winter arrives in newcastle... and so does dipani's birthday.

November 25, 2010: 1 am

happy birthday dipani!!

coming back from the lake district

From the bus... from Grasmere to Penrith

Watching the trees go by from the train from Carlisle to Newcastle

lake district - random

Was surprised that the YHA-Grasmere breakfast included 1x2 inch (actually smaller than that) plastic-wrapped pieces of cheese - why? why couldn't they just cut the pieces out of a big chunk and put it on a plate for folks to pick up

The best (best!) sticky toffee pudding I've had was in the YHA hostel in Grasmere

Tourist pamphlets at the Penrith train station
(note: in case anyone's interested, there is a Bond Museum in Keswick)

lake district walks 5

On my last day I did a very easy walk from Grasmere village to Rydall Cave and then walked back to the village along the edge of Grasmere lake. It was the sunniest day of my trip and I had actually intended to climb Loughrigg Fell, but I missed the path going up and instead ended up at Rydal Cave. And then some dark clouds started to hover around and it started to rain a bit so I dropped the idea of going up and instead went down to the Grasmere lakeside. And then the rain stopped - of course. Still, the lakeside was nice and I just hung around looking at the birds.

Rydal Water from Loughrigg Terrace

Seagull solitude

Brown swan, White swan


Not a good photo but I think this is a Heron?


The sky in Grasmere Lake

lake district walks 4

6.5 mile walk from Grasmere village to Easedale Tarn: The Sourmilk Gill (gill refers to a ravine stream) starts from the tarn and comes down through the hills, becoming a nice small waterfall along the way, before it runs through farmland. The walk goes through the farmland along the gill, up to the waterfall, and across the hills to the tarn nestled there, across the gill here and then back to the village along the other side of the gill.

Climbing up to the waterfall

Looking back at the Sourmilk Gill going down into farmland

Easedale Tarn

At this stage, the weather turned dreary and it started raining so I didn't hang around and quickly crossed the stream and walked back. Along the way I encountered a fell runner, fell running or mountain running being a sport in these parts with runners having set some crazy records.

lake district walks 3

Short walk from Keswick to the nearby Castlerigg Stone Circle, a neolithic stone circle built around 3000 BC. Great 360 degree views of the surrounding peaks from here, which includes some of the highest peaks of the Lake District - Helvellyn at 951 m, Skiddaw at 931 m, and Blencathra at 868 m. Would love to climb some of these in sunnier weather!

Blencathra... over which the clouds are hovering

I think the one in the distance on the left must be Helvellyn

Sheep in a field of turnips

lake district walks 2

Here and there, I noticed a bit too much of Wordworth - the Wordsworth Street, a graffiti with one of Wordsworth's poems (the lonely as a cloud poem - couldn't photograph this coz when I saw this, it was pouring cats and dogs) (who draws graffiti with Wordsworth poems?!), the Babbling Brook guesthouse ("In every babbling brook he finds a friend" - William Wordsworth), the Wordsworth Hotel and Spa (whose sign also proclaimed, no doubt, borrowing from Wordsworth again: "The loveliest spot that man hath ever known")... I mean really, give me a break.

lake district walks 1

Just back from 5-6 days of glorious walking in the Lake District. I have to admit though that walking in a combination of rain, cold and wind isn't exactly my cup of tea. I got drenched to the skin on my first walk of the trip - found out that my jacket wasn't exactly waterproof... and well, I'd gone out walking in jeans. So later that day had to do some quick shopping for waterproof stuff at the village I was staying in. It rained quite a bit during the next 4-5 days... one of the days it poured so much that the roads to Ambleside were closed. Yesterday was the only completely dry day (and of course today as I was heading back to Newcastle, the sun was bright enough to blind you). Well, so didn't venture out too high - that I've left for sunnier (and hopefully less windier) days. Still, once equipped with some basic waterproof stuff, I managed to do quite a bit of walking and it felt GOOD. And thanks to the weather and the season, the Lake District wasn't overrun with tourists.

The Lakeshore Walk: From Glenridding to Howtown by one of the "Ullswater Steamers" and then a 6.5 mile walk from Howtown back to Glenridding along the Ullswater lake

Rainbow, seen from aboard the boat from Glenridding to Howtown

Starting off on the walk from Howtown

Along the lakeshore

Walk towards Grisedale Tarn: I didn't walk all the way to Grisdale tarn (a tarn is a small lake, more like a pond) which is quite high up. Instead, I did a smaller 6.5-mile loop, from Glenridding along the Grisdale Beck (a beck is a stream) to Ruthwaite Lodge, across the beck to its other side and then back to Glenridding. No views of Ullswater lake on this walk, but the valley along the beck was just beautiful.

Grisdale Beck

Looking back to the valley along which I've been walking
and
looking further up the valley along which I continued to walk (below...)

Nearing the end of the loop - - or I could have gone on and climbed steeply up... Grisdale tarn is somewhere behind those peaks

On the way back...

the weather could not make up its mind and the dark clouds (and rain and drizzle) came and went...

At one of the bookstores in Grasmere I saw a book titled "Know Your Sheep" - just peeked in and now I know that there are more than 100 breeds of sheep. Quite fascinating, I must say.

jesmond dene

Went for a 2 hour hike through Jesmond Dene - a long narrow forested valley along the Ouseburn which is one of the many glacial streams that were formed after the Ice Age - of course at the time it was likely to have been a raging torrent and this is what formed the valley as it made it way towards the River Tyne. In the 1850s Lord Armstrong, an industrialist and one of north-east England's most influential men (he manufactured armaments and warships), acquired the land of this valley and planted exotic trees and shrubs, laid paths and built bridges. It was his own private parkland until the 1880s, when he donated the parkland to city.

walking along the Ouseburn

The city seemed far away once I descended into the valley and the smell of the forest - of trees, plants, moss, lichen, growth, decay and god only knows what else - filled the air. The forest smell was strangely intoxicating and I wondered a bit whether there was any way to capture that on camera. So some of these photos were taken with that in mind, though as I look at them now even I can't smell the forest anymore! For that will have to just go back to the dene for more walks.

bridge / moss

raindrops

nourishment

a clearing in the forest

and everywhere, leaves glistening with the moisture

leaf decay/illness

in the water of the Ouseburn