Windermere – Day 3

My luck was holding, since the weather was good again. I decided to go on one of the walks from the book I had bought. This one started off at Bowness on Windermere and visited three different view points. Biskey Howe, Brant Fell and Post Knot. Out of the three Brant Fell was the most spectacular

I normally don’t have much luck following these walks but after some trouble at the start I managed to follow it successfully. I don’t know if this is because I’m getting better at it, the books description was better or because the route was better sign posted.

Just as I arrived at Brant Fell I saw a young deer running away from me. I got off a couple of pictures before it disappeared from view. I was just thinking that I wish I’d gotten more when it came back again and ran round me in a wide arc, before disappearing again. My first deer pictures

The night before I had bought some food to have for lunch, but I’d bought much too much so I again went down to the lake to eat it. It was very peaceful there as I ate. At least until a large group of children showed up.

This was my last day in the Lake District. The next morning I headed back to Chesterfield.

Again, there are more pictures in my gallery

Windermere – Day 2

I got up early and went down for breakfast almost as soon as the restaurant had opened. A good thing about the restaurant was you got a nice view over the town and lake

Fortunately the rain had stopped, so as soon as I’d eaten I set out. The first port of call was the visitor’s centre where I bought a book of walks and a book about navigating using a map. Plus a bought the obligatory fridge magnet.

I then set off for the lake. I arrived next to a couple of piers where some people were getting ready for canoe lessons. The view over the lake was magnificent.

After walking along the lake a bit, I sat down to have a drink and to think about where to go next. It turned out the walks weren’t just around Windermere (the town) but were all around Windermere (the lake) so many of them were too far away to be to attempt them.

I was going to do one of the walks but it turned out that the start was seven miles south of where I thought it was.

After this I decided to head up to the top of Orrest Head. The book said it gave a great reward for such little effort. I would hardly call it little effort, I had about three coronaries on the way up. However it was right about the reward.

After that I returned to the hotel. I spend the afternoon doing some writing while watching crappy day time television.

In the evening, since it was nice I went to the fish and chip shop to get some scampi and chips. I took them down to the lake where I ate them while watching the sunset.

Windermere – Day 1

My journey to the Lake district started Monday morning. With my case packed, tickets and train itinerary in hand I headed out to the train station. The journey to Windermere was relatively simple and only required two changes. One at Manchester and one at Oxenholme.

After my experience going to Edinburgh, where I couldn’t get a seat for most of the trip, I decided to pay the extra money for first class seats. Which meant not only did I get a seat that’s large enough for a normal sized human but also free food and drinks.

Four hours later I’m stumbling out of the station at Windermere with just a print out from google maps to guide me. My first thought was that it looked a nice area, my second was there seemed to be a lot of road works going on. Aided by my map I was able to quickly find the right road, but then I hit a snag. I’d thought once on the road finding the hotel would be easy, since I knew the number. What I hadn’t counted on was the fact that none of the houses on that road had numbers. Of course being my parent’s son I went the wrong way. This was made worse by the fact the heavens had decided to open up. It didn’t bode well for my holiday.

Still I managed to find the hotel, and it looked rather nice, though the hill leading up to it was rather daunting.

Once I’d sorted out the preliminaries of booking in I went up to my room. I made myself a pot of hot chocolate and hoped that the bad weather wouldn’t last.

The hotel website had claimed that it got satellite TV but the choice of channels was pretty underwhelming.

The room included breakfasts and one evening meal. So I had dinner there the first night. The meal was very nice, though actually eating it wasn’t too much fun, which is one of the dangers of travelling on your own.

I’ll write about my second day in another post.

You can find more of my pictures at my gallery