Penny’s husband was in Spain, so she had a free weekend; and we decided that rather than run both days we’d run on the first and cycle on the Sunday. One route I’ve done and enjoyed was out through the North Pennines to Lambley Viaduct, but you get to Haltwhistle from Lambley along a disused railway line, which I thought might be a bit boggy for our bikes. I was quite keen to try the ‘Raid’ – the 50 mile cross-border sportive route – but in the end we opted to drive to Bewcastle and go from there up to the scottish border at Kershope and back.
It was a friendly sort of a day. At Bewcastle we bumped into a friend’s parents, and had a chat with them, before starting off up a hill. Penny started strongly and I worried that I was going to repeat yesterday’s dismal performance and be lagging behind. I love this part of the world: there are very few cars, very few people, and lots of sheep: and at this time of year, of course, a lot of lambs. We took a wrong turning and ended up at a farm called Flatt (just one of at least two up here). As we were turning round a gentleman in a car came up looking for Bewcastle: we were able to send him back the way we’d just come from, just as the farmer came up on his quad bike and greeted us cheerily.
At another junction we were greeted by two ladies looking for Bewcastle; however just as I was about to send them to the church and castle, a BT van came past. The driver in that knew that what the ladies were really looking for was in fact the Bewcastle Hub at Roadhead, as tea and cake were on offer (unfortunately by the time we got back we’d just missed it; one thing missing on this route was a cafe). The very kind driver showed them the way, and off we headed again.
Rather than going straight up the road that goes almost due north along one edge of Kershope forest (one of our running routes), we instead turned off and wiggled around through Bailey. Although there are a lot of pine/spruce forests up here, there are also some older woodlands, with trees and boundary walls covered in moss.
We finally dropped down the hairpins to Kershope Bridge: we had made it to Scotland! Time for a Graze bar and some water.
Cycling back to Bewcastle seemed to go a lot more quickly than cycling up to Scotland had, despite a large hill from Oakshaw Ford up to the Roadhead road. I’ve cycled up here before (so I knew there was more to go as it kinked round to the right) but today it felt harder: I think I’m a lot less cycling fit (or fit generally) than I was. However I did get up it, and there’s then a fast, mostly downhill, sprint back to Bewcastle – with just one of those sneaky little hills that always seem extra hard just before the end.
We neither of tend to stop for pictures much when cycling, but the scenery was stunning and the roads quiet; and we saw lots of footpaths, bridleways and forest tracks which looked like inviting trail running routes.
There’s so much world to explore, just in and around Cumbria, and the views remind you of it: you could live a lifetime up here and not see all of it. I’m really grateful to still be fit and healthy and able to have these micro-adventures, and will keep doing so as long as I am able.
Hartsop Above How, Little Hart Crag, High Hartsop Dodd – no. 33 of Over the Hill at 60.
I have a love-hate relationship with the south of England. I grew up there, and love being back there once I’m there: but travelling there, or back, or around when I get there, rarely goes without a hitch.
I was in Bristol for a meeting on Thursday. The journey down had been smooth, and I had a lovely time meeting up with a couple of my ante-natal friends on the Wednesday evening. The meeting, in an office with a view of the cathedral and a pedestrianised College Green, was interesting and enjoyable. It all went pear-shaped when I travelled home: a landslip just north of Cheltenham meant my train was almost two hours late arriving in Birmingham, and there were no onward trains to Carlisle. I was advised to go to Crewe on a stopping service and that there would be a bus there; when I got there I was told to go to Preston. From Preston I was put in a taxi (which smelt of smoke, and with a taxi driver who had the most appalling smoker’s cough and who seemed to be falling asleep at the wheel – but at least I was finally on my way up the M6) and I finally got home at 1.30 a.m.
And this is why I love Cumbria and it has become home. There is space up here, with a sense of freedom. However whilst I had arranged to get out to enjoy that space on Saturday and Sunday, I woke up on Saturday morning still feeling tired from my late night on the Thursday and with a stinking headache. Having taken nurofen and then nuradol on an empty stomach, as I felt so ill, I then took Alex down to Lancaster to go back to University. At lunchtime I made the mistake of having a medium cappuccino from Costa Coffee – which means the equivalent of about 4 coffees in one cup. By the time I met up with Penny later and we started running up a very steep hill from Brothers Water to the ridge which goes to Hartsop Above How, I was feeling quite ill again.
However the great thing about running (or walking) with friends is that they keep you going when you think you can’t. As Penny carried on uphill ahead of me, I stopped for a couple of Graze bars and some water and kept going. We skirted around Hart Crag at Houndshope Cove, before getting on to a path which also forms part of the Fairfield Horseshoe. The views across to the south were stunning, and more than made up for the hard work on the way up (below in the photo you can see Windermere, Coniston and Morecambe Bay). Strangely, Mr Holmes doesn’t mention this stunning view in his book.
Turning off the main path, we made our way to the top of Little Hart Crag above Scandale Tarn (more of an overgrown puddle than what we normally think of as a tarn). The wet ground conditions we’ve had recently were really obvious even up this high, including an attractive stone-floored puddle (Scandale Puddle?). But we were about to descend…
The descent was steep; by the end we reckoned it was about 1 in 5. We crossed a broken stile and came down to the valley floor, relieved to be back on flat land. A short run past Hartsop Hall (an old, now National Trust-owned, farm, which I wrote about after running around Brothers Water) and back along the trail to the west of the lake, and we got back to the car. We had done 10.87 km and it had taken us something around 3 and a half hours.
Our conclusion was that we are not fell runners and Mr Holmes clearly is: we need to more or less double the times he took doing the routes. But we were out on a lovely day in the glorious Cumbrian countryside: it doesn’t get much better than that.
I warn you now, this is not going to be a prettily-illustrated blogpost with photos of the Lake District to make you wish you were running around up in the hills.
However, perhaps – ultimately – protecting those hills is what this is partly about. From quite early on in my career I have felt strongly about sustainability: not even so much an awareness of climate change (which, I think it is clear is happening, whether or not you believe it’s caused by humans) as a desire to use the earth’s resources efficiently and wisely, and to ensure that historic buildings got re-purposed. For a long time I have felt that some of the National Trust properties should in fact be converted to flats; I was fascinated by the properties in central London which were rebuilt behind their beautiful facades (and those facades restored); English Heritage/Historic England shock me with their lack of pro-active management of their vacant properties.
‘Development’ was always the arm of property with which I was most enthralled; and whilst building brand new, energy-efficient, buildings interested me, as I’ve gone through my career I’ve felt more and more strongly about re-using brownfield land and repurposing buildings. If nothing else, it just seems excessively wasteful if we don’t.
The pressures to be ‘net zero’ have increased through the decades, but we seem to back away from them as soon as developers squeal that their profits are being reduced. I have some sympathy with the developers: they have employees to pay, and we need development and redevelopment: we need them to survive. I completely understand that repurposing existing buildings is more expensive than building on greenfield sites – although research by various bodies now indicates that in the wealthy south-east it may be becoming as cost-effective, particularly when looking at whole-life costs, to repurpose and retrofit as to build new – but surely the government should be doing more to ensure that buildings are re-used and repurposed rather than the continual increase of building on greenfield sites?
For some years now I have been querying why the government has been going on and on about how many new homes we need: we’ve all heard and seen the headlines of ‘x number of new homes needed’. If you look into the requirements further however, it’s not that we need that number of new homes. The numbers are based purely on the fact that the UK has one of the most inefficient stocks of buildings in Europe if not the world, in particular our residential stock. The ultimate logical result of building the number of new homes that we are told are required will be that many existing buildings will become unsaleable (and/or unlettable).
We already have many empty properties in our town and city centres: the RICS instigated a ‘living above the shop’ campaign a couple of decades ago, but unlike in most of Europe, where flats over shops are quite common, it’s never quite caught on here (not that we have no flats over shops, but we still have plenty of empty space above shops). Planning regulations have been changed to make altering the use of a building from office or shop use to residential easier (and to ensure they provide a decent standard of accommodation), but still nothing seems to be really progressing, and developers – particularly the volume house-builders – are even wriggling out of providing (e.g.) solar panels and heat pumps on all new builds by arguing that it is unaffordable (at least gas boilers are being phased out).
I really believe that until the Government does something to ensure that repurposing second-hand buildings, rather than building new, is economic, we will remain stuck in a wasteful society which will not be making the progress that they state they want the UK to make towards net zero: and which in my view is a commendable goal. Various respected institutions, including the RICS, have suggested removing VAT from retrofitting works: but as yet this has not happened.
Allied to aiming for net zero surely must be the desire to try to ‘save’ embedded carbon: to look at the whole life costs of buildings in terms of carbon. Yes, our existing buildings are inefficient at present in terms of their energy use, but you also need to consider the enormous amount of energy used to create the materials for and then to build those buildings, and that making them more efficient must surely be the best way forward.
To provide some real life case studies, I look around myself in Carlisle and see a city centre which is crumbling. For years, offices occupiers have been moving to brand new accommodation on the outskirts of the city where parking is free and motorway access is easy, but the character of the area is dull. Even 15-20 years ago it was clear that we needed to increase footfall in the city centre; with the decline in retail and then the further decline in office occupancy since Covid, this has become even more apparent, with the number of empty shops increasing.
This will be of no interest to people who don’t know Carlisle unless you have parallels in your own city and town centres, but we have a former department store opposite the cathedral which has been vacant for probably 10 years or more; it would make a fantastic block of flats, and is in a lovely location. Debenhams is now empty, since the demise of that company; and now House of Fraser is going to become vacant. The one hotel in the city centre also seems to have an uncertain future; and in the outer ward of the Castle are two or three blocks which have been vacant since 2011, when the last tenant (the County Council) moved out. And yet, despite all this empty space, hundreds of modern little boxes, thoroughly-insulated but otherwise without many advantages over older buildings, are being constructed on greenfields on the outskirts of the city.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying we don’t need any new buildings at all. But we do need to start thinking about re-using old buildings before we build new ones. And the only way that is going to happen is if, in some way, it is made cost-effective for developers.
A while ago a friend gave me a book. It was such an inspiring and beautifully illustrated book that I bought a copy for my running buddy, Penny. She loved it too: and suggested that our next challenge should be to do the entire book.
The book was Barry Holmes’ Over the Hill at 60 Something, and I recommend it highly for anyone who loves running in the Lake District, is thinking about doing all the Wainwrights, and who would like some inspiration for some new routes. I’m sure many of them will take us along tracks and paths we’ve run before, but adding on other byways that we don’t know.
We decided to start with Catstye Cam, no. 20 in Mr Holmes’ book and only about 11-12km. We’ve run up the track towards the mines and the Youth Hostel before – during the Hevellyn or Glenridding trail race – but as we headed up Greenside lane we were commenting about how you tend to remember bits of races and run routes rather than the whole thing. My main memory of going up towards the Youth Hostel in the Lakeland Trail race was that I was walking bits and running bits, and sometimes overtaking people who might then overtake me back…
Apparently Greenside mine was a lead and silver mine, and once the biggest in the UK. Nowadays a hydro-electric scheme is fed from the beck that plunges down the side, and the terraces formed by the mine still step up the hill behind the cottages opposite the youth hostel (the cottages are currently on the market – £400k-odd for a 2-bed and £600k for the 3-bed. Pity they’re outside my budget, though they’re not exactly accessible for everyday living unless you have a fairly sturdy car).
By the Youth Hostel we took the path towards Red Tarn. This led on uphill, at first gently and then more steeply, while we alternately got rained on and then optimistically hoped that the sun was going to come out and the clouds and mist would blow away. We were to be disappointed. As we both commented on how un-mountain-fit we feel at the moment, I began to think maybe it didn’t really matter if we didn’t actually get to the top of Catstye Cam. Penny disagreed and tried bribing me with the promise of a bowl of soup when we got back down: I didn’t in fact take much persuading as it did seem silly to go all that way and not get to the top.
The path was quite rocky, and with the amount of water there’s been – and continues to be – the rocks were quite slippery. As we turned to go up to the summit the wind also started gusting, and at the top I was holding on to my hat. This was partly as in fact the rain seemed to have made it stretch and get looser – it seemed to be falling further and further down over my eyes as the day went on. Even in the rain and mist there’s a sense of achievement in getting to the top of something; we did think that the view would be stunning on a clear day!
Running back down was, of course, mostly easier – apart from where the rocks were quite large and slippery. We nipped back down to Red Tarn, which looked as if it would be very inviting for a swim on a warmer day. I thought about my Bristol Rovers hat which blew into the Tarn back in about 2002 when David and I and some of his friends and family were walking up Striding Edge (I was mostly on all 4s, it was so windy that day).
From Red Tarn it should have been a fairly straightforward run back to Glenridding, if it wasn’t for the fact that I’d drawn Mr Holmes’ route wrongly on a photocopy of part of the OS map, which was getting damper and more bedraggled in my pocket. Instead of staying to the north west of the wall leading up to Birkhouse Moor, we went over the stile at the Hole in the Wall: where we also got a slightly clearer and sunnier view across to Ullswater in the distance, with low lying dramatic clouds lifting slowly above. As we then couldn’t see an obvious path, we ended up inventing a route downhill through the bracken to join up with a lower path, then crossed through more bracken to come out near Lanty’s Tarn. From there the path back to Glenridding is easy to follow, with stony steps, and we’ve done it several times before in either direction.
Mr Holmes ran the route in 1 hour and 50 minutes. It had taken us nearly 4 hours by the time we got back to the car and as it was a Sunday there was no time for soup. Still, we won’t get fitter if we don’t start somewhere. Which route shall we try next?
Another long time without a blog post! Last year I didn’t actually do many new routes in terms of cycling or running, and I’ve been working at two jobs (one part-time and one full-time), which has also limited the time and energy I have for writing. I’m still trying to keep fit: I did the Kielder half marathon in October, in about 2 hrs 15, which I was pleased about; and I’m still singing, albeit I don’t practice anything like as regularly as I need to. I’m still hoping to do my Diploma at some point, but I’m struggling to learn pieces off by heart: which is purely lack of time spent singing them.
At Christmas my sister, her partner, and my Mum came up to stay with me, and on Christmas Day my two older children joined us for Christmas dinner (in fact Bella insisted on cooking it and I wasn’t allowed anywhere near the kitchen – other, of course, than to tidy up later). I felt tired by Christmas and the beginning of the New Year didn’t really improve my mood – for a while I just felt rather unmotivated about anything.
These moods always pass however, and when my chamber choir, Amici, was asked to sing at Gilsland church in October, it gave me the motivation to start thinking ahead to our concert of French music in September and to get that organised. But I also had a holiday to Venice to look forward to over the February half term.
I have to admit that Venice was not particularly high up on my bucket list. I love Italy and when I eventually retire I hope to spend a lot of time travelling around Italy, and other parts of Europe, but as a holiday destination it struck me that Venice would be too touristy. Having said that, it’s in Italy and it’s historic, so that ticked two definite boxes.
We had decided to go by train. The train from Carlisle to London felt cramped and hot, and by the time we got to London I was developing a headache. Bella and I walked over to St Pancras International and had lunch in a French-style cafe, before meeting my mother, sister and sister’s partner to go through the Eurostar check-in. Whilst I love how St. Pancras itself has been developed, with plenty of cafes in which to pass the time while you’re waiting, and plenty of shops to be tempted by (useful sometimes: I bought a new shirt on one occasion when I was passing through, as I needed a clean shirt for the following day having got so hot on the train), the Eurostar part is disappointing with only two cafes with limited offerings.
Before long we were heading on Eurostar to Paris, where the Gare du Nord felt familiar from having visited it only 18 months ago. A short metro journey and we were at the Gare de l’Est (I think it was…) and going in to more shops to buy snacks to pass the time, even though the TGV we were to be travelling on apparently had a Michelin-starred chef heading up its food offer.
It’s a pity we didn’t stick to Brunel’s wide gauge railway track in the UK, which would match up (I believe) to the continent. Their trains are wider than ours, and feel so much more spacious as a result: especially when they are double-decker as well. A smooth 4-hour journey including some lovely food from the Michelin-chef’s buffet car (it was expensive, but it was worth it: I wanted to bring the glass pots home but in the end decided it was too much extra to carry) and we were in Zurich. We’d also been entertained by a rather attractive young man playing the ‘handpan’: much to the annoyance, I think, of an elderly German couple sitting near us who would have liked peace and quiet.
With hindsight, going via Zurich was not a good idea. My mother had been there with my father several times so that was, of course, at the forefront of her mind. She’d been quite upset on the train and was quite snappy at any perceived criticism; this was made worse by a mad and extremely nasty American in the hotel reception being extremely rude to the Swiss hotel staff (Bella thought we should call the police), and my Mum being almost ready to get into a fight with the guy. My head was still thumping despite taking some painkillers, it was late at night, and we still had a day’s train journey ahead of us…
The next day’s journey was of course the most attractive bit, as we headed down the side of Lake Zurich and through the Alps. However with my headache growing worse rather than better I missed most of it; I know we changed trains at Milan but can’t really remember much about it apart from the fact that there was a free magazine in Italian and Bella was complaining about not being able to access the wifi. We passed Lake Garda but I didn’t notice it; but by the time we had gone through Verona my head was improving, and I was able to appreciate the journey over the causeway to Venice.
Despite having said that it’s not on my bucket list, arriving in Venice was magical. Having traversed the causeway, we stepped out of the station and walked down wide steps bustling with people towards the water taxis and vaporettos; a water taxi then whisked us away to our Palazzo as the fresh air blew away the last of my headache. All around were the beautiful old buildings that you associate with Venice: it really does look like the cards, paintings and photos that you’ve seen. It was exciting to be ‘driven’ right up to the old water entrance of the palazzo we were to be staying in, right on the Grand Canal: it felt as if we were aristocracy at the least.
We walked through a dark entrance hall past an old gondola, and out into a square, the smell of christmas box meeting us at the door. Up in a lift and there we were in our penthouse apartment (with two roof terraces). The floors were sloping and not for the first time I thought that not only is it amazing that Venice still stands, but that we should all stop worrying so much about the structural stability of buildings: despite building methods that would be frowned on today, plenty of old buildings still stand firm (Venice is built on a huge number of wooden piles, driven into the silt: by contrast, many of the Georgian buildings in the UK have no foundations worth speaking about at all).
Carnival was on, so even in the evenings the streets were full of people, some in costume, and the main streets were lit with decorative lights. We went out for dinner and ended up at a restaurant which wasn’t at all the one we’d booked but which did provide a lovely meal. After the two days’ travelling, everyone’s mood had lightened and Venice felt welcoming and exciting.
The following day we spent a lot of time walking around, just looking at the city. We found a shop which sold notebooks and which had a cat hiding on a shelf – not ‘the’ cat in ‘the’ bookshop near the Arsenale, but far more central. We walked past the Rialto market – the Rialto bridge was probably the busiest part of the city every time we went there – and then walked in a westerly direction, including having lunch in a lovely cafe which we didn’t manage to find again, before heading back towards our apartment, with ideas for what we wanted to see the following days.
I think one of the ‘problems’ with Venice is that much of it, including items in the shops, is very, very beautiful; and of course the Italians seem to appreciate good food far more than we do. It would be easy to wander around Venice and spend a small fortune on food and beautifully-made items, and I think in many ways it’s far more the ‘city of love’ than Paris. With no cars (and no bikes), star-crossed and other lovers could spend hours wandering around, sitting at cafes, and generally watching the world going by (though it must be difficult to walk along holding hands with anyone, as the streets are mostly narrow and so, so busy).
I had hoped to see and hear something of the music which Venice had given to the world, but the only classical concert on was of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons: I would have liked to have found a small church hidden away somewhere that was putting on a concert by a local choir and local musicians, in the way that Bella and I came across a student playing Chopin in Paris. Likewise Bella had hoped to go to a jazz club, and we did walk past a few, but being with a bunch of old people who wanted to sleep, she didn’t get that wish.
That evening Rachel, Bella and I went out to find a supermarket in order to buy stuff for dinner: as I think is normal with Venice we found some surprising little corners and managed to walk quite a long way round before going back home (via a completely different route) with our cooking ingredients.
Having had rain on day one, on day two the sun came out and after admiring the view of the Grand Canal and of the Dolomites from our roof terrace, we did more walking but without getting wet. We visited the Fortuny museum in the morning: he was an amazing polymath of a man about whom I knew little. All I had heard of was Fortuny gowns, so it was fascinating to see his house, full of theatre sets, amazing models, printing and photographic items, and all sorts of other things.
We popped into the Leonardo exhibition but the church it was in was freezing, and so nobody lasted long: but I really liked being able to see models of Leonardo’s machines which you could actually move, and see in action.
That evening Ross (Rachel’s partner) and I headed off to the supermarket via St Mark’s Square, which I wanted to see in the dark. The city was still fairly lively as it was the last night of Carnival and again we found some attractive corners, and walked along streets we hadn’t walked along before, and then others which seemed more familiar. I think perhaps what was disappointing to us both was that although Venice is lovely, and beautiful, and unlike any other place I can think of, it felt a bit too touristy (and we were of course as guilty of that as the thousands of others who visit it). With hindsight, I guess with a small population (50,000 or so), actually it’s not so different to some smaller British cities: what is notable with Venice is, even in February, the huge influx of people during the day.
Murano glass is of course in evidence all over the place – for example the light fitting in the photo above – and whilst originally we’d thought spending most of a day going to Murano would detract from the rest of Venice, in fact that was what we decided to do on day 3. It was another sunny day and we caught a fairly early vaporetto to the island. I stood up on deck, loving the feeling of the wind on my face and enjoying seeing the Arsenale, followed by the hospital with its water ambulances and then the cemetery island, before we arrived at Murano.
Coffee sitting by the canal was followed by visits into several shops before we went into the glass museum: a fascinating place exhibiting this amazing craftsmanship going back centuries. Not surprisingly glass works were all around us, including some glass seaweed in the flower beds of the cafe at which we stopped for a drink. I especially liked the glass formal garden: the photo (bottom left) doesn’t really show quite how impressive it was. It’s not the sort of thing I’d ever have in my house, but the detail was amazing.
The vaporetto back to Venice was really busy, so having got up on deck against the rail I didn’t really have the option of offering to swap with one of the others ‘below deck’ – though I don’t think they minded too much as by then it was getting cold and a mist was coming in. It did mean that I saw the huge hands created by artist Lorenzo Quinn (I found out later that he had previously created some hands which looked as if they were holding up some of the buildings in the city). By the time we were back at St Mark’s Square the mist had dropped right down.
The following day was our last full day and still misty, and we decided to visit the Doge’s Palace. I’d have liked to have seen the other museums around St Mark’s Square as well, and to have gone in the basilica, but when you’re only somewhere for a few days you can’t do everything: and I think you enjoy it more if you don’t rush around trying to do everything. It is, of course, impressive, but I think I’d have liked to have seen a bit more of the day-to-day accommodation: where did the Doge sleep for example, and where did the servants live? The boys, if they’d been with us, would have loved the armoury and probably also the prisons.
We then discovered that French trains were on strike, so – thank goodness for the internet – booked flights back and sorted out getting refunds of our various rail tickets (the European refunds being far more generous than the British ones). Having cooked in the apartment most evenings, for our final evening we went out to a couple of bars for cocktails and snacks: all quite expensive (though probably no more so than in the UK, to be honest) but beautifully served and by friendly staff. One thing which we all agreed on was how friendly the Italians were – and what superb English (and no doubt other languages) they spoke (I had attempted some Italian but I know I made a lot of mistakes, which they were polite enough to ignore!).
Due to the changes in travel plans for our final day we had a water taxi ride across the lagoon to the airport in the mist, a treat as it was considerably further than to the station: we also were back in the UK after a two hour flight instead of two days of train travel. However, if I went again would I fly? No, I’d go by train but try to find a different route home from the one going out, and to have a couple of decent stopovers en route. And would I go to Venice again? Yes – but definitely not in the tourist season; and I think I’d also try to stay somewhere that felt more like the ‘real’ Venice; the Venice the locals call home.
When we swam in Ullswater at midsummer someone commented what fun it would be to rent a house for a weekend. I suggested a weekend, looked up some properties – and lo and behold 5 of us were booked in for September, near Broughton in Furness. One of the main things we wanted to do was swim in Beacon Tarn, as Penny and I had been enthusing about what a nice walk it was to the Tarn and how lovely it was.
The weather was fairly hideous for most of July and the beginning of August, and we were keeping our fingers tightly crossed that it would be good for the beginning of September. Fortunately, it was – just! Four of us took the day off work and drove down on the Friday in the sun, arriving at lunchtime laden with food and drink, wetsuits and running kit.
Having unpacked we drove to Devoke Water (https://runningin3time.blog/2021/07/17/swim-bike-run-hills-and-water-2/), out of all the lakes and tarns we have swum in so far one of the favourites. At approximately 1km long, swimming from one end to the other and back is something that most of us aren’t quite confident of tackling yet – but it does mean it creates about a 6km all-round run route. Having swum (without wetsuits) and warmed up in the sun (with flapjacks), we put our swimming stuff back in the car and started off on a run.
It was a beautifully warm day and we were warm, if not hot, and started off our run going up hill and past some cattle. We were aiming for a large rocky outcrop which looked as if it would provide a stunning view – having crossed boggy bits, scrambled over rocks and through bracken, we then got to the top of the outcrop. Two guys were up there setting up tents, one of whom took some fab. photos of us. We then took our own photos of the views before clambering down the other side and making our way to the bridleway which runs along the southern edge of the lake.
It was a lovely run, until we got to the western end of the lake where we started following sheep tracks up to Water Crag – Anne and I then opted for a lower route back to the track which leads to the eastern end of the lake while Penny and Rosie went up Rough Crag before running down to meet us as we jogged back to the car.
The tea room we had visited on our previous trip to Devoke Water was closed so instead we decided to stop by the river Duddon at Ulpha Bridge. Some children were rather scarily jumping off the bridge into the river while their fathers sat by allowing them: we paddled in the river further along and tried not to watch, hoping that nobody would get hurt (they didn’t). It was such a lovely day it seemed a pity to have to go inside, but we needed to get back to make dinner and wait for Hannah to arrive, who had a long drive from Berwick.
The following morning we had waffles for breakfast and then drove to Water Yeat and met Mark and Laura. The sides of Coniston were chocca with cars, and Coniston Water itself busy with families and groups of friends making the best of what was probably going to be the last day of summery weather: paddleboarding, kayaking, swimming, sailing… we turned to the west to walk up to Beacon Tarn, which was also considerably busier than when Penny & I had swum there last October, although at least only with walkers and swimmers.
I’d wanted to swim the entire length of Beacon Tarn and did so, Mark and Penny close behind. Rosie had to head back home so by the time we got back to our picnic spot she was changed and ready to leave. Laura had supplied sandwiches and crisps and Anne had brought more flapjacks and some cake; we warmed up before walking back, and then drove round to the eastern side of Coniston Water – which was still heaving – where we had an ice cream and went for another walk. Although it was warm, it was overcast.
That evening over dinner we drank quite a lot and what with not having drunk enough water during the day, I woke up in the early hours with a stinking headache and churning stomach – and had to wait for the others to wake up in order to cadge some painkillers. The weather had changed and it was far cooler, with a forecast of rain. As Coniston had been so busy on the Saturday and due to the change in weather, we decided rather than swimming in Coniston and driving home to go to Ravenglass and at least have a look at Wastwater, partly because it’s a favourite but also because it’s a long way for Hannah to travel so it made more sense for her to see it as we were in that area anyway.
At Ravenglass we looked at the steam trains and then went to look at the ruins of the Roman bath house, before walking back along the beach just as the rain started. However by the time we got to Wastwater – having had to wait for a queue of about 100 tractors to go past us on one of the narrow lanes leading to Wastwater – the rain had stopped. As we stood looking at the lake, someone (Anne I think) said “are we sure we don’t want to go in?”: so in we got. Our third swim of the weekend, and probably the coldest, but well worth it.
We then went for lunch at The Kellbank in Gosforth – the same pub which Penny and I had gone to for dinner when we stayed in the yurt for our swimming weekend last October. This time there was no sheep in the bar but we had an excellent Sunday roast.
It was time to go our separate ways and make our way to our various homes. It had been a brilliant weekend and more confirmation of how friends and doing things you love with friends is one of the best things about being alive.
We are now a two (grand) piano family. Bella was given a Bluthner by her piano teacher, who was moving to a smaller house; and as at some point she will doubtless move out and take her piano with her, I’m hanging on to mine. I started thinking that perhaps I should start practicing again, in the hope that one day we’ll be able to do some two piano pieces together.
However her standard of piano playing far, far exceeds mine – I just scraped a pass at Grade 7 while I was at University, while she’s already playing pieces of far more difficulty than that. A couple of years ago two piano-playing friends of mine independently suggested the Chethams International Piano Summer school for her: this year she went. Being under 18, I had to chaperone her; there was a lot of sitting around but we also got to go to some amazing recitals by international professional pianists. One of the concerts which sticks in my mind was Rachmanninov played on two pianos; another was the astounding recital given on our last night by Dina Parakhina. Bella was able to play and practice on Steinways and Yamahas, had lessons from Martin Roscoe and Kathryn Stott, and organ lessons from Simon Passmore.
Not only was the piano playing and the tuition fantastic, but the facilities were – as you would expect – incredible. The modern block with the practice rooms, a recital hall and a concert hall, also had quadruple glazing – I tried doing some singing practice in one of the smaller practice rooms one evening and the acoustics were superb.
The other thing was that Chethams is situated right in the middle of Manchester, and it was my payday while we were there. I remember liking Manchester when I went there in my 20s and 30s, either to visit friends or for site visits, but feeling very ‘southern’ as soon as I opened my mouth. With redevelopment after the Arndale bombing and the introduction of an extremely convenient tram service, the city centre has been transformed: there are still plenty of old buildings (mostly Victorian, from its industrial heyday, but also a medieval cathedral – with a brand new, shiny, organ) but also modern public spaces and, by the sound of it, lots of city centre living. It’s vibrant – or at least, it is by about lunchtime (people in Manchester seem to get going about lunchtime and then through the evening – the first half of the morning is quiet, with cafes rather than shops open) – and there is an eclectic range of places to eat. We quickly found that each meal at Chethams was likely to be some version of chicken, and ended up eating out several lunchtimes and two evenings.
We came home on the Saturday, to repack and leave again on the Sunday, this time with the two boys in tow. For this second week Bella was going on a Rodolfus Foundation course in York and the boys and I were going down to Somerset to visit my Mum, before all going back to York.
The accommodation at St Peter’s school in York was rather smarter than that at Chetham’s (fewer pianos though), and the site, close to the city centre, extends right down to the river. After the boys and I had dropped Bella on the Sunday we drove to Chesterfield, where we stayed overnight in a very noisy Ibis hotel (too close to the dual carriageway) and had some highly commendable pizzas at Pizza Pi in Vicar Lane shopping centre – they make their own dough and the pizzas are wood-fired. If you need somewhere to eat in Chesterfield and like pizza, I would recommend them. Edward was very keen to go back again on the return journey, but we didn’t have time in the end.
One of the main reasons for going to Somerset – other than seeing my Mum – was to put some of my Dad’s ashes in the firebox of a steam train on the West Somerset Railway. My Mum had extremely mixed feelings about this: she basically feels that all of him should be in the church yard, where she is going to be buried when it’s her time to go. However my Dad had said to my sister that he wanted to be on a steam train. We got to step on to the footplate and have a look at the various levers and so forth (it’s very hot up there – I wouldn’t have wanted to have been a driver or fireman in high summer) and then left the little box containing part of Dad on the footplate with the fireman.
Just after we pulled out of Stogumber station (as previously discussed with the driver and fireman), a tribute was played to my Dad on the train whistle. I think he’d have loved it; my sister got a video and we both had a tearful hug.
After lunch and ice cream in Watchet we caught the train back and then went down to see my uncle and aunt: he’s just come out of hospital so was too convalescent to join us for the train, but they had both shed a few tears at the video as well. It was great to see them and to sit out in their garden enjoying the sun and some scones.
The day before had also been slightly emotional as we’d been to Aerospace in Bristol. Dad helped design the Harrier Jumpjet engine and Concorde’s engine, and I grew up very conscious of Concorde being a Bristol ‘thing’ and of feeling proud of it. I used to see it fly over when I lived in London, and I was living in Bristol (pregnant with my first child) when she did her last flight. I remember looking up the price of tickets once: stepping on to her at Aerospace was only ever going to be the way I’d fulfill my dream of going on Concorde.
On the Friday we drove back to York, this time taking my Mum with us. The journey took 6 and a half hours as the traffic was so hideous, and Bella was extremely annoyed with us for missing her and the week’s Rodolfus choir singing in York Minster. We did have a look round the Minster on the Saturday – I’ve always resented paying to go in, but felt that I really should have a look inside – and then Mum and I went to hear the choir in the chapel of St Peter’s school on the Sunday. They were absolutely superb – they were just as good as any of the Oxford or Cambridge chapel choirs. I’m rather envious of her having such a musical time – it’s made me think more about starting piano again, and also wish that there was something the equivalent of Chetham’s for adult amateur singers. Meanwhile Bella wants to do both music weeks again next summer, as well as hoping that she’ll get to Paris again, to celebrate her A level results.
I absolutely love York and had enjoyed Manchester: whilst I would never consider moving back down south as the traffic is so hideous, I do wonder about some of the northern cities. But then I get home to Cumbria (or Cumberland as it now is) and feel, well, At Home.
I’m not keen on Ullswater. It always seems a bit dirty, especially up at the Pooley Bridge end, probably largely due to the fact that it’s a popular swimming spot. However in many ways it’s the most accessible of the lakes for those of us who live in North East Cumbria, and so when Hannah said she was coming over for a conference in Penrith and suggested a swim the night before, I suggested Ullswater.
I’ve swum at Pooley Bridge, near Howtown, and at Sandwick, and of the three I thought that Sandwick might be the least busy in an evening, partly as it’s all the way down the Howtown road and further. The road splits into 3 around Martindale, and all three roads then become dead ends. The one at Sandwick finishes by a group of houses (holiday cottages, by the closed up look of them) in a gap between Hallin Fell and Sleet Fell. Looking back to previous posts, I see similar comments then to ones I was about to make now: whereas a family occupied the picnic bench back then (https://wordpress.com/post/runningin3time.blog/5263), this time we disturbed a walking couple who looked as if they had probably hoped for a romantic evening together, perhaps only joined by a family of ducks.
The group had grown from being just Hannah and I to include Tricia, Penny, Laura and Anne. Tricia reminded me of last time we had done a longest day swim: we’d traipsed up the hill to Bowscale, and I thought I remembered carrying a cake which the others had to help carry at points (https://wordpress.com/post/runningin3time.blog/6864). Tricia wasn’t so sure: certainly the other time, either before or after, it was Jo’s birthday so there was definitely cake involved. For some reason the time I took a cake to Devoke Water is also remembered: partly as it didn’t actually completely melt in the car.
The weather forecast had been for rain stopping at 7pm; as it turned out the weather had been lovely most of the day, and no wet weather clothing was needed (though a couple of us wished we’d bought extra layers for afterwards).
No cake was involved on the longest day 2023, but a picnic was, and by the time we’d had a fairly lengthy swim the picnic table was deserted and we were able to sit at it to enjoy our combined efforts (Tricia had brought egg sandwiches, made with eggs from her own chickens, which have a fantastic taste. What they’re fed on and whether they can roam freely really does make a difference). I was pleased with myself as I’d swum parallel to the shore in a northerly direction to a point and back, and then did the same again without my wetsuit, but just to the halfway point. It was lovely as there was a rocky ledge descending from the woods into the lake, which meant NO WEEDS (there was a band of weeds between the beach we entered the water at and the deeper water – I stopped doing front crawl at that point and did breaststroke so I didn’t have to look down). Tricia and Anne had swum out towards the centre of the lake, in a slightly southerly direction; when a boat came charging towards us I was a little worried it wouldn’t see them (fortunately it did but it was a reminder to me of why we have bright pink or orange buoyancy things).
Going into the water wetsuit-clad was quite warm; as long as you kept moving swimming without a wetsuit was fine too (apart from the feeling of the weeds against you on the way in and out). You can see by the others’ faces in the photo what a great time they had; and somehow the swans gliding by seemed like a fitting end to our lakeside time, as the sun began to descend.
We waved goodbye to Tricia, who was heading uphill to sleep outside on this shortest of nights (it sounded a lovely idea until she admitted she sometimes gets slugs in her bivvy bag). As we drove back we discussed the next social swim; or even a swimming weekend…
Oh my goodness… I see my last post was in January, almost half a year ago! Why has life got so busy for everybody? There I was, thinking I’d like to do some more freelance writing – and blogposts are always a sort of incentive that pushes me in that direction – and lo and behold it’s the middle of June and I haven’t written about any of the things I might have done. In fact, so quiet have I been that one or two people have commented on it!
The main thing at the beginning of the year was that I changed jobs. Having handed in my notice just before Christmas, I was due to start my new job in mid-March. Normally in the past when I’ve changed jobs I’ve found the last 2-3 months quite relaxing: I’ve known I was moving on and having been able to backpedal a bit and just making sure I’m not leaving too much of a mess. On this occasion I felt really passionately about the properties I was dealing with, so it was quite difficult to let go and even more so to leave without making sure things were in as ‘tidy’ a situation as they could be when I left. I was busy!
Then, of course, there was the whole thing of starting a new job post-Covid. In this hybrid working world – which I do think is great – it’s really difficult to get to know your new colleagues, as you don’t see them every day. However I’ve been going regularly to Leeds and to Penrith and trying to talk to as many people as possible (quite often the person by the kettle will be from Natural England rather than the Environment Agency, but that’s led to some interesting conversations too!). The job is great, but obviously there’s a lot to learn: but what I love is that (unlike in my previous job) I’m now being paid to – expected to – use my previous knowledge and experience for the benefit of the organisation. My whole career has been based on the principle of managing properties effectively and professionally, and in the best interests of ‘managing public money’: I’m genuinely expected to act on those principles now.
Meanwhile I’ve also been tutoring on a Planning and Development course, which has linked in neatly to my job as Biodiversity Net Gain is the current hot topic. I won’t rant on about it here though as I need to break this up with some photos and describe some of the things that I have got out to do outside work: it hasn’t been all about work, even though I do feel as if I’ve been working 5.5-6 days per week (and I know that’s a lot less than some people do).
I’ve realised it’s easier if I just do this like a small photo album, as there are actually several things I’ve done and not written up. Once upon a time I would have printed off photos and stuck them in an album: nowadays they get filed digitally and then all too often forgotten…
Bella and I went for a walk. In fact we didn’t just do one walk, but two. I love the fact that my daughter now thinks I’m OK enough to spend time with: we sing in 2 or 3 of the same choirs, and she wanted to go for a walk with me. Having walked up a hill and back down again (c.10km) we then in fact did another walk around Penrith of c.10km. I can’t remember the name of the hill – I think it was Branstree – and google maps isn’t any help. The weather was gorgeous, although cold, and I just loved being out with my daughter. There was more to the walk than just looking at scenery as there are reminders around the area from when Haweswater dam was first built, and the valley below us was flooded by United Utilities (in the 1930s I think), in order to provide water for the people of Manchester.
In May we had a trip to London, which included having some fantastic food and ‘art gelato’. The restaurant we had lunch in before we came back, Lahpet, was an eye-opener for me: I really wasn’t at all sure that I’d like ginger salad but it was amazing (and I could hear people at the next table saying how much they liked it too). We also went on a riverbus and to the opera, and I managed to run each morning – partly as we were staying with friends and Caroline runs each morning, which spurred me on (something I have failed to do since getting back home: I’m not a morning person).
Earlier in the month (or it may even have been April – time has been flying), Penny and I ran the newly opened Eamont Way. This is a trail of about 4 miles which takes you from central Penrith to Pooley Bridge. We decided to run it from Pooley Bridge, up to the A66 just outside Penrith, and back. There are a fair few gates and stiles but it’s great to have a new mostly-off-road route so near to Penrith.
photos thanks to Penny
It’s actually been pretty chilly this year, until this month (June) and so those of us who swim outdoors purely for pleasure, rather than ‘seriously’, hadn’t been swimming until recently. However we finally managed a fantastic swim in Bassenthwaite and a picnic afterwards. Although we started off in wetsuits (apart from Laura’s son Jake – to whom all credit for being prepared to go swimming with his Mum and her friends), everybody then swam without wetsuits for a bit (so much freer – I really dislike the way my wetsuit, even though it’s a swimming-specific one, restricts me).
photo credits a mixture of Penny, Laura and me.
Another ‘first’ was running up around Priest’s Hill at Newcastleton with Rosie, and then paddling in the Liddle. We’re hoping to do this again sometime and follow it with a swim, if we carry on having good weather. More summer adventures to follow anon, I hope!
I worked for several local authorities ‘down south’, at most of which I dealt with property issues in relation to their leisure centres; which also inspired me fairly early on to get into exercise more, at which point I also trained and qualified as an aerobics teacher. When I moved to Carlisle I joined the Board of the local leisure management company. Something I wondered about straight away was why the city had no leisure centre which combined both ‘dry’ side and ‘wet’ side.
The Pools was on its last legs; there’s a beautiful old Turkish baths in the older part of the building (which a local group is trying to save), but the more modern part contained three swimming pools in buildings which – despite dating from the 1960s or 70s (at a guess) – were on their last legs, as was the pool plant. It seemed to make complete logical sense to provide a ‘wet side’ facility at the Sands centre, the main leisure centre in Carlisle which had a large gym, a sports hall, and a large hall which doubled up as an auditorium.
This has now finally happened. The newly-refurbished, extended Sands, opened in mid-November last year and today I finally got around to going for a swim there and having a look round.
It was great. There is a lovely new 8-lane pool, which at 8.30 on a Sunday morning was empty enough that I had a lane to myself. I liked the changing village; they seem to have learnt from the mistakes and problems of other changing villages, and so the cubicles are spacious and well spread out and there are also cubicles immediatly opposite the showers, which are also each in cubicles (so if you like to strip off and wash properly, you still can).
The gym looked fab. and there are two studios; one of my other new year resolutions is to try to start going more regularly, and in fact as I have to fetch Bella from Carlisle most Wednesday evenings I think I will try to go to the gym and for a swim before I fetch her.
What was also nice was that a couple of staff recognised me. One I hadn’t seen for years, since I used to take Edward regularly when he was a toddler and there was a creche he could go in. Once he was at nursery and I was back at work, I never seemed to get to the leisure centre; and then other things got in the way like school runs and, more recently, Covid. I went swimming a couple of times at the Pools during Covid, but that was all.
It feels as if everything was on hold for 2 or 3 years; something which struck me last night as well. Rosie, Penny and I went up to Kielder Forest to do the Dark Skies 10km run. I have done this run twice in the past, but as one of the organisers commented, it hasn’t run for 3 years. Last year (Jan. 2022) it was due to be held but I think the weather was too bad, and our entries got postponed to this year. The route was different from before, perhaps because of Storm Arwen which caused such havoc last January/February. I didn’t enjoy the revised route so much as there was more tarmac and less winding through trees, but it’s still a magical run: especially when a full golden moon comes out from behind the clouds and lights the sky up.
Penny was staying at my house as Tim was away doing motorbike stuff for the weekend. When we got back to Brampton the Urban Wood Fire pizza guy was in the square. I had a haggis pizza, which was ace! It made us think we’d do a Burns Night run in a couple of weeks, followed by a haggis, neeps and tatties meal.
I’m now thinking of doing the Dark Skies 10 mile run in March; which takes place the night before the Vocal Classes for the Music Festival (I have only entered 3 classes this year). And having spent most of today in Carlisle – including going to two services at the Cathedral, as Bella was singing in the choir – I’m looking forward to spending more time locally this year. I hope.
runningin3time 