Helm Crag

About Helm Crag

Helm Crag stands at the end of a ridge north of Grasmere in the Central Fells, and although modest in height it is conspicuous from the village below. The rocks crowning the summit have given it the popular name The Lion and the Lamb, and between that silhouette and its position it is among the most readily recognised hills in the Lake District.

Alfred Wainwright thought the fell undervalued, describing it as giving an invigorating short climb and a taste of genuine mountaineering, and counting it among the things that make Grasmere's surroundings what they are.

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

Access rights here

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

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Sunset

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Daylight

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Civil twilight ends

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Computed astronomically for 54.475, -3.041. Plan your finish with the daylight safety planner.

Finding the summit

The recorded summit point is rock tor known as 'Howitzer'. On broad or flat summits the obvious cairn is not always the true high point.

Survey method

obvious summit

Record revised

25-Jan-24

Drop measured from

NY324095 · 333 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.

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

Which hill this one belongs to

Helm Crag is not counted as an independent hill in its own right. In prominence terms it belongs to High Raise (763 m) — the nearest Marilyn you can reach from this summit without first dropping below its key col, 333 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