Illgill Head

Moderate, and easier than its reputation — the fell is famous for the Wast Water Screes, but the walkers' route never goes near them. From Wasdale Head church the ascent is a steady grass-and-path pull of roughly 500 m; our walked round over Whin Rigg and back is 16.9 km with 682 m of ascent. The catch is the edge, not the climb. The summit plateau runs along the top of the Screes with a sudden, unfenced drop of hundreds of metres to the lake — magnificent in clear weather, and no place to be wandering in cloud or strong wind. Stay well back from the rim and the day is straightforward.

Yes — 609 m, in Wainwright's Southern Fells, and the higher of the two tops above the Wast Water Screes. Its neighbour Whin Rigg (535 m) is a separate Wainwright at the other end of the same ridge, which is why almost everybody walks the two together.

Two honest options, and they make very different days. Wasdale Head (the National Trust parking near the inn and the green) gives the direct approach up the fell's northern flank — but it fills early, because it also serves Scafell Pike and Great Gable. Nether Wasdale or the Greendale roadside puts you at the Whin Rigg end for the full ridge traverse. Neither is large; the Wasdale road is long and single-track, so arrive early rather than hopefully.

There is a path along the base of the Screes beside the lake, and it is notorious — a slow, ankle-turning boulder scramble that takes far longer than its distance suggests and is genuinely awkward when wet. It is not a descent from the summit: the face of the Screes itself is not a walkers' route at all. The way off Illgill Head is by the ridge, at either end. Treat the lakeside path as a separate outing to be judged on its own terms, not a shortcut home.