Steeple
3 classifications here — 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
- 819 m · 2,687 ft
- Prominence
- 21 m
- Grid reference
- NY 15755 11674
- Coordinates
- 54.49339, -3.30217
- County / area
- Cumberland
- Region
- Lake District C&W
- OS Landranger
- 89
- OS Explorer
- OL4S
- Summit feature
- rock 2m NE of cairn
- Key col
- NY157116 (798 m)
About Steeple
Steeple stands at 819 m in the high country between Ennerdale and Wasdale. Strictly it is not an independent fell at all but the rocky northern spur of Scoat Fell, though its sharp peak and steep crags have won it a standing of its own.
Alfred Wainwright thought highly of both the hill and its name, remarking that it commands the eye on a map and does the same in reality.
Background written from facts in the Wikipedia article on Steeple (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 54.493, -3.302. Plan your finish with the daylight safety planner.
Summit weather live
Loading forecast for the summit (819 m)…
Forecast adjusted to summit altitude. Weather data from MET Norway (CC BY 4.0).
Finding the summit
The recorded summit point is rock 2m NE of cairn. On broad or flat summits the obvious cairn is not always the true high point.
- Survey method
- obvious summit
- Record revised
- 23-Oct-23
- Drop measured from
- NY157116 · 798 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.
Get food nearby
3 places to eat or drink within 10 km of the summit, rated under the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (Scotland runs its own Food Hygiene Information Scheme, a pass/fail equivalent).
| Place | Type | Rating | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wasdale Head Inn | Hotel/bed & breakfast/guest house | 4 out of 5 | 4.8 km · SE |
| Strands Hotel | Hotel/bed & breakfast/guest house | 4 out of 5 | 8.2 km · S |
| The Sawmill Wasdale Cafe | Restaurant/Cafe/Canteen | 5 out of 5 | 8.2 km · S |
Classifications and ratings are the local authority's own and can be coarse — this is a lead, not a guarantee of opening hours or that food is served to non-residents. Follow a name through to the official rating page to check, and confirm before you rely on it.
Food hygiene data from the Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland (Open Government Licence v3.0). Distances and directions computed by OpenFell from the summit.
Which hill this one belongs to
Steeple is not counted as an independent hill in its own right. In prominence terms it belongs to Pillar (892 m) — the nearest Marilyn you can reach from this summit without first dropping below its key col, 798 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
| Peak | Height | Distance |
|---|---|---|
| Scoat Fell | 841 m | 0.3 km |
| Black Crag | 828 m | 0.8 km |
| Red Pike (Wasdale) | 826 m | 1.3 km |
| Pillar | 892.4 m | 1.4 km |
| Haycock | 797 m | 1.6 km |
| Pillar Rock | 779.9 m | 1.6 km |