30% Hills, Wast Water and The Rare Breed Goats

Woke to a fantastic start to the day, not quite the longest day but with the sun full on the fells at 5am it felt like it.

I decided to navigate today and take us across to the Western lakes as we wanted to visit a Twitter pal @RareBreedGoats in Wasdale.

I thought a nice trip up and down the Wrynose and Hardknot Passes would be a bit of fun. Didn't I ever end up in the dog house by scaring my husband half to death with the pretty 'interesting' roads. 30% or 1:3 is a little on the steep side and severe bends, all right, hairpins and narrowness didn't exactly help! Ahh well it's all character building. I might just add, we didn't come back the same way!

 

Some cracking scenery on our approach to the Wrynose Pass

 



 

 Looking back down the pass, only halfway up.

 

 

Looking up the pass

 

 

Nearly down, just a small case of gripping the steering wheel!

 

 

Got a good shot of a Common Sandpiper poking about in the rocks by the stream.

 

Had a bit of time to spare before the farm visit so we checked out Wast Water for an hour. The dogs really enjoyed the stream.

 

 

Some really nice views around Wast Water. We will have to come back to this area for a bit more exploring on another holiday.

 

 

Next came the visit to see the Rare Breed Goats. Apart from seeing and meeting the animals, walking through fields of golden buttercups and hearing how Richard is a great advocate for conservation in his farming methods we came away with some delicious home produced sausages.

 

 

Here come the girls, they had gone for a wander in the woods and Coriander the collie had to go find them for us. It was lovely to hear the sound of the bells drifting through the trees. There are only 150 (breeding?) female Bagot goats in the country and Richard owns 60 of them.

 

 

The goats are wearing different colour collars to help Richard identify the different bloodlines, it's a small gene pool and it really matters!

 

 

Next came the Highland cattle, who can resist these guys.

 

 



We met a few of the Herdwicks that are kept down at the farm for school visit purposes, all the others are up on the fells. The cattle had to get a look in too. 

 

Next came the boy Bagots. The were mighty impressive with their huge horns. The one to the right is actually scratching his back.

 

 

A good close up of the impressive head gear.

 

 

 The 5 Billy goats gruff....who's that trip trapping over my bridge!

 

 

 

 Now the little guy on the right, Jorvik, made the headlines a few months ago when he was born too early and was very small. Richard posted photos of him living in the house and he eventually had his 15 minutes of fame on the regional news. Richard tells me he has caught up with the other kids now.

 

 

Jorvik!

 

 

Well that was the last day of our holiday, the dogs had their last walk up the path to Place Fell. The weather had been amazing, the walking and cycling great and to meet up with 4 Twitter pals topped it right off.

 

 

 All packed and ready to go....perhaps see you next year!

 

 



 

 

Up Helvellyn!

19th June
I knew this walk was going to take a long time so we left the cottage in Patterdale just before 8am. As I was walking up the road to Grisedale, a man with a Labrador appeared. I remembered that one of my Twitter pals lived here and had a black lab so I asked him if the dog was called Morgan and sure enough it was @helvellyn out for his morning walk.

The first part of Grisedale was really easy going as there are a few farms up through and a beautiful valley with sheep and cows grazing.

 

 

Our walk for today, it looks a little bit far

 

Out on the path now, still the same view taunting me.

 

The view back down the valley, so glad I came this way, very pretty contrast to the fells.

 

The first real pull of the day was up Dollywaggon Pike. Just before I hit the slope I met a mountain biker who passed me earlier on the road and I had caught him up pushing his bike up the track as it was too rough to ride. He was doing the same route as me and looking forward to the downhill bit. He gave up running at 71 and now at the age of 79 he was scaling Helvellyn with a bike! Mind you it's hard to beat a rock lifting Herdwick, they breed them tough up here!

 

Grisedale Tarn with my cyclist friend just visible, pushing his bike. 

 

The dogs making the steep 'steps' up to Dollywaggon pike look easy, they even had time to look at the view as I was so slow.

 

Looking back down Grisedale, nearly at the top of this first and worse climb.

 

At the top of Dollywaggon Pike, too knackered to smile by the look of it!

 

Although misty, the views were beginning to get far reaching, distant lakes and peaks beginning to emerge.

 

This was looking towards Keswick.

 

 

Striding Edge.

 

I think I'll leave this, not a safe way down for the dogs.

 

 

This is Swirral Edge in the foreground with my zigzag route down, behind. Still a long way to go.

 

 

Ullswater.

 

Us on the summit of Helvellyn. How many walkers get to see it this nice?

 

Looking down from the summit to Red Tarn being flanked by Swirral and Striding Edges.

 

 

Another view of my route down, one of those days when I can't take enough photos. Ullswater stretching out into the distance.

 

Gily taking in the view and what a view we had!

 

On our way down the zigzags into a new valley, Glenridding. Our already travelled route in the background.

 

This has to be one of the scruffiest sheep I've seen..."Moi...scruffy, this is fashion daaarrling!"

 

The dogs found a nice stream to paddle in, by now the weather had warmed up a treat and it was hot going for the dogs.

 

 

Can't believe that we walked from the distant peak, look at that blue sky!

 

Ullswater and Glenridding. Even though I enjoyed the walk, this was a very welcome sight.

 

And now I have come full circle, back on the Grisedale path, and heading back down the road to Patterdale.

 

 

Our last few yards back to the cottage, time for a nice cup of tea! 

And finally....I think I managed to actually wear them out for once.

 

Haweswater Reservoir & Whinlatter Forest.

On Monday we decided to do a circular walk around Haweswater but unfortunately it was a bit of a disappointment. The reservoir was a pretty sterile place even though it is where you can see the Golden Eagle, which we didn't see. The start of the footpath on the west side was pretty to begin with but soon became very barren.

 

Looking back towards the dam.



Looking in the other direction of Haweswater.

 



 

Gily checking out the scenery.

 

When we reached the other end, 5 and half miles later we found that the eastern footpath was closed so we either had to walk back the way we came or 5 miles back along the road. We decided to go the road way as it was very quiet and we made good time.

 

This was the view of the far end of Haweswater from the road.

 

 

The highlight of the day was having a fantastic meal at The Ramblers bar next to The Inn On The Lake Hotel at Glenridding and watching the swifts screaming overhead, diving after all the flies.

 

WHINLATTER FOREST.

 

Fantastic day here at the forest. We were able to watch a live feed of the Ospreys nesting down in the woods. They had 2 chicks in the nest and the mother was keeping them cool with her wings out as it was pretty hot. I went for the 5 mile walk whilst Simon went on the biking trails. Finally saw some siskins from the visitors centre, we don't get these in our garden.

 

 

There was this beautiful sculpture of the Osprey in the car park.

 

The walk was everything that yesterday's wasn't apart from being a bit short. The dogs were straight off up the path, loving the woods.

 

 

 

 

The views from up the top of the walk were amazing today, the weather was incredible.

 

 

 

 Looking towards Derwent water

 

It looks as though it stays pretty damp here a lot of the time.

 

Me and the dogs having a shady time.

 

A couple of hours later we got back to the van and it was cooler to put the dogs in rather than have them out whilst we had our lunch.

 

 

Well it's a big day for the dogs and I tomorrow as we are off up Helvellyn. We are going to go the long way round, up Grisedale to Dollywaggon Pike, Nethermost Pike to Helvellyn. I'll have a look at Swirral Edge but not risk the dogs safety if it looks dangerous. Planning to go back down to Glenridding via the common. It will probably be about 13 miles and I think it's going to be hot! But it's what I've come here to do!

 

 

The views this morning of Glenridding were just beautiful, this was about 7am and it felt as though I was in Austria!