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.

The Lake District Day 1

Yesterday saw us once more heading up the A1 and over the A66 to the Lake District and our caravan which we keep at the Windermere Camping and Caravan Site at Ashes Lane near Stavely.  We stopped at Ferrybridge to buy an M&S sandwich to eat quickly in the car and then later at the Morrit Arms Hotel just off the A66 at Greta Bridge for a very pleasant cup of tea.  Greta Bridge is the fictional location for Dotheboys Hall in Charles Dicken's Nicholas Nickleby.  Once back on the A66 the weather began to deteriorate and the promised rain began in earnest at Tebay where we crossed the M6 before heading down into Kendal.  Annoyingly the heavens opened as we were setting up the caravan and I was soon soaked through -  a good excuse to invest in a new super-waterproof courtesy of Mountain Equipment later in the week.  Still we were soon settled in and enjoying a meal with Thomas who had driven out from Ambleside to join us.

As promised on the forecast the rain continued the following morning, but it was pleasant to have a morning in the van and catch up with our chilling out.  Later on the rain eased and, although dull we were able to get out.  We had been looking forward to seeing the bluebells that had been so good in the nearby Rather Heath woods last year, but as we had been seeing them well in flower since Easter we wondered if we might be too late.  We had just caught them in time, however, but I felt that they are not as good as last year.  Still wonderful to see.  We decided to drive into the Lakes for a walk around White Moss Woods between Rydal Water and Grasmere.  This is a walk that I had long promised myself and had been saving for a day of inclement weather.  I love woods in the rain.

We timed our walk for when Thomas finished work and met him for a pre-prandial in that fine hostelry 'The Golden Rule', a wonderful, homely pub that has not changed since I first went in as a student just a few years ago.  It is just a pub that sells wonderful beer; no music, no TV and no food.  Just what a pub should be and always very popular with locals and visitors alike.  After some refreshment we headed to one of our favourite restaurants in Ambleside, Dodds.

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