The Lakes Day 4 - Keswick
We headed for Keswick on Day 4. First we visited Castlerigg Stone Circle which is situated near the town of Keswick. The prehistoric monument is one of Britain's earliest stone circles, about 5,000 years old!
The stone circle has been managed by both National Trust and English Heritage while the site manager was, in practice, sheep. The monument sits on sheep pasture and they can freely move in and out the circle.
It was another cloudy day with light shower sometimes. We were going to walk in nature rain or shine anyway. We decided to climb up to Catbells to reach dark clouds.
The reason that I was interested in a Catbells walk was to get a better view of St Herbert's Island on Derwentwater, which was the inspiration for "Owl Island" in Beatrix's Tale of Squirrel Nutkin. In the story, red squirrels accessed the island to collect nuts under the permission of Owl who lived there. I won't expose what happened to one of them, Nutkin here, though.
I knew that the top of Catbells wasn't this tip but one behind it when I got to the point...
Derwentwater and Owl Island were always on the left side of the view while we were climbing the fell.
At the point the top of Catbells was seen over there, Suddenly, I felt terribly sick and anxious!!! I had to tell J that I won't be able to proceed. I know that disappointed J and I was very sorry about the whole situation...
To remedy my condition, we visited the Lingholm estate to have a cup of tea and brunch, which was located at the foot of Catbells. How convenient!
Like Wray Castle, Lingholm was one of the large country houses that Beatrix Potter's parents enjoyed renting for summer vacation in the Lakes. According to the estate, "Beatrix Potter spent ten summer holidays at Lingholm over a twenty-two year period, between 1885 and 1907." While Mr McGregor’s garden in The Tale of Peter Rabbit was a combination of several gardens that Beatrix knew, she credited Lingholm's Victorian octagonal walled garden as her original inspiration for Mr. McGregor’s. I was so lucky to see the garden in person!
Tea and brunch time at the cafe near the garden! I had a cup of green tea and avocado toast. J had cappuccino and Lingholm Breakfast Roll with smoked bacon, Cumberland sausage, halloumi, mushroom and rocket, I think. Somehow there was no photo to confirm it.
After the nice break, we drove to the downtown of Keswick. Maybe because it was around lunch time, the town was busy with many people. The sun was out for a short time, too.
We stopped by at a bakery/cafe called the Wild Strawberry and picked up a couple of croissants and tea cakes for later.
Then, we drove to a town called Cockermouth. It was supposed to be a beautiful and bustling Georgian market town, but I felt like I was in a strange Twilight Zone village...
Well, there were more people on other streets. It started raining when we found Wordsworth House and Garden, where the poet was born and lived with his parents, sister, three brothers and servants in the 1770s. We didn't enter the house but just glanced the exterior in the rain. It was time to go back to the cottage in Ambleside to take off our rain jackets and pants and relax.
To be continued...
