Lake District Delights

After my thoroughly enjoyable ride round the mid Wales bothies I carefully checked the unlikely figure of 17,000' of ascent on the OS mapping map which stated a revised figure of just over 20,000' !

A day on the Heart of Wales line from Llandovery up to Llandrindod Wells for lunch gave me lovely winter views of the surrounding scenery after which on the Thursday afternoon I arrived at the Elenydd Wilderness Trust hostel of Dolgoch for their autumn work party. I parked up in a flat corner, had a chat with Colin the warden and organiser and then settled down for a quiet night in the van.

A fine sunny morning saw others arriving and I busied myself with moving log piles, pruning round the car park and drive way and occasionally looking through the impressive archive of local farming history. I joined the other volunteers round the fire in the evening but had come fully prepared to self cater so retired to the van for around 7pm.

A group of us set to with barrows, shovels and a plate whacker to attend to over a hundred potholes on the mile long approach track and I discovered that Anthony knew the couple who had provided such good catering during the Shepton Mallett work camp and Daz had a shared interest in the rail industry being part owner of a Class 20 loco.

Others were splitting logs, felling trees, deep cleaning the hostel and attending to a host of minor internal and external repairs to prepare the building for the winter period. Being off grid and with low hours of sunshine there was little hot water so after another sociable early evening I was back to the van for a hot shower and home cooking.

A change of weather on the Sunday meant that after a few more hours of log splitting I was away to Llangynidr to collect a 22 year old terrapin that was being rehomed in Rotherham. Said creature was in a secure box on a damp towel and would I was reassured be OK for up to 48 hours. The owners kindly gave me a contribution towards fuel, some beers and some top quality noodles so I was OK for even longer.

I called to see my brother in Bishop's Castle but he had to leave for Shrewsbury later so with Lilly safely locked in his barn we enjoyed a good meal and catch up before he headed off. With heavy snow forecast I decided to get away very early and arranged for the reptile Rescue Centre to take Lilly a day early in case I got stranded in Derbyshire.

Thus I arrived at an ordinary enough house near Rotherham where a guy inspected Lilly and declared she had a touch of shell rot (caused by a lack of UV light) apparently so he rang the owners to confirm they would foot the vet's bills. He claimed to have about 500 rescued creatures and many were indeed visible on his numerous CCTV screens but it was all a rather bizarre set up and I didn't linger long.

Having picked up Mandy from Sheffield we drove via Matlock to Dethick for a very enjoyable evening with Pete and Nina in their comfortable Winnebago. Overnight 7'' of snow fell which gave the new all weather tyres a good test as we left the field and headed back to the Decathlon store where we spent some of the dosh from the repurposed bike.

Wednesday saw us travelling up to Barnard Castle for a night at the Red Well Inn that allows park ups. It was well below freezing but the pub was cosy and the Eber did the job overnight. BC was a lovely town to explore, although the actual castle was closed and we found a trendy deli for lunch before moving on to the Rose and Crown at Romaldkirk for a very comfortable night and a great meal. We had worked up an appetite by walking along the Tees to Cotherstone and then back along the railway line cycle track.

Friday saw us meeting Marcus and Sandra at Locomotion in Shildon which is a large and impressive railway heritage centre. Two huge sheds displayed a remarkable range of steam and diesel locomotives plus carriages, freight waggons and track maintenance equipment including two huge snow ploughs. A set of carriages from a royal train were beyond luxurious but a major highlight was the vast Flying Scotsman sitting quietly awaiting its next outing: just a year ago we had seen her powering through Dent on the Settle to Carlisle line.

Due to a planning fubar our next overnight was away to the south up on the North York moors where the Owl at Hawnsby put us up in a well presented annexe across the road and we enjoyed another excellent meal in stylish surroundings. Another 6'' of snow fell overnight so we waited for the forecast thaw to arrive before testing the Cross Climates on a snowy car park and then a steep icy hill, the latter being at the outer limits of my comfort zone but impressive nevertheless. We decided to detour around a series of hairpins on a 1:4 lane but were soon down on to the A19 near Thirsk where the thawing snow, heavy rain and strong winds scuppered our plans to head west through Wensleydale. With the A66 also blocked we took the more southerly option via Skipton where we bought a fortnight's food and then passed through numerous flooded sections on the A65 and A591 to reach Elterwater just as the light faded.

The lodge was as warm and welcoming as ever and as always immaculately presented so we were soon settled in to the familiar surroundings which have many happy family memories for me. This annual fortnight always gives me a time to reflect on the good fortune and adventures of the previous year and look ahead and plan for the forthcoming trip.

We walked in to Ambleside to get Mandy a decent down jacket and caught the last bus home making use of the £2 fare cap before attending the owners' meeting for an update on the large solar installation above the leisure centre, the proposed new adventure centre in the nearby slate mine and the planned power cut of 10 hours for the following day.

To avoid this we joined Andy the estate manager who has worked here for 42 years on a walk to learn more of the history of the site from when it was a gun powder factory to it's time as a caravan park and then the transformation to the timeshare of today back in the 80's. It was a really interesting talk with many of the site's quirks now making sense.

A memorable  ride over to Wray Castle, along the west shore of Windermere, across to Oxen Fell and back via the eastern shore of Coniston gave us the final section done in the dark using new bike lights to good effect. We persuaded two Chinese tourists in a hire car a long way from the tarmac to turn round and not attempt to find or explore Cathedral Cave at this time of night with only phone torches. A swim and time in the sweat rooms eased our limbs after some 40 miles of exertion.

Another ride in to Ambleside and round to Grasmere via Rydal gave us a chance to explore the quiet village although there were a few very dramatic passes of a quartet of fast jets threading their way northwards through the fells.

Marcus and Sandra joined us for the weekend with a walk back from Dungeon Ghyll and a good meal in Stove and more time in the pool being enjoyed by all.

A ride over to Grasmere again and then north over Dunmail Raise gave us the chance to return along the quiet western shore of Thirlmere before a welcome lunch to warm up on a cold day.

Our plan to catch the open top bus from Grasmere to Kendal was scuppered as due to rain they put on a closed top double decker but we still enjoyed the lofty viewpoint from the front of the top deck. Kendal has some very pleasant corners and alleys along one of which we found an excellent vegetarian cafe after which we caught the mid afternoon bus right back to Elterwater.

A final day ride over to a very quiet Hawkshead was the coldest ride of the week and whilst the food and drink in the cafe revived us we were soon back to feeling the rawness of early December.

All too soon our fortnight was up but we managed to meet Mandy's family in Ambleside on the Friday as both our bookings for a planned meet up in Keswick had been scuppered by the campsite flooding. As it would have been £50/night for us as non members this was no great loss and we saw them again on the Saturday morning before a trouble free run back south as Storm Darra wreaked havoc along the west coast of Britain.

Back in Sheffield I have spent the time sorting out the van and it's contents for the start of another trip and am currently waiting at Autohaus Dolby for an oil and filter change plus ancillary belt before heading to Brecon for a dental appointment and COVID jab.

With luck I get a ferry on the 19th over to France and will spend a month getting down to Italy where Mandy will join me. Then it's on to Sardinia, Sicily and Greece as the Brexit clock counts down which will be reset by time in Turkey and with luck the Caucasus.

As always I will update in due course so enjoy more pics here until then.