August/September

At the beginning of the year I thought writing a monthly post would be no problem at all. However here I am at the beginning of October not having written anything for nearly two months – time seems to pass so quickly sometimes.

We have just been enjoying a few balmy days of Indian summer, which was wonderful, even the wind was warm. However, the autumn colours seem to have come early and also quite suddenly in the past couple of weeks and the leaves are being blown around and are piling up in the courtyard. The swallows and house martins have left and we are starting to see the geese flying overhead in formation as they migrate. While I am thinking about birds, I now often see wrens in the local hedgerows when I take the dog out. Also I saw some sandpipers when walking down on Crummock shore: my bird recognition is not expert but I’m pretty sure that’s what they were.

One of the reasons I am a little late with this post is that I have had a couple of trips away. I spent a week in August with family and friends at the Bungalow in Martindale. It is a remote shooting lodge which has no electricity and interesting plumbing owned by the Dalemain Estate! We had a great time (although the general level of maintenance and cleanliness of the property left much to be desired.) It was lovely to walk (or cycle for some of the party) on the far eastern fells without a long drive home at the end of the day. I do not wish to use my website as a platform to be negative or critical of other places but I will say that the absolute low point of the week was our evening at Sharrow Bay and I would not recommend anyone to go there at the present time – very sad.

Place Fell

Guests who have stayed in the past months may have seen me donning cycle shorts and hat and heading off down the road on my bike (which I had not ridden for over ten years!) This was in preparation for the C2C from Whitehaven to Sunderland via Foulsyke, although I really should call it the Home2Home as I was brought up in Sunderland. It is a very interesting and well put together route with lots of excellent off road sections. Pity about the tail end of Hurricane Katya on our first full day but we had a great time and crossed the Pennines in glorious sunshine and even got up Hartside without getting off our bikes!

Leaving Foulsyke

The highlight of the valley in September is the annual Loweswater Show. We were lucky to have a lovely sunny day and if you want to get a flavour of the event, visit Roger and Ann Hiley’s website.

I think I have probably written enough for now and I will end by saying how amazing the heather has been this year, giving the fells a wonderful purple glow in late August and early September.