s risk: we list places people park and cannot vouch for any of them. Take valuables with you and leave nothing on show.
Buses
The 530 and X6 stop at Grange-over-Sands, at Rail Station. From there it is 3.2 km and 98 m of ascent to the start of Humphrey Head from Kents Bank station — a route we rate Moderate overall (hardest: navigation) — a walk in before the walk. And the same back: about 11.7 km in all, with the walk. As timetabled from 27 October to 1 November. Towards Clogger Beck (530): Tuesday to Friday 16:36 only. Towards Cartmel (530): Tuesday to Friday 15:16 only. Towards Ulverston (X6): Tuesday to Saturday 23:38; Sunday 18:59 to Ulverston St Mary's. Towards Kendal (X6): Tuesday to Saturday 22:41; Sunday 16:43. Checked against the operator’s timetable, 24 September 2026. Times here are a guide, not a promise — leave yourself more than the minute.
By train: Grange-over-Sands station is 1.4 km on foot from the nearest parking for this fell (Grange-over-Sands car park 2). We haven’t mapped a route up it from there, so we can’t tell you the walk to the start.
Rural routes change seasonally — confirm on stagecoachbus.com (opens in new tab) or Traveline before relying on a last bus.
Getting there across the Lake District: Buses · Parking map · By train · By boat
Hazards on Humphrey Head
Notes from a planned route, not walked: Humphrey Head from Kents Bank station
- About 1.4 km of the line each way, between the station and Pigeon Cote Lane, follows the Embankment Path and other footpaths that OpenStreetMap does not record as public rights of way; on the headland, from about 1.7 km to the top, the paths are mapped as permissive. The rest is a public bridleway (Pigeon Cote Lane), a few metres of byway at the station and Holy Well Lane. That is a map-data note, not a ruling on access: check the access land and rights of way maps before relying on this stretch. Morecambe Bay Partnership publishes a longer walk from the same station, ‘Humphrey Head from Kents Bank Station’ (9.2 km), inland by Jack Hill.
- Cumbria Wildlife Trust, which manages the headland as a nature reserve, warns of ‘sheer cliffs on the western side of the nature reserve’; OpenStreetMap maps crags about 15 m from the path near 2.0 km. The Trust asks for dogs on a lead on the reserve, where cattle graze at times. The saltmarsh circuit round the point is not this line: the Trust says to check tide times before trying it.
If you need to get off (the leg from Kents Bank station): The way off is back the way you came, never more than about 2.7 km to the station.
Quoted from the route page of a planned route, drawn from the map and not yet walked: its warnings and the note for the leg that reaches Humphrey Head.
We have not written a hazard card for this fell yet, and that is not a sign that it is low-hazard. Read the warnings on the route pages that climb it, check the forecast, carry a map and compass, and turn back in cloud if the ground is not what you expected. The National Park Authority’s What to pack page, AdventureSmart’s hill walking kit list and Mountain Rescue England and Wales’s safety page are linked from our what to carry guide.
If you need Mountain Rescue
Dial 999 or 112 and ask for the Police, then Mountain Rescue.
Before you call, have ready: where you are (a grid reference if you can – the OS Locate app shows yours on your phone), what has happened, how many of you there are, and your mobile number.
Then stay where you are until the rescue team contacts you.
If you cannot make a voice call because of a hearing or speech impairment, emergency SMS works only if you have registered first: text “register” to 999.
From Mountain Rescue England and Wales’s guidance on calling them out (opens in new tab) (read 26 October 2026).
Map, GPX and nearby Birketts
Skip mapFree mapping: OpenTopoMap / OpenStreetMap, with SRTM elevation data (switch layers top-right).
Parking, toilets and buses: Parking & buses ↑.
Birketts within 3 km of Humphrey Head
No bonus Birketts within 3 km.
Routes over Humphrey Head
Kents Bank station, on the Furness line, is at the start. The line goes out and back on the same paths, turning at the trig point on the top.
Download GPX Planned route · not yet walked
Every line here is a guide, not a guarantee — conditions change. Navigate for yourself and carry a map and compass. How to use this guide.
On the hill: terrain and water on Humphrey Head
Terrain & access
A 53 m top with a mapped path to within about 3 m of the summit.
Computed from open data, not walked — pathless ground needs confident navigation, and mapped paths, barriers and access boundaries can be incomplete. Data © OpenStreetMap contributors (via Overpass); Natural England CRoW Access Land; DoBIH v18.4 (CC BY 4.0); Copernicus GLO-30. See the terrain & access report for how this is worked out across all 144 fells.
Water & shelter on the way up
On the Humphrey Head from Kents Bank station route:
On-route facilities © OpenStreetMap contributors, per route — an absent marker doesn’t mean none.
Access on Humphrey Head
Access: the summit lies outside mapped open-access land (CRoW). A recorded right of way passes within 120 m of the summit, but we have not checked that it reaches the top itself — keep to rights of way, and check access before you go.
Local restrictions can close open-access areas temporarily — check the official open-access information (opens in new tab) before travelling.
How we worked out the access
Summit and approach positions are tested against Natural England’s CRoW Act 2000 access layer; rights of way and wall or fence detail come from OpenStreetMap. Both are open datasets with known gaps — in our own survey only 4 of 26 wall and fence crossings had a stile or gate mapped within 150 m — so absence of a mapped feature never means absence of a real one. Nothing here is field-verified unless marked, and none of it is legal advice. How we checked 377 fells.
Access land: © Natural England copyright. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2026.
About Humphrey Head
Classifications & hill data
Is Humphrey Head a Wainwright?
Humphrey Head is one of Wainwright's Outlying Fells, not one of the 214 in the Pictorial Guides.
Selected lists
This is the summit’s grid reference. If you call from anywhere else, give your own position, not this one.
The summit is not a Birkett top.
Lists, height and summit position from the Database of British and Irish Hills; the feet are converted from its metres and the grid reference from that position. How we check →
Places to stay near this fell
- Kents Bank Holiday Cottage (opens in new tab) self-cateringabout 0.2 km
We have not stayed at any of them. We take no bookings or affiliate fees. Distances are straight lines from each route start, never walking times. Properties found via OpenStreetMap (opens in new tab).