Category: Lake District 2023

Lake District 2023 18: Getting Home

The final post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District, detailing the journey home.

Welcome to the final post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. In it I talk about my journey back to King’s Lynn.

A MULTI-MODAL JOURNEY

Thursday was the only day on which I could travel home – the next non-strike day was the following Tuesday by when I was due back at work. I had been warned by thetrainline.com of trouble on the Ely-King’s Lynn portion of the journey – they had wanted to me to book a whole new journey, but I knew better – so long as I could get as far as Peterborough I could then get a bus to King’s Lynn, and there is no difference in the time taken to walk from the bus station to my home and that from the train station. Thus I was prepared for a journey using three modes of wheeled transport plus walking.

THE JOURNEY

My parents gave me a lift from Ambleside to Oxenholme the Lake District, getting me there well before my train was due. The train arrived five minutes late, which is early by Avanti’s usual standards. The train was a little crowded, but I had a reserved seat, and it was otherwise uneventful.

At Preston I had to change to another Avanti service, as the one I was on ran non-stop between Warrington and London, and my second change was at Birmingham New Street. This train was also fairly crowded.

At Birmingham New Street I boarded a service bound ultimately for Norwich. This train ran exactly according to schedule, and it turned out that I had just under a 20 minute wait at Peterborough for the bus to King’s Lynn.

ExCel proved to among the bus routes on which no single journey costs more than £2, a substantial saving on previous fares on that route (Lynx, whose buses I use to get to and from work are not as yet part of this scheme). Arriving at King’s Lynn bus station, as unappealing as that location is, was something of a relief – I knew for certain at that point that last possibility of trouble was behind me, which given the situation in which I made that journey was no small thing.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Here are my pictures from this day…

Crossing the Great Ouse by bus, the moment I regard as the end of the holiday.
You will be seeing more of this swan family in posts to come, although the eight cygnets here have been reduced in number to six.

Lake District 2023 17: Kendal

Continuing my series about my holiday in the Lake District with an account of our visit to Kendal.

Welcome to the latest post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. This post deals with the last trip of the holiday, on the Wednesday, when after finishing in Coniston we got the bus to Kendal (my father decided to get out at Ambleside and return to the cottage, but my mother and I went on to Kendal).

A TWO PART BUS JOURNEY

The bus we boarded at Coniston terminated at Windermere station, so we had to change buses there, and the bus we boarded for Kendal was absolutely jam packed. I ended up standing for most of the journey , so saw less than I would have liked of the areas we passed through.

KENDAL

Kendal, on the edge of the Lake District, sits on the river Kent. Both town and river are splendid. The river, superbly clean, is home to a huge amount of bird life, as you will see from my gallery, while the town features a number of interesting buildings and some fine bridges over the river. We were only a few minutes away from missing the last bus back to Ambleside (this is a longish distance route as well, running between Lancaster and Penrith, making the 17:40 departure time of the last bus from Kendal very odd). This time I had a top deck window seat, and made up for what I had missed on the inbound journey.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Here is the gallery for Kendal – to view an image at full size click on it…

A male grey wagtail almost fully into its summer plumage.

Lake District 2023 16: Coniston

Continuing my series about my holiday in the Lake District with an account of a visit to Coniston.

Welcome to the latest instalment in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. This post focusses on Coniston.

ANOTHER TOPE CONNECTION

As with Hawkshead which featured in my last post Coniston is a setting for one of Rebecca Tope’s Lake District series, “The Coniston Case”.

CONISTON

A short and scenic bus ride took us on from Hawkshead to Coniston. We found a likely looking pub for my birthday lunch, discovered that we could not order food before 12:30, and decided to wait because it looked very good. I found a suitable local beer to drink. The food proved to be excellent, with just one minor quibble: I asked for my steak rare, which means it should be red in the middle, and it came closer to medium than rare.

Lunch done we set off on a walk to Coniston Water. We headed back by a slightly different route.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…

This picture and the next (click to view at full size0 show the pub menu).
Many maps of various kinds caught my attention in and around Coniston.
I was pleased to spot this.

Lake District 2023 15: Hawkshead

Continuing my series about my holiday in the Lake District with an account of a visit to Hawkshead.

Welcome to the latest post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. We are now on to the Wednesday, my last full day in the area and my 48th birthday. The day started with a visit to Hawkshead by way of a fairly short and scenic bus journey.

BACK ON THE TOPE TRAIL

Hawkshead features in Rebecca Tope’s series of Lake District novels (“The Hawkshead Hostage”) – not the only place we visited that day to do so.

THE MOST SCENIC VILLAGE IN THE LAKE DISTRICT

This is Hawkshead’s own strapline for itself, and it may even be true (in the space of a few days I can hardly lay claim to have seen anything approaching every village in the area, so I can go no stronger than that) – it is certainly extremely scenic, and the church is very interesting. The churchyard is no longer used for burials and is now a designated nature reserve.

PHOTOGRAPHS

The gallery…

I have seen many church organs, but never one with pipes positioned like this.

Lake District 2023 14: Keswick

Continuing my series about my holiday in the Lake District with a post about our visit to Keswick.

Welcome to the latest instalment in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. Today deals with the last activity of the Tuesday – after concluding our explorations of Grasmere we went on to Keswick before returning to Ambleside.

ABOUT KESWICK

Keswick looks down on Derwentwater (although this area is called the Lake District very few of the bodies of water in question actually have lake in their title – they are either -mere, -water or water (Coniston Water and Brothers Water to name two of the latter). Those of you who think the Derwent part of Derwentwater looks familiar are probably right – you almost certainly had pencils which had Derwent stamped on their sides, and they were made here – there are graphite deposits in the area. Keswick has its place in Rebecca Tope’s Lake District series – main character Simmy Brown’s other half, who becomes her second husband during the course of the series, is an auctioneer and his auction house is in Keswick.

EXPLORING KESWICK

Grasmere to Keswick is a short and scenic bus ride, and I enjoyed it. Keswick has an old meeting hall, a pencil museum which we didn’t visit and a general museum which we looked at but opted not to visit given the price. It is also home to a splendid park in which we spent some time. A bus journey back to Ambleside, alighting at Ambleside bus station at my initial suggestion – I had figured it was close as the bus was going to get us and I was right – it is a much shorter walk than from the garden centre which would have been the next stop.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…

A rather scenic cricket ground.
The significance of this sign is the top line (see also the next picture) – Ellie Threlkeld is England Women’s second choice wicket keeper at present, and this sign provides a clue to the origins of that surname.

Lake District 2023 13: Grasmere

Continuing my series about my holiday in the Lake District with a look at Grasmere.

Welcome to the latest post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. After Brockhole the regular mode of transport changed from boat to bus and the focus of our explorations shifted away from the immediate vicinity of Windermere. There is a very comprehensive bus service in this part of the world, and my parents car remained parked in Ambleside from our arrival on the Saturday until the Thursday morning when I was given a lift to Oxenholme The Lake District station. If I find myself staying in Ambleside again I will book to Windermere and catch a bus into Ambleside, avoiding car use altogether.

THE TOPE CONNECTION

One of the books in Rebecca Tope’s Lake District series is called “The Grasmere Grudge”, so I was interested to see the place for myself. There are more places connected with this series of books to come.

THE BUS JOURNEY

We had long wait for the bus due to epic quantities of car traffic using the road (I reckon a lot of people had had the ‘cunning’ idea of delaying travelling to the Lake District until the Tuesday after the bank holiday and that is why it was so hugely busy on that occasion – we saw fairly heavy traffic on other occasions but nothing quite like this), and the first bus was too full to admit us. The second which arrived very shortly after was very sparsely populated and we got seats in the open topped section, which made for a very enjoyable journey through a very scenic area.

GRASMERE

Grasmere is where the poet Wordsworth along with many relations was buried, and there is some good riverside walking (the river in question being the Rydal) there as well. The church at Grasmere is at least the third to have stood on that site, there having been churches there since the seventh century.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Here are the photographs…

Lake District 2023 12: Brockhole Exhibition

A look at the exhibition at Brockhole, which proved well worth a visit.

Welcome to the latest instalment in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. This post is the second about Brockhole, and has a single focus, the exhibition about the Lake District.

A VERY EFFICIENTLY ORGANIZED EXHIBITION

Considering how small an area it occupies this little exhibition covering many details about the Lake District is remarkably comprehensive. The pictures will tell the story…

The fish that live in the depths of Windermere.

Lake District 2023 11: Brockhole General

A look at Brockhole as part of my series about my holiday in the Lake District.

Welcome to the latest post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. This post is the first of two about Brockhole, as I felt the exhibition about the natural history, geology and wildlife of the Lake District deserved a post to itself. Brockhole marked a switch in the focus of our explorations – it was the last of the places around Windermere that we visited, and it was our last use of the cruising boats as a mode of transport – when we had finished at Brockhole we headed for the bus stop, and that mode of transport remained our choice for the remainder of our explorations.

A NATURE RESERVE

Brockhole is a nature reserve with a former stately home housing the gift shop and the exhibition referred to in the introduction. There was much to see between the landing jetty and the house, and a bit more once we had finished in the house. If I am ever in the area again I would certainly hope to revisit this place, and see more of it than I did this time round.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Lake District 2023 10: Wray Castle

A look at Wray Castle as part of my series about my recent holiday in the Lake District.

Welcome to the latest instalment in my series about my recent holiday in the Lake District. We are looking at Wray Castle in this post. Having seen if from afar various times earlier on the Monday we visited it as our last activity of that day before heading back to the cottage.

A 19TH CENTURY FOLLY

Castle Wray is not a real castle, it was built in the mid 19th century for a certain Dr Dalton. It is approached from a jetty with a boathouse that has been designed to look ruined. There is a very scenic pathway up from there to the castle itself. Immediately outside the castle there are some incredible views out over the lake. There is a large jackdaw population in this part of the world, and the castle was designed with various ways for the birds to fly in. They are a decent substitute for ravens, belonging to the same family. I did not actually go into the castle, preferring to enjoy the scenery outside.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Lake District 2023 9: A Steam Railway Journey

A look at the Lakeside and Haverthwaite Railway as part of my series about my holiday in the Lake District.

Welcome to the latest post in my series about my holiday in the Lake District. Today I look at a train journey that formed part of the Monday’s activities, which all focussed on cruising on Windermere. There will be one more post about the Monday, dealing with Wray Castle, before we move on to Tuesday.

A HERITAGE RAILWAY

Lakeside, about as far from Ambleside as one can get and still be on Windermere, is the terminus of a heritage railway which runs for a short distance alongside a river heading towards Morecambe Bay where it joins the Irish Sea. There is one intermediate stop at Newby Bridge and then the inland terminus at Haverthwaite. In our case we stayed only a few minutes at the Haverthwaite end before returning to Lakeside to resume cruising. The line, like so many others now operated as heritage railways, fell victim to the Beeching directed axe in the 1960s, though it was closed for only a few years before opening again in its heritage railway guise in 1973.

THE JOURNEY

The train was a fraction late setting out as they wanted to get more people aboard but thereafter ran quite smoothly. We faced away from the river on the journey to Haverthwaite and towards it on the way back, and I was in forward facing window seats both ways. There was a lot to see on both journeys, and I recommend you to include this little journey in your itinerary if you are in this part of the world.

PHOTOGRAPHS