by annette
Kendal, Hawkshead & The Lake District
Kendal, Tarn Hows, rain, mint cake
by Annette, aka Mum who is ‘a pig from another country, whilst in a small Cumbrian tea shop, because my scone made crumbs scatter all over the table’ (refer to Minnie next time you see her).
Thursday 30th September
Where does one start? We are staying at the YHA in Kendal. Our room is up approx. 12 flights of stairs in the servants quarters of a Georgian House; low beams, no window, but it is nice and cosy. I was imagining we would be doing 2 or 3 walks per day. We went to Hawkshead yesterday, picked up a rustic guide for a 2 and a half hour scenic walk to Tarn How and back. We were only half way through our ‘instructions’ ending up at the Tarn (beautiful lake) which took us about 2 and a half hours. Steve and I were secretly panicking we wouldn’t be back to our car before dark.
The ‘walk’ involved rambling across beautiful farms, through woods, across streams, along narrow lanes complete with dry stone walls (of course)- it was glorious. It’s just a shame the 16 year old guide was hard to follow, and also that we took a wrong turn which threw out the 2nd half of the journey. We had to walk back via the road before finding a gate we were familiar with, which calmed us all down, to finish up rambling across a farm, past a vicarage, through a church yard and back into Hawkshead.
It was an adventure (we got to eat our sandwiches in the pouring rain sheltering under a wooded area) but the girls don’t want to do another.
Friday 1st October
Today is non stop raining. Because of our efforts yesterday, the girls got to decide what we do today.
So, we are catching up on the blog. We are also going to a chocolate cafe where there are 18 sorts of hot chocolate to choose from. They don’t want to go outside. I’m going to check out Kendal though, soon.
PS. Kendal’s famous Mint ‘Cake’ as used by Tensing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary on their Everest journey.
Ingredients: sugar, glucose syrup, peppermint oil and water. Hmmm. I’m not even going to try it.
Aunty Donna says;
Love the pics! Looks like you ae really getting around. Fras and I landed in Auckland today, arriving on LAN Chillian flight! We wre booked on Qantas. The whole flight was spoken in Spanish, and then some English…First day IN NZ has been nice weather and friendly locals. Cheap alcohol, so F & D are slightly pissed!