Tuesday 27 April 2010

The Lake District - Snow

You probably realise by now, that if there's any sign of snow, we break out the camera. Well luckily for us, the snow fell on our second day in the Lakes... not great weather for sight-seeing, but it beats the rain at least.

Let's start with a bit of snowy scenery






That's a pub through the trees, called the Alfred Wainwright. He's actually quite famous in these parts and there's documentaries about him on the BBC all the time - Google him!



More cold sheep


This is the pub where we had lunch. It was nestled under a group of fells called the Langdale Pikes, which are apparently quite spectacular (when you can actually see them). The pub was nice... open fire, food, beer, pool table.... all the essentials.


This was the pub next door, where we didn't go for lunch, but looks more photogenic.


And here we are at Tarn Hows, which is another lake (there's a lot of them round here actually). The cool thing was it was frozen.




Caiti took this one... we're impressed.


Boat on Lake Windermere... we were testing out the superzoom on the camera when we took this one.


No snow in this one, it's true, but this is where Beatrix Potter lived. The cottage is called Hilltop - quite possibly because it's located on top of a hill


This is the view of the village from her place. Lovely.

Friday 23 April 2010

The Lake District - Rain

Righto.... let's see how we go posting a few of the pics we took when we were in the Lake District during the February half-term break this year.

We stayed in Windermere which is nice (as are most of the towns round these parts) and cruised about checking out the sights. We didn't have much luck with the weather though.... the sun always seemed to come out just as we were leaving. We did get some snow however (not that snow was particularly unusual last winter!) so this made up for the lack of sun a little. Unfortunately however, the rain and snow meant we didn't get the chance to climb a hill, which is basically a must-do activity in these parts. Next time....

So to start, here some of the rainy photos:


Happy in the Lakes (between showers)


There's lots of stone walls to stand in front of and smile


Curious sheep (and a bit of rain on the camera lens)


This is the pub at Kirkstone Pass, Elevation: forgot (but high enough for snow when it was raining down below).


The pub was closed so we just hung out and took photos


The World Snooker Champs are on at the moment, but Keezee is more of a billiards fan it would seem.


Pub and scenery


Stone bridge and mountains.... typical scenery in these parts


More kids and scenery... we did take a lot of photos


Here we are in the lovely town of Keswick. There's a lot of good pubs here (trust us on that) as well as a chocolate shop that was completely out of control - both in terms of the number of shoppers and the deliciousness of the chocolate. They gave us a flyer to announce they're on the internet now.


Now here we have one of those amazing places we just seem to stumble upon from time to time. This is Castlerigg Stone Circle, which is a prehistoric monument just sitting there unassumedly beside a quiet road just outside Keswick.


Playing on the stones... kids have been playing on these stones for nearly 5000 years - before that, you don't want to know what went on.


By comparison the stone wall behind is only about 300 years old - youngun


Caiti checking out the relative alignment of the mid-winter and equinox stones - so she says!


Church at Hawkshead. This is a nice little village, home of several nice looking pubs and the Beatrix Potter Gallery.


The aforementioned Beatrix Potter Gallery and (one of the) pubs.


This is the boat that takes you over Lake Windermere, to save you driving all the way round.


View from the boat that takes you over Lake Windermere, to save you driving all the way round. A bit cloudy, actually.


We took this one so that we would remember that we went to Grasmere. Wordsworth lived here for a time, we're told. Grasmere is nice too, by the way.... actually, it's lovely.


Church at Grasmere... (we know this is Grasmere because we were reminded in the previous shot). Lovely!