Reasons for Reasons
I was ‘raised’ – to use a phrase from our American friends – in south Lakeland and it has always remained home. Even though I left to study when I was 18 and didn’t return untill September 2010. A lot of years.
During those interim years I have had a great life, travelled and met some wonderful people and also have a managed to bring up my son fairly successfully. So, it although it was sort of ‘on the plan’, my move back North was not without trepidation.
As part of my ‘self affirmation’ that I had made the right decision I started a Facebook album ‘Reasons To Move North’. This has had wonderful comments from my friends but I never had the courage to make it public. Then recently I went on a Travel Writing Course with Zoe ,and much to my delight and surprise received more affirmation from positive comments on my travel writing. Something else which has always remained strictly within closed leaves.
A mindful review of my first year here followed and I realised that I had had an amazing twelve months. Yes, I have travelled away, but I have also done more here in the North West than I would have previously thought possible. And I have had so many visitors! People like it here! I have become a guide for friends and acquaintances who then spread the word about how wonderful the Lake District is. This led to my providing itineraries for weekends or longer visits. Some I accompanied, others I simply provided a ‘bespoke’ itinerary, with or with accommodation booked.
So, now it’s time to go Global!
And now I have built my own blog I have used my technical, from a previous life in IT, to build one for the Howgill Harriers. If you would like one put together then please contact me for a quote.
Bewerley and Greenhow
Grey sky, grey walls and muted colour merged into into an endless apron of rolling dales. Autumn may have turned the woodlands into a rash of vibrancy but the moorlands surrounding Greenhow had become bland, brown under a battering of ferocious wind. For a while. The wind though had a purpose. The grey blanket bunched into dark knots and soft light began to filter through with the merest highlight of green on the horizon. Light adds everything to the landscape. Barbed wire and fence posts took on a new life with definition and...
read moreMy Kind of Pavements
Caught the last of the sun’s rays on the way home, this evening, over Farleton Knott. Amazing light, lovely colours, How beautiful a pile of old stones can be!
read moreAbandoning Wainwright
With everything from thunder to winds which, will ‘impede walking’, forecast by MWIS it was a weekend to leave the mountains alone and hike out those low level tracks and trails which hang in on the edge of Lakeland. Autumn brings its own rewards and though the light was not exactly congenial to photography, the trees are adorned with a colour spectrum to rival any New England Fall. Walk number one started on the Lancaster canal and looped around to Warton Crags. Grey obliterated most of the view and the usual distance hills of Lakeland...
read moreNot to be Repeated
I don’t think there can be an easy way to do ‘The Nab’ from Martindale. Well not strictly true. It is fairly straightforward to get to the top, it is the getting off bit that was not easy. Following the route recommended by Bill Birkett I went up Beda from the Old Martindale Church. Easy enough. I was lulled into a false sense of security for quite some time. The sky was a bit grey on the tops of the higher hills but I could see my whole way around to the Nab via Ret Dodd. The sun was soft and golden, highlighting the autumn...
read moreRecommended book
I have just finished this. Wonderful book for walkers. Add it to your Christmas list
read moreThe Honister Three
Apart from the usual delights of views, mountains, hills, sky and so on, this hike was up hills I had managed to miss on other days. Fleetwith can easily be incorporated into Haystacks and Buttermere, why did I not? Brandreth and Grey Knotts were a more strategic miss on day two of the Coast to Coast when we opted to go via Red Pike to Ennerdale. Honister Pass was a bit grim, only the merest glimmer of sun emerging below the clouds where Buttermere should have been. The tops of the hills were distinctly Grey with not a...
read moreLast Summer Sunshine
I have discovered that it is so easy to miss Wainwrights. I have walked around Patterdale, up all the well known hills and valleys, even on the Coast to Coast! Birkhouse Moor is off one of the main tracks up to Helvellyn and easy to by pass if you are not following in Arthur’s footsteps. I thought it would make a quick walk for a day when I really had other things to do, the summer rolled on. It sort of fitted the bill, but of course to make a challenge we headed up the steep side, only to find at the top it is about 100m from the main path...
read moreWastwater Wainwrights
High pressure days with wondrous blue skies may have temporarily have left the hills, but drama remained. Wastwater is beautiful all the time and this year to have seen it, literally, in snow and shine. The sun and clouds were competing for centre stage, perfect visibility alternated with thick mist. Some peaks had vistas stretching far to the far reaches of Cumbria and others, well they were just another pile of stones. Leaving Wastwater from Bowerdale we headed up Netherbeck, initially following the track along the beck. An...
read moreThree Southern Fells
The three little hills of Harter Fell, Green Crag and Hardknott may not have the drama of Helvellyn and Striding Edge but they proved almost as rewarding. Harter Fell I had tramped before, but it was disgustingly wet and so foggy we never made the top but this time the views were captivating from the moment we stepped out of the car. White trails only slightly disturbed the blue as we left the car park, dressed in summer shorts dragged unexpectedly out of cupboards. The forest in the area is slowly being restored to deciduous native...
read moreIndian Summer in Cumbria
The weather ruined all plans I had this weekend. With Friday free for walking I had set most of the time to sort out all the detritus life which accumulates in brown envelopes. But then the sun came out! Autumn rolled in on hazy sunshine, clear skies and soft winds nonchalantly picking leaves off trees as though reluctant to turn the season. The result. I have spent most of the time outdoors in the hills shrinking my list of Wainwrights. I had been itching to to walk the line from Arthur’s Pike to Wether Hills since hiking up Hallin in...
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