The Southern Fells

Great Carrs

Great Carrs northern summit cairn, looking north towards a distant Skiddaw with Crinkle Crags and Bowfell on the left.
Photograph taken: 29th August 2018

Great Carrs northern summit cairn, looking north towards a distant Skiddaw with Crinkle Crags and Bowfell on the left.
Photograph taken: 29th August 2018
The war memorial at Great Carrs, built in memory of the 8 crew members who died in the crash of Halifax LL505 on 22nd November 1944. This view looks south-west to Grey Friar.
Photograph taken: 25th June 2024
Great Carrs as seen from Swirl How, looking north. Pike o'Blisco and the Langdale Pikes can be seen in the distance.
Photograph taken: 25th June 2024

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Location map for Great Carrs

Wainwright top at Great Carrs

Context

Great Carrs is a Wainwright in The Southern Fells area of the Lake District National Park.

Location

Grid Ref: NY 27079 00949
BNG e,n: 327079,500949
Lat/long: 54.398764,-3.124715
GeoJSON: [-3.124715,54.398764]
///W3W: sprawls.desktops.auctioned
Feature: cairn on rock outcrop

Elevation

Height: 785m / 2,575ft
Drop: 20.0m
Rank: 42 / 214

Details: Locating Wainwright tops

It's easy to make the mistake of thinking that the Wainwright top is at the true summit of a fell. For many fells in the 214, this is not the case. Wainwright often chose a top because of its aspect or view rather than its height. This is what sometimes makes finding the Wainwright tops so confusing.

Locating a top is also complicated by the fact that features change over time. Cairns come and go, some grow and some shrink, fence posts are added or removed. Although the summit sketches in Wainwright's guides and the photographs in this guide are useful aids for identification, the features shown are subject to change, especially on popular fells. See Fleetwith Pike for an example of how cairns change.

Important: The accuracy of GPS on smartphones is ±5m at best but could be as much as 8m out. Please bear this in mind when using the location data.

Route planning

Fells

Grey Friar: 1.3km; 78m; 22min
Swirl How: 0.6km; 38m; 11min

Details

There are 2 viable routes from Great Carrs

The Wainwright guides indicate “ridge routes” from each fell and although this is useful, it doesn't always allow for effective route planning. The routes shown here are the Wainwright ridge routes (indicated with ) plus any other viable routes (indicated with ), not necessarily linked by a ridge. This list provides a more comprehensive network of potential routes that can be used when planning days out on the fells.

All routes have been plotted in the OS Maps app. The distance, ascent and time values are those given for the plotted routes. Time values are for moderately fit walkers without breaks. They should therefore be considered minimum values for the purposes of route planning.

Classification

DoBIH No

2637

Local

Birkett, Synge, Wainwright

Birkett: Lake District hills over 1,000ft listed in Bill Birkett's Complete Lakeland Fells. There are 541 Birketts, 211 are also Wainwrights.
Synge: Lake District hills over 300m listed in Tim Synge's The Lakeland Summits. The book aims to list every significant summit over 300m in height within the National Park, 646 in total. It includes all 214 fells in Wainwright's Pictorial Guides, including Castle Crag at 290m.
Wainwright: Lake District hills included in volumes 1-7 of Wainwright's A Pictorial Guide to the Lakeland Fells. There are 214 Wainwrights in all. This is a curated list, not based on height criteria.

National

Nuttall

Nuttall: Hills in England and Wales that are at least 2,000 feet (610m) high and with a drop of at least 15m on all sides, as published in the two volumes of The Mountains of England and Wales by John and Anne Nuttall. There are 169 Nuttalls in the Lake District, 114 are also Wainwrights.

Geology

Bedrock

Long Top Tuff Member

BGS code

LTT

Type

Igneous (extrusive)

Age

449.0 – 458.4 Ma

Period

Ordovician

Parent

Airy's Bridge Tuff Formation ➔
Borrowdale Volcanic Group

Details

Members, formations and groups

Member: A smaller unit of rock that shares common charateristics and features, often used in geology to describe specific layers within a formation.
Formation: A larger unit of rock that is distinct from other formations above and below. A formation may include two or more members.
Group: A stratigraphic unit that includes two or more associated formations that are usually contiguous or contain significant features in common.
Suite: A geological unit containing intrusive, highly deformed, or metamorthic rocks of the same type, lacking discernable stratification.
Complex: A geological unit containing intrusive, highly deformed, or metamorthic rocks of different types, lacking discernable stratification.

Notes

These igneous rocks form bedded units of rhyolitic tuff and lapilli-tuff with localised units of pyroclastic breccia. A tuff is a rock formed of volcanic ash, ejected from a volcano during an eruption.

Daylight

Tuesday, 9th June 2026

Daylight

17 hours 10 minutes

Dawn