Great Cockup - Izeria

Great Cockup is a fell in the northern region of the English Lake District, one of the four Uldale Fells (the others being Longlands Fell, Great Sca Fell and Meal Fell).

1. Description

Great Cockup reaches a height of 526 metres (1,726 ft) and merits a chapter in Alfred Wainwright's Pictorial Guide to the Lakeland Fells. Wainwright describes the fell as functional rather than ornamental, writing: "Viewed from a distance Great Cockup appears as a modest but extensive eminence with no obvious summit and nothing calling for closer inspection. First impressions are confirmed by a tour of exploration, the fell underfoot proving no more attractive than the fell at a distance."

1. Etymology

The fell's name may mean "blind valley frequented by wild birds", from Old English cocc hop. If this is the case, it would originally have referred to a valley below before being transferred to the hill. The prefix "great" distinguishes the fell from its smaller neighbour Little Cockup, which lies on its north-western shoulder overlooking the hamlet of Orthwaite, with a height of 395 metres (1,296 ft). The word "cockup" denotes a blunder in colloquial English; this prompted Denis Norden to visit the fell in an edition of It'll be Alright on the Night, a programme featuring outtakes from film and television. The fell's name has also been adopted for a local beer brewed by the Hesket Newmarket Brewery, "Great Cockup Porter".

1. Topography

The fell has a series of stone-built grouse butts 500 metres (1,600 ft) west of the summit, some of which have been dismantled leaving just the foundations in the ground; they can confuse walkers as to their original purpose. The lower southern slope of the fell has a large, isolated boulder which is marked on large-scale maps; this is thought to be an erratic left by a retreating glacier. The fell has also yielded some rare fossils with unusual forms of dendroid graptolites being found on the slopes.

1. Ascent

Great Cockup is almost always ascended from the hamlet of Orthwaite following the bridleway up Hause Gill for 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) and then leaving it and ascending Great Cockup's steep southern slopes to the summit. A direct ascent over Little Cockup is possible but the bracken can be thick at certain times of the year. Great Cockup is separated from Meal Fell, 1.5 kilometres (0.9 mi) to the east, by the pass of Trusmadoor.

1. Summit

The view from the summit is dominated by a good view of Skiddaw's northern slopes while there is an excellent open outlook towards the Scottish Borders.

1. In popular culture

On 12 October 1996 Denis Norden presented the TV show It'll Be Alright on the Night in episode 15 Alright on the Night's Cockup Trip. This decision was made as the name of the hill references the theme and content of It'll Be Alright on the Night, which is mistakes made in TV shows. On 21 December 2020, YouTuber Tom Scott posted a video where he hiked Great Cockup whilst he gave a monologue to camera, in homage to the aforementioned TV show's title sequence which took place on the hill.

1. References


1. External links

Graptolite bearing rocks on Great Cockup Hesket Newmarket Brewery Alright on the Night's Cockup Trip 1996

Nearby Places View Menu

Meal Fell

Meal Fell is a small fell in the northern region of the English Lake District, it is situated seven kilometres (4+1⁄4 miles) south-west of the village of Caldbeck and is one of the four main Uldale Fells (the others being Longlands Fell, Great Cockup and Great Sca Fell).

Hiking Landmark

Dash Valley

The Dash Valley is a small valley in the English Lake District. It has only one dwelling, Dash Farm, the fields of which spread right across the valley. The valley is flanked on the northern side by Great Cockup, and on the southern side by Bakestall, part of the Skiddaw massif. At the head of the valley Dash Beck, the river which flows through the valley, falls dramatically forming Dash Falls (aka Whitewater Dash), which Wainwright called the finest succession of falls in the Lake District. A private road leads up the valley to Dash Farm, and a track branches off this and goes all the way up the valley, past Dash Falls to Skiddaw House, a former shepherd's hut now used as a youth hostel. The upper part of the valley is in the Skiddaw Group SSSI.

Hiking Landmark

Great Sca Fell

Great Sca Fell is a fell in the English Lake District, seven kilometres (4+1⁄2 miles) southwest of the village of Caldbeck. It is the highest of the four Uldale Fells, the other three being Longlands Fell, Meal Fell and Great Cockup. It is a Wainwright, and the lowest of the lakeland "Sca fells", the other two being Scafell and Scafell Pike.

Hiking Landmark

Skiddaw Group

The Skiddaw Group is a group of sedimentary rock formations named after the mountain Skiddaw in the English Lake District. The rocks are almost wholly Ordovician in age (Tremadoc through Arenig to Llanvirn epochs) though the lowermost beds are possibly of Cambrian age. This rock sequence has previously been known as the Skiddaw Slates, the Skiddaw Slates Group and the Skiddavian Series. Its base is not exposed but in its main outcrop area, it is considered to be in excess of 5,000 metres (16,000 ft) thick though less elsewhere. It consists largely of mudstones and siltstones with subordinate wacke-type sandstones. Their main occurrence is within the northern and central fells of the Lake District, either side of the major ENE-WSW aligned Causey Pike Fault, but inliers are found at Black Combe in the south of the Lake District and at Cross Fell in the North Pennines.

Landmark