Across the shallow vale, Nettle Hill rises to 382m, the highest point of Crosby Garrett Fell, while Begin Hill forms the lower southern rim. Between them lies a quiet sweep of open limestone pasture, but beneath the grass are traces of a much older landscape: three Romano-British settlements survive on Begin Hill, their enclosure banks still discernible across the fell. From here the ground falls away towards Smardale, giving the walker the first sense of the dramatic valley landscape waiting beyond.

From Sandy Bank, Begin Hill rises in long limestone steps above the pasture, its pale scarps breaking through the green fellside. Below, the old Smardale Railway traces a quieter line through the landscape. The Coast to Coast reaches the hill by crossing Severals Gill and slipping beneath the former railway through a small tunnel — a sudden transition from the sheltered gill to the open limestone country above.

In late spring, Severals Gill changes character as drifts of bluebells spread beneath the trees and along the old railway. Their intense colour follows the sheltered gill towards Smardale Bridge, contrasting with the open limestone pasture above. For the Coast to Coast walker, it is a brief, unexpectedly intimate passage — woodland, flowers and the quiet course of the gill before the landscape opens again towards Smardale.

Close to Begin Hill’s 310m summit, this small pond sits almost unnoticed among the open grassland. Yet the apparently empty fell around it conceals an exceptional archaeological landscape. Three Romano-British settlements — Intake I, Intake II and Severals — lie nearby, together with prehistoric round cairns and traces of an ancient field system. The quiet pond makes a useful landmark from which to begin reading those faint patterns in the turf.

Perched close to the eastern edge of Begin Hill, Intake I looks out across the deepening Smardale Valley towards Smardale Fell. The settlement itself is quieter than the view: little more than low, grass-covered banks now interrupt the pasture. Yet those faint earthworks mark a place where people lived and farmed nearly two thousand years ago, with the dramatic limestone edge of Smardale falling away beside them.

Almost two thousand years after its inhabitants left Begin Hill, the shape of Intake I can still be read in the turf. Low banks trace the enclosed homesteads of a small Romano-British farming community, their stonework softened beneath generations of grass. There is something remarkable in standing here: what first appears to be an empty Cumbrian fell slowly resolves into the footprint of homes, fields and lives lived high above Smardale.

Intake II is the northernmost of Begin Hill’s three Romano-British settlements, and its oblong enclosure remains particularly easy to pick out in the turf. From this exposed position the ancient homestead looks east across Crag Wood into the deep Smardale Valley, while Nettle Hill rises across the open fell to the west. Nearly two millennia have softened its walls into grassy banks, but the shape of this small upland settlement still survives remarkably clearly in the landscape.