NY2861706147 From the car park, pass through the kissing gate and cross the cobbled packhorse bridge to the dog-leg in the valley-road, by the post box. Then take the signposted road to Stool End Farm, crossing a cattle grid as you go.Follow signage through the farmyard and exit onto the Land Rover track slanting up to the left. Ignore the track branching right onto The Band. This will likely carry fifty times the traffic of our route but offer considerably less opportunity for splashing. Follow the track along the wall parallel to Oxendale Beck. At one stage, the signage guides you to the left of a sheepfold. Resist any temptation to cross Oxendale Beck by the footbridge but keep heading upstream, crossing Buscoe Sike by a small footbridge below the cleft of Whorneyside Force.

NY2633905197 After the footbridge, turn right and follow the ravine to the charming fall and plunge pool at Whorneyside Force. Allegedly the fall is climbable in dry conditions but a detour to our left (looking up) is loose but viable. Keep following the gill up.

NY2596505393 Watch out for this confluence, as it would be easy to blunder and carry on up Green Hole. Cross the main beck and set off up the rocky staircase alongside Hell Gill proper. This leads you to a shallow scoop in the side of the Band.

NY2519406007 At 560 metres, by a conspicuous rickle of stones, take a thin right fork and head up to the skyline. Cross the main drag of the Band (the one that heads up to Three Tarns) and turn left at the second track (the one on the actual crest of the Band).

NY2496606356 At 750 metres, the track abandons the crest to set off across Bowfell imposing Mickleden flank. This is the Climbers' Traverse. Although visually arresting, the sense of exposure is minimal, with all of the steep rock above you and merely bracken clad slopes below. The only vaguely gymnastic move is a parkour jump down from a rock.

NY2461706596 After about 400m of contouring, a stony zag is offered up to our left. Take this, noting the huge expanse of the Great Slab, surely a place named by Ronseal's marketing agency.

NY2462106436 When the ground levels out at the top of the Slab, join the cairned path up from Three Tarns. In mist, note that the summit requires a slight detour south.

NY2447106432 From the summit hold the ridge to the subsidiary top of Hanging Knotts, avoiding the cairned temptations of the main track down to Ore Gap. Locate a thin trod slanting down to Rossett Pass. It may seem sketchy and rough, but this is the route of the Bob Graham Round, so be thankful you aren't halfway through that monster. At Rossett Pass, make the risibly easy ascent to the rocky turret of Rossett Pike, and continue along its crest.

NY2539808001 To cut off the corner of Stake Pass, locate a thin trod dropping off the crest and taking a slanting traverse to join the Stake Pass zigzags at about 420 metres. Descend to Mickleden and follow the main track down. By then you'll have the scent of the Old Dungeon Ghyll in your nostrils so you won't need further directions. And having completed the Climbers' Traverse, you can hold your head high in the Climbers' Bar, can't you?