The scenery about here was particularly impressive. Our resting-place was scarcely big enough for both, and a glance vertically downwards showed us the spot where we had commenced operations three quarters of an hour previously. The black depths of Goat’s Water formed a striking foreground to the view of Coniston Old Man across the valley, and it almost seemed as though the tarn could be reached by a stone falling from our tiny ledge. Up above us the crags loomed fearfully. They overhung considerably in places, and we saw that our only course was to follow boldly the line of our chimney till it abruptly terminated in the face. Fortunately the weather was good, the rocks dry and warm. To have attempted the chimney with much ice or water about would have been foolhardiness worthy of our wildest days.
From the ledge we found the climbing splendid, keeping up the slight rib of rock on the right that formed the nearly vertical boundary of the chimney. The holds were just sufficiently large to give ample support, especially when the back could rest on the opposite side of the crack. ‘Backing up’ is usually a very constricted performance, with but limited views of the scenery around. Here on Doe Crag it seems as though most of the mountain is cut away excepting those parts of obvious utility to the climber. We crawled round the rib when the crack became too thin, and worked up several feet of slabby rock until the appearances seemed to indicate that an actual gully was now about to manifest itself and commence a fresh run up the wall. We therefore traversed again to the left into a large recess, and after a little scrambling upwards found ourselves brought to a stop by a dead wall. The bed of our recess was loose and steeply sloping. Its sides were slightly iced, and considerable care was needed in settling securely down to consider the situation.
The wall was about twenty feet high and too smooth to climb. On each side of us were huge overhanging buttresses that projected considerably beyond the latter portion of our route. It was not manifest which of these would offer the best way of surmounting the wall, and it might be that neither was suitable. We could see that a traverse out of the difficulty might be made in the northern direction, but it was very exposed and it led too far away from our chimney.