February

 

Grasmoor and Whiteside from in front of Foulsyke

One of the most important pieces of news this month is that I have had my annual VisitEngland inspection. The inspector was very helpful and complimentary and he writes:

Crummockwater Cottages once again retain the Five Star Self Catering Rating with consistent high scores within the ratings. The continued high standards further ensure the Gold Award is also retained for another year.

 

We are currently into a dry but very cold spell of weather. Judy and I went up Grisedale Pike yesterday, it was beautiful but extremely cold and windy on top – wouldn’t like to guess what the wind chill factor was. We saw this pretty ice formation on a stream by the path going down to Force Crag mine.

It wasn’t quite so dry a couple of weeks ago at the beginning of half term when our walking group went up Broom Fell and Lords Seat: in fact it was near blizzard conditions at one point. As we came back down into Whinlatter Forest however there were lots of children enjoying themselves on sledges and someone had made a fun little snowman on one of the tables.

Although it is still very wintry there are now a few daffodils out, the birds have started singing and I found some frogspawn in the woods earlier this week. Not sure how long it will survive.

The dry clear weather does give some good opportunities for photographs so here is one of my favourites this month of the old jetty at Crummock.