Great Mell Fell

Great Mell Fell
Great Mell Fell seen from Gowbarrow Fell
Highest point
Elevation	537 m (1,762 ft)
Prominence	198 m (650 ft)
Parent peak	Helvellyn
Listing	Marilyn (hill), Wainwright
Coordinates	54°37′12″N 2°55′59″W / 54.62°N 2.933°W / 54.62; -2.933Coordinates: 54°37′12″N 2°55′59″W / 54.62°N 2.933°W / 54.62; -2.933
Naming
Translation	Large bare hill (Brittonic (Cumbric), English)
Pronunciation	/ˌɡreɪt ˌmɛl ˈfɛl/
Geography
Great Mell Fell Location in Lake District, UK
Location	Cumbria, England
Parent range	Lake District, Eastern Fells
OS grid	NY397254
Topo map	OS Explorer OL5, Landranger 90

Great Mell Fell (Bare hill, with the later additions of both "Fell" and "Great") is an isolated hill or fell in the English Lake District, north of Ullswater and adjacent to the Eastern Fells. It rises from a level plain to a height of 537 m. Its top is an excellent viewpoint for many of the surrounding higher fells. The fell is now owned and managed by the National Trust and offers a place of quiet refuge.

The fell was once well wooded, and retains a good covering of trees on the lower slopes, as well as scattered larches and pines higher up. Its rock is unusual for the Lake District, a reddish conglomerate of Devonian age, which has been eroded to form a rounded hill with smooth outlines and no rocky crags.

Great Mell Fell is an isolated hill which rises abruptly from a wide expanse of marshy lowland to a height of 537 m. The fell has smooth, rounded outlines with no crags. Rock is represented only by a number of large erratic boulders, mainly on the north slopes, but also by the Cloven Stone near a barn to the south of the fell.

The hill is triangular in plan (indeed, it is almost the shape of a broad arrow-head) with the apex pointing west, down the steep "nose" of the fell, and with the gentler, broader eastern slopes divided by two shallow valleys which drain into the Wham Sike and Routing Gill Beck.

Great Mell Fell lies on the watershed between the Derwent river system to the west and the Eden system to the east. This watershed is formed by a low ridge, barely perceptible in places, which connects the Northern and Eastern Fells. From Bowscale Fell it runs across Eycott Hill to Great Mell Fell, then over Cockley Moor to High Brow and up the north-east ridge of Great Dodd, to join the main ridge on the Helvellyn range. Thus the eastern sides of the fell drain eventually into the River Eden via Dacre Beck and the River Eamont, while the western parts drain through Keswick via Trout Beck, the River Glenderamackin and the River Greta to the Derwent.

Great Mell Fell is a quiet place of refuge within the surrounding agricultural land, for wildlife as well as for walkers. The sheltered lower eastern slopes are well covered by mixed woods of oak, rowan, birch, holly and Scots pine. Within the trees badgers and roe deer live, and green woodpeckers nest. It is said that the last wild cat in Cumberland was snared here in the nineteenth century.