Day in the Lakes

Saturday 22nd August
Somebody was obviously looking after us today as we awoke to sunshine and we have had a wonderful day out in the lake district. It started by John & Colleen kindly dropping Geoff Barney & me in Kendal where we had a stroll through the town and then went looking for where the Lancaster canal used to end before being fill in in 1955.

The river Kent runs through the town and there is a pleasant walk along the bank

And then we found the end of the canal!

There is a recycling centre on the spot........it made us think it would be a little difficult to restore the canal to it's former glory.....
This is what would have been the last bridge on the canal I believe and what you can see to my left is not water but a tarmacked path of what is now now called the "Canal Trail". We walked along part of this before heading back to town to find a suitable coffee stop to meet more friends. This time it was Jean & Dave who live in Elterwater who were to collect us. We found a suitable venue at Abbots Hall next to the Parish Church. We had just met up with Jean & Dave when we heard a voice saying "Good gracious it's Gill & Geoff" . Ex RAF friends Jeff & Sheena Baker were down from Scotland for a wedding in the church next to where we were sitting. We hadn't seen them for several years so had a hasty catch up before departing on our tour. What a small world. Where to?

With our local guides we had no choices to make but were taken, largely through back roads through wonderful scenery to several places including Ambleside via the Kirkstone pass, Grassmere, Langdale, Coniston, Elterwater, Hawkshead and Windermere. This was not necessarily in the order of visiting. We broke off for lunch in Dave & Jean's lovely house in Elterwater. They have spent several years renovating an old stone built cottage and the result is a wonderful home, with a downstairs flat which is used for holiday lets. It also has a fabulous garden mostly hidden around the back and sides away from all the holiday makers. Holiday homes seem to be the norm in some of these lakeland villages. They told us that Elterwater is about 70% holiday homes.

Rosegate House

We found water for Barnaby to play in

He considered a try

But declined to go out of his depth!

As we went along with occasional stops Dave identified all the peaks for us but I cannot remember where this was.

Langdale Pikes

Tarn Howes

The last port of call for the day was Windermere where we managed to find a good pub serving a carvery for £3.95 which we were able to sit and enjoy that with stunning views of the lake from our table. It has to be the best value of the year. A good end to a great day. The sun had continued to shine most of the time and the rain had declined to put in an appearance (Forecast for Sunday NOT GOOD!!

Dave & Jean then drove us back to Petroc as they had not seen her before.

And so to bed............a long walk to church followed by late lunch at the pub beckons tomorrow.....how do we stand this busy life!