The Lakes, Days 10 and 11.

 We spent Wednesday 9th visiting friends and exploring Kendal. An excellent day.

Thursday was another bus day, this time to Grasmere. On arrival we enjoyed coffee and cake in the Heaton Cooper Studio before launching off to Easedale Tarn. The weather was perfect and it was good to reminisce as we passed the Quaker Guest House where I had stayed whilst at school many years ago. We quickly reached the steep part of Sourmilk Ghyll with plenty of stops for photography. The climb went quickly and it wasn't long before we pulled up to the tarn. This is a popular spot for wild swimming but it looked cold today. Deciding to pass on the swimming as I had left my wet suit behind (!) we made do with lunch, finishing off last year's Christmas cake. Crossing the beck we descended into Far Easedale and made our way back by Easedale Ghyll along a superb greenlane. This was the route Thomas and I took on mountain bikes when we rode Wainwright's Coast to Coast, 16 years ago now! Green lanes like this fascinate me: who has walked them in the past; do they hold memories of those who have gone before; was it an old packhorse route?

In the perfect weather the autumn colours were beginning to come into their own now. Once back in Grasmere we again dallied in shops and cafe before catching the bus home, returning at 6.30. Once more it was comforting and cosy wandering down the lane at dusk with lights on the site beginning to shine out. The bar, of course, was too tempting to resist.

Lake District March 2016. Day 4, Easedale and Blea Rigg

This morning we awoke to a day of splendid weather: clear blue skies and warm, early spring sunshine.  It was another Wainwright Day, this time with Heather for company rather than Thomas. We had decided to walk from Grasmere along Easedale and up past the spectacular falls of Sourmilk Ghyll to Easedale Tarn.  Here we enjoyed a relaxed coffee in lovely sun with fabulous views.  Although not particularly busy at this popular spot, we left most people behind when we got beyond the tarn.  The route took us steeply up the headwall at the end of the valley to Codale Tarn where we stopped for lunch.  It was pleasing to find a frog and some frogspawn up here, the spawn being in merely a shallow puddle.  Hopefully it won't dry out before they grow into froglets.  It didn't take us long from here to climb up to the ridge over looking the Langdale Valley and up to Sergeant Man, which I had missed two days previously.  From here there were fabulous views of the Langdale Pikes and Stickle Tarn and over to Wetherlam and Grey Friar in the Coniston Fells.  We wandered down the very pleasant ridge to Blea Rigg, another Wainwright, before taking a different path back down to Easedale Tarn and Grasmere.  As we drove back to the Wild Boar along the shores of Windermere we witnessed a fabulous sunset.  Once back I had time for quick bath before Thomas arrived.  Leaving Heather to enjoy a relaxing bath, Thomas and I repaired to the bar for the customary pint before the evening meal when Heather came down.  Yet another excellent day.

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