Alcock Tarn from Grasmere
Start Grasmere Village
Getting here Parking: Broadgate Meadow car park, Grasmere, 0.1 km from the start (straight line). Bus: the 555, 559 and 599 stop at Grasmere, outside Village Hall, a 120 m walk from this start. Parking & buses ↓
Hardest part Severe steepness: Steepest sustained climb about 36% around the 1.9 km mark.
Before you choose
- The line follows the B5287 through Grasmere, over White Bridge, for about 0.25 km at the start and about 0.45 km at the end, along Broadgate and Swan Lane. OpenStreetMap maps a pavement beside part of it, on Broadgate, but not the whole way. It also crosses the A591, the main road through the valley, twice: at about 0.5 km and at about 4.0 km by the Swan.
- About 1.4 km of the line, between about 0.7 and 2.1 km, follows paths that OpenStreetMap does not record as public rights of way; the first 0.7 km of it is mapped as a permissive path. From the tarn down to the village the line is on public footpaths and lanes. 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.
Daylight & turnaround
Daylight is short from October to February — check today’s sunrise and sunset before you set off, and carry a head-torch and spare batteries. On short days, decide your turn-back time before you start.
See also walking in bad weather and today’s conditions.
Route map
Easy 50%Moderate 31%Hard 15%Severe 4%
Heights on this chart and its high point are read from the track itself (a terrain model sampled along the line, or a GPS recording), so a top can differ from its listed height, usually reading lower.
Free mapping: OpenTopoMap / OpenStreetMap, with SRTM elevation data (switch layers top-right).
The elevation profile is under the map; the stage notes follow.
The walk, stage by stage
Grasmere Village → Finish (4.5 km, 320 m)
From Broadgate in Grasmere, by the Village Hall, go north along the B5287 over White Bridge. At about 0.5 km the line crosses the A591. A public footpath then leads east, over a footbridge on Greenhead Gill, to a lane past the church of Our Lady of the Wayside. At about 0.7 km a gate leads on to a permissive path running south-south-east along the hillside, with a stile at about 1.4 km. At about 1.5 km the path turns uphill and climbs steeply to Alcock Tarn. This is the steep part of the walk: about 230 m of height between 1.5 and 2.25 km, about 36% sustained near 1.9 km. The tarn, the highest point of the walk, is at about 2.4 km. Go north past the tarn and through a gate at about 2.5 km. A rocky public footpath then leads down west-north-west to a footbridge over Greenhead Gill at about 3.4 km. From there a lane, also a public footpath, leads south-west into the village, across the A591 by the Swan at about 4.0 km, to the B5287 by the Swan Hotel bus stop. Follow the road south over White Bridge to the start.
WaypointsGrasmere Village (Broadgate), White Bridge, the footbridge on Greenhead Gill, Our Lady of the Wayside, the permissive path, the stile at about 1.4 km, Alcock Tarn, the gate at about 2.5 km, the footbridge over Greenhead Gill, the Swan Hotel bus stop, Grasmere Village (finish).
Easy to get wrongThe climb from about 1.5 km to the tarn is steep and rough. Many paths are mapped on this hillside: the desk count for the whole line is 15 path junctions near it, so check each turn against the map.
If you need to get offBefore the climb, the way off is back the way you came. From the tarn, the line itself is the way down: about 2.1 km to the village.
GPX track for your GPS or phone. Planned route · not yet walked
Conditions and timing
Check live conditions in the “From the fells” panel, on MWIS (opens in new tab) and the Met Office mountain forecast (opens in new tab) before you set off.
Getting there and back
Parking
2 more places to park near the start
Positions are approximate.
Of the pay-and-display machine tickets sold at Broadgate Meadow from 17 August 2024 to 31 March 2026, 11% were bought before 10am (our count of FOI/2026.500 ticket data). Contains public sector information provided by the Lake District National Park Authority and licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
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.
If the parking is full
There is no real plan B here. Every place we know beside this route serves the same walks and sits close together, so expect them to fill on the same mornings. Worth starting early, or having a different walk in mind before you set off.
- Stone Arthur (layby) — joins the loop at about km 3.8 of 4.5: a 450 m walk to the line, and you walk the round from there
- Nab Scar (layby) — joins the loop at about km 0.5 of 4.5: a 800 m walk to the line, and you walk the round from there
- Silver How (layby) — a 370 m walk to the start
We never say whether anywhere has spaces today. Walks to the line are measured along mapped paths (OpenStreetMap), not in a straight line. How we choose these places.
No signal when you get there? RoutePark keeps this list on your phone: choose this walk’s GPX at home, keep it, and it opens offline.
Buses
The 555, 559 and 599 stop at Grasmere, outside Village Hall, a 120 m walk from this start. This walk starts and ends in Grasmere, so there is no bus to catch back to the start.
The 555 passes this route at 0.0 km (Grasmere, outside Village Hall, 70 m off the line). It passes again at 4.1 km.
Rural routes change seasonally — confirm on stagecoachbus.com (opens in new tab) or Traveline before travelling.
Toilets and refreshments
The essentials
- Arrival The Village Hall bus stops on Broadgate are about 75 m from the start. 74 m in a straight line, not a walking distance. (OpenStreetMap contributors, via Overpass, 16 October 2026, checked 16 October 2026)
- Toilets Paid toilets are mapped about 300 m from the start, in the village. 298 m in a straight line, not a walking distance. (OpenStreetMap contributors, via Overpass, 16 October 2026, checked 16 October 2026)
- Refreshments Several cafés are mapped within about 250 m of the start, among them Lewis’s Café & Bistro and Lucia’s. Opening hours are not recorded here. (OpenStreetMap contributors, via Overpass, 16 October 2026, checked 16 October 2026)
- Limitation A stile at about 1.4 km and a steep, rough climb to the tarn: not a pushchair route. (OpenStreetMap contributors, Cumbria extract of 24 July 2026, checked 16 October 2026)
Water, shelter & getting away
On-route facilities © OpenStreetMap contributors — an absent marker does not mean the facility isn’t there.
Getting there across the Lake District: Buses · Parking map · By train · By boat
Planning detail
How each grade on this page is set, and the timings stage by stage.
Difficulty profile
Severe overall — hardest: Steepness; terrain not assessed; exposure not assessed on the ground
Five independent axes, not one score. This route has not been walked yet, so none of them was set on the ground: one of the five is our judgement from the map and the route’s record, and the rest are computed from the recorded track and the map, which measures the line rather than surveying the ground.
How we grade: each axis is Easy, Moderate, Hard or Severe, and a route between two bands takes the higher one. Length: under 8 km, 8–14 km, 14–20 km, over 20 km. Steepness, the steepest 500 m of the track: under 15%, 15–25%, 25–35%, over 35%. Terrain, navigation and exposure are judged rather than measured, and each note says why. How we grade.
Pacing
| Summit | Cumulative | Ascent | Time (fast–steady) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Finish | 4.5 km | 320 m | 1:26–1:54 |
A fast–steady range from Naismith’s rule, deliberately on the slow side. Breaks, weather, rough ground and the slowest person in your party all add to it. How we time walks.
Access & barriers
Can a dog, a buggy or dodgy knees manage this route?
- Buggy: Stiles or rough going on the route.
- Knees: A long, steep ~32% drop over 250 m around the 2.7 km mark — hard on the knees.
With a dog
Hardest for a dog here: stiles and gates. The steepest stretch is a sustained climb of about 36% around the 1.9 km mark.
- Stiles and gates: A stile of unmapped type at 1.4 km — a dog may need lifting over. (OpenStreetMap, mapped as of 2026-10-16)
- Rock and scrambling: Ground underfoot: Not assessed.
- Drops and exposed ground: Not assessed on the ground; the map suggests Easy. No mapped crags on or beside the line.
- Ways off early: None recorded for this route.
- Livestock, shade and water: Not recorded for this route yet. We never call a stream safe for a dog to drink, so carry enough for both of you. The lead rules, and what to do around cattle, are on dogs on the fells.
On the line: 4 gates · 1 stile (type unmapped)
Barriers as mapped on OpenStreetMap, which can miss some. Spotted one? Tell us (opens in new tab). Barrier data as of 2026-10-16. Access data © OpenStreetMap contributors (local extract).
Walks from places nearby
- Walks from Grasmere — 0.2 km from this start
- Walks from Easedale Tarn — 3.2 km from this start
Straight-line distance from this walk’s start. Those lists hold the routes we have mapped and every Wainwright and Outlying fell within about 5 km of the town, ranked nearest first.