England · Lake District National Park

Fairfield

WainwrightHewittNuttallTrail 100MarilynHuMPSimmBirkettSyngeFellranger

7 classifications here — Trail 100, Marilyn, HuMP, Simm, Birkett, Synge and Fellranger — belong to lists OpenFell holds only part of, so they have no list page. See how far the coverage goes.

Height
873.3 m · 2,865 ft
Prominence
300.3 m
Grid reference
NY 35873 11754
Coordinates
54.49705, -2.99165
County / area
Westmorland and Furness
OS Landranger
90
OS Explorer
OL5S
Summit feature
embedded outcrop within cairn/shelter
Key col
NY 3441 1207 (573 m)

About Fairfield

Fairfield is the highest of a group of Eastern Fells lying south of the Helvellyn range, reaching 873 metres. Its prominence makes it a Marilyn as well as a Wainwright and a Hewitt, so it reads as the centre of its own group rather than a top on someone else's ridge.

Background written from facts in the Wikipedia article on Fairfield (Lake District) (CC BY-SA 4.0). Heights, prominence and grid references come from the Database of British & Irish Hills, not from Wikipedia.

Access rights here

Conditional Right to roam: Right to roam only on mapped CRoW open access land.

Permission needed Wild camping: Needs the landowner's permission — the Dartmoor commons are the only exception in England.

General position for England — local byelaws, seasonal restrictions and closures can override it. Full details: access rights in England · check another location.

Daylight at this summit today

Sunrise
Sunset
Daylight
Civil twilight ends

Computed astronomically for 54.497, -2.992. Plan your finish with the daylight safety planner.

Summit weather live

Loading forecast for the summit (873 m)…

Forecast adjusted to summit altitude. Weather data from MET Norway (CC BY 4.0).

Finding the summit

Surveyor's note

rock 20m SW at NY 35861 11736 is 0.3m lower.

The recorded summit point is embedded outcrop within cairn/shelter. That distinction matters on broad or flat tops, where the obvious cairn is not always the true high point.

Survey method
Leica RX1250
Record revised
19-May-19
Drop measured from
NY 3441 1207 · 573 m

Survey notes are field observations recorded in the Database of British & Irish Hills (v18.3, CC BY 4.0) by the hill-surveying community.

Long-distance paths past this hill

One waymarked long-distance route runs within 2.5 km of the summit — useful if you are linking this hill into a longer walk, or want a made path for the approach.

RouteTotal lengthFrom summit
Coast to Coast Walk 303 km 0.9 km

Route lines © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL); distance from the summit computed by OpenFell.

The Fairfield group

12 other listed summits sit in the same prominence group, with Fairfield as the independent hill at its head.

Listed summits in the Fairfield prominence group
SummitHeightDrop
Hart Crag 823 m 51 m
Dove Crag 792 m 50 m
Great Rigg 766 m 31 m
High Pike (Scandale) 657 m 1 m
Little Hart Crag 637 m 34 m
Heron Pike North Top 621 m 22 m
Heron Pike (Rydal) 612 m 21 m
Hartsop Above How 586 m 30 m
High Hartsop Dodd 519 m 3 m
Low Pike 508 m 18 m
Stone Arthur 504 m 3 m
Nab Scar 450 m 2 m

Grouping is by prominence alone: a summit belongs to the nearest higher Marilyn it connects to without a deeper intervening col. Over a large massif that can gather hills no one would walk in a single day, and which few would describe as parts of the same mountain — it is a measure of independence, not a suggested route.

Nearest listed peaks

PeakHeightDistance
Hart Crag 823.1 m 1.1 km
Great Rigg 766.4 m 1.4 km
Seat Sandal 736.8 m 1.5 km
Dollywaggon Pike 858.5 m 1.8 km
St Sunday Crag 841.2 m 1.9 km
Dove Crag 792 m 2.1 km