Lakes district, part 2

Lakes District – Day 4

Another long day but a great one!  We started off with a 4 ½ hour walk/lunch exploration of Wordsworth country, the area where one of England’s favourite poets lived and died.  Yesterday, we saw his grave in Grasmere, today we saw his house – well, not the inside; we just had a tea in the tea room and used the toilets in the yard.  We walked above Rydal Water (lake), dropped down to his house and church, had lunch in the nearby Badger Bar then walked along the far side of Rydal Water back to our car.  So many sheep in this country – sheep and trekkers dot every hill and every dale.   The people who write the guides to walks must all be mountain goats because today was said to be a ‘level’ walk but we walked up and up before it leveled off.  We see so many walkers older than us striding up and down the fell (hill) walks here – makes us feel very inferior! 

views from our walk in Wordsworth country.  

This aft, we went for a drive and what a drive it was – along very narrow single width roads that are two way roads; we are lucky to still have our side view mirrors!  Shon did a great job of driving!!!  Twice we went over ‘mountain’ passes – incredible views both up one side and down the other.  At the top of Honister Pass there is a slate mine with gift shop – lovely stuff but too heavy to pack and quite pricey!  Very cool to see all the slate though. 

road up Honister Pass

And down the other side

Tonight we are having another quiet night at home – no wild nightlife for us seniors – and I suspect that there is not a lot of nightlife in Keswick as most people come here for fell walking or boating, not wild nightlife.  Most of the trekkers we see are older couples, although there are younger couples, too, and a very few families (cuz school is in at the moment).  Back to the steep mountain passes – we saw a couple of cyclists start up one pass, we passed them part way up and they caught up with us on the downhill side – amazing strength to power their way up those hills!!

This was the road up which the cyclist was powering between Buttermere and Newlands Valley

Speaking of seniors, we are delighted to be seniors here in Britain and get concession prices on many items.

One more day here then we drive south to cousin Joanna’s place in Swindon.