Manx Rover's Ramblings

“To come here, I disregarded my doctor’s advice, pooh-poohed my son’s pleas, and didn’t once pray for divine intervention,” stated Bryn with defiant steeliness. “And you know what? I don’t give a Continental!”

Occasionally, birdsong brightened the sharp morning air with the magic trills not heard on the mountain tops. The stark beauty of the Lake District National Park gave way to the well-tended patchwork of a tamed landscape.

Dew Drop, or Bryn as we later learned, was lively and engaging company. It took only a couple of pints to transform the mischievous rapscallion of the mountain tops, into an independently minded nonconformist. 

Even though he experienced great difficulty walking, Bryn was eager to revisit the Lake District; the playground of his youth. The staggering shuffle across the mountain tops was his first respite in many years.

At Angle Tarn it was easy to understand the bond that connects mankind with the land. No claim of contracted possession, only the ‘oneness’ that extends back to ‘The Beginning’. Our Land! An extension of ourselves! The land we sprang from, the earth we’re part of, the place where we belong and to which we will return.

Our farm-stay digs were a foxhunters Mecca. Mounted above the sideboard, in a display cabinet, a fox sat perfectly still amidst a stage-set rural scene. The stuffed animal fixed would-be diners with an unblinking glassy stare.

It was madness to overlook Wainwright’s haven whilst distracted by a ‘Test Match’ silly mid-off or long leg. After all, ‘the wise man, when he walks, just walks’.

Neither birdsong nor creaking trees are heard in that desolate place. A chorus of gushing waterfalls and gurgling streams is the music of the mountaintops.

That night, the long forgotten sleep of the innocent came to call. Not a single sound spoiled the silence of the black night. The farmhouse, well-rehearsed over centuries, was up to the task of refreshing guests with the spiritual nourishment of untroubled slumber.

The air was chilled and humid, the breeze strong and blustery, and the sky dark and low. Unlike the furtive mist that caressed the cheeks, the storm’s calling card was a shotgun blast of icy droplets full in the face. It was when battling the misty storm that Mr Catastrophe whispered, ‘G’day’.

Ramblers get lost at Greenup Edge! However, just below this confusing ridge is the easiest walking of all the high-level sections from St Bees to Robin Hood’s Bay, and is certainly something not to be missed. The all-round views are amongst the most dramatic in all Lakeland.

Below, nestling by a lake is Grasmere – reputed to be one of the prettiest villages in England, and once home to the eighteenth century poet, William Wordsworth.

‘Good morning’, everywhere to everybody by everyone.

Often the path was a stony rivulet with runoff gushing around large boulders that doubled as steppingstones.

Gaelic ‘drumlins’, formed during the last Ice Age adorned the landscape.

Even though the day had been dull, damp and dismal, the walking had been exciting, the weather exhilarating and the landscape spectacular.

The Royal Oak Hotel, ‘William Wordsworth slept here’. Minestrone soup, Cumbrian roast ham with the biggest jacket potato I’d ever seen, and to finish off – pear Bakewell tart. Good night!

What lay ahead wasn’t suburbia in the greenbelt, but untamed mountainous country, made wrinkle-free during the last Ice Age.

A ragged ceiling of cloud hung close and dark overhead. All about, exhausted climbers lay scattered on the marshy yellow ground recovering from their exertion.