LAKE DISTRICT - MARCH 2020

We always go away with Mr & Mrs S around February time to catch the fells when they have their snow blankets on. However, this year was different. Our niece, Eloise, had passed away on 16th January after her second battle with leukaemia. Although she had beat it both times, her little body just gave up from all the harsh treatment. Being a Christian, Eloise loved Jesus and believed wholeheartedly that was her saviour and because of her trust and faith, we know that she is now in heaven with Him. Eloise climbed her first mountain/Wainwright in November 2018 for Mrs S'd Dad's 60th, which you can read about in ****. Eloise also wrote her little bit at the end which shows her testimony in itself...

The credit of finding the cottage goes completely to Mrs & Mrs S who offered to find one due to us not being quite in the right frame of mind or even having the energy. And what a find it was too! It has to be one of the best ones we've stayed in for size and comfort and perfect views all round...

Living Room

Dining Room

Kitchen

Our Room

Dining Table..& Planning Room!

Downstairs Bathroom

Downstairs Hallway

Mr & Mrs S's Room

Upstairs Bathroom

More of Upstairs Bathroom

Upstairs Spare Bedroom

Downstairs Spare Bedroom

View From Conservatory

Upstairs Hallway

View From One of Living Room Windows

Living Room...And Mrs F 😊

Patio Area In Garden

Outside, Which Looks Like A Bungalow!

We arrived at the cottage about an hour earlier than Mr & Mrs S. In fairness we arrived a couple of hours than the instructions said we could arrive, but wanted to go and see if we could at least drop our stuff in before heading into Keswick for a bit of grub, as we didn't want to leave everything in the car. We had the pick of the room this time, so Mrs F tested the beds to see which was the comfiest, as everything else doesn't really matter, it's just a room where we sleep at the end of the day. We had the downstairs double room, which worked well for not having to tackle the stairs at the end of a hard day and with the morning stiffness 😉  Mr & Mrs S arrived and we all unpacked and headed into Keswick for some much needed food. We went to our faithful weatherspoons - all we needed to decide was weather to load up now and eat light later or eat light now and load up later. We with the the load up now!

Mr F had read in the visitors book that red squirrels roamed around just outside by the waterfall. We didn't see any when we first arrived, but on and after the first morning we saw them everyday 😃

DAY 1: GREAT MELL FELL

              LITTLE MELL FELL

Mr F Hunting For Red Squirrels

We planned on using this time away for a few reasons. For us, we hadn't had any time to stop and reflect on everything that had happened with Eloise and really needed to have time to do this away from work and everyday life. Neither of us actually had any time off following her funeral, which was on a Friday and we were both back to work on the Monday. We also had a celebration of her life service which was incredibly emotional too the following Saturday, working in between and straight back to work again. We were both broken emotionally and mentally and wanted to use this time to slow down, pray and come to terms with everything. The truth is, it never has truly sunk in, so a week away was never going to be enough time for us to think about and really accept it. It was however a good time to recharge and just do nothing other than our walks out on the fells each day, which in all fairness weren't overly strenuous days. Mrs F doesn't normally like to nap during the day as it often means she can't sleep that night and will often resist the urge to sleep in the afternoon. But this week, she completely gave in to napping and still slept through the night, as did Mr F, which just goes to show how much we needed it.

For Mr & Mrs S, they had not long made the decision to leave church and move to Hastings to be near Mrs S's sister who was very quite poorly. So they had a lot going on too, but it was nice to be able to recognise our individual needs for this holiday and be in different places comfortably around each other.

As mentioned, the days for the week weren't overly strenuous and this was largely to do with what Mr & Mrs S still had to tick off their list nearby, which were all quite low. If we were here on our own, we'd have stretched ourselves and ability much more, but were fine just to be out doing what we love each day. Sadly, on this day (and for the first time ever!) Mrs F didn't take her camera. As Great Mell Fell & Little Mell Fell are bot low ones, photos wouldn't have been overly exciting! We drove to the bottom of Great Mell Fell and was a gradual steady walk up to the summit. It was a bit steep in some places, where Mrs S struggled a bit with her breathing. Mrs F however felt really quite fit and strong and Mr F had to keep telling her to slow down and wait for the group. It was slightly further than we remembered it and didn't spend too long at all at the top due to it being windy and not very nice in weather. It was literally a straight up and straight down the same route. We didn't even take our rucksacks out of the car. We got back in the car and drove to the bottom of Little Mell Fell, which is lower and even quicker to get up and down. Mr F spotted some frog spawn in a deep puddle near the start and wanted to scoop some up to take home...Mr F said no!!

Our first day leg stretch historically is never a first day leg stretch, rather a hit the ground running blazing in! This however, was the first time ever that our first day leg stretch was just that! It was in good time too as the rain came shortly after we got back to the car. As we drove back towards to A66, the rain eased so we decided to head to Glenridding quickly to collect something that we had made for us. There is a lovely little shop in Glenridding that sell the most beautiful models of dry stone walls, which are all made by a lady who used to build actual walls using the same method. These models however are made of little pieces of slate. We asked if we could have a bespoked one made of Hallin Fell summit with Eloise's name built into it, as it was her first and only mountain she climbed. After Glenridding, we headed back to the cottage to chill out for the rest of the day. Mrs F was on dinner duty that night making chorizo and pasta with garlic bread, which we eat whilst watching Spy. The TV had Netflix built in, so Mrs S signed in and we could could watch films 😃

Views From The End Of The Long Windy Road From Our Cottage

Mr F Having His Nap

Eloise's Hallin Fell 💗

DAY 2: HIGH RIGG
              RAVEN CRAG

We didn't have our usual crazy rush around getting ready morning, in fact they were the most relaxed we've ever had! We had breakfast in the conservatory whilst watching the squirrels and having a general chit chat. It was quite cloudy over our cottage and pouring down with rain, which really wasn't overly inviting! We logged into the public camera in Keswick High Street and surprised to see that it was dry and calm. It was clearly raining just over by where we were and OK in others areas; we just didn't know if those other areas were where we planned to go! But, as we're not fair weather walkers and have all the gear - and we had driven all this way to be on the mountains - we decided we best start getting ready....

Getting Ready In Shelter Of The Porch From The Rain!

Today Mr S drove. We had to drive up a long windy road until we couldn't go any further with the car and the road we had left to drive on. We found a good spot to park with only a short distance to the start of our climb. There was some kind of geocaching fell race on High Rigg. People were heading off in controlled waves and picking up their map from various boxes. We think that once they had found what they were looking for on one map, they touch it with an electronic band and come back to get a different map from a different bucket. We stopped just before the start line of the race to look at the best way to the top and had no choice to walk right through the racers at the start line. It looked like it was going to pour down at any moment, but it was incredibly windy...

We didn't take too many photos as the weather was really windy and we were trying to find where the summit was. The terrain was very up and down and all over the place, basically not your average one obviously way up to a higher point with clear paths. So we reached what we called the summit according to the Satmap, but then we saw a higher ground that looked more like the summit. We spent the best part of half an hour making our way over, when Mr S checked his Satmap and guess what...the first one was the summit after all! At this point we needed lunch, so Mrs F battled against the winds to see if there was a sheltered spot a little further down from where we were. When she turned back, the group was nowhere to be seen. So she headed back up and still couldn't see them. So she walked back from where we had just come from...and still couldn't see them! At this point she was starting to panic a bit as she could hardly stand up due to the overpowering wind and no point in calling out because no one would hear over it. It was a good couple of minutes - although it seemed much longer - before Mr F came back to find her along with Mrs S lower down...a mini search party! Mrs S was already in a wind shelter further down. Mrs F wasn't best impressed with the fact that everyone went off and left her, but Mr F said they all thought she had gone off to have a pee and was gong to catch up with us afterwards. Panic over, we all sat briefly in the wind shelter but wasn't much of a shelter, so headed back towards the main road where the car was parked...

The Start Of The Race

Heading Up There...Somewhere!

One Of Few Obvious Paths

Slight Views From The Top

As we were ticking off all of the local ones that Mr & Mrs S hadn't yet done, this was a case of going around and mopping up all the little dotted ones here and there. So our next point of call was driving to Raven Crag. We done Raven Crag when Mr & Mrs S wanted to have a day off when we were here before (see 2016, November entry) but the weather was truly awful in terms of low cloud so the view from the top was pretty much non-existent. Today was much better, although there was still lots of cloud, it wasn't as low as before so had a good chance of actually seeing the view this time.

The bridge across over Thirlmere reservoir/dam to the start was closed for maintenance, so we parked literally by the barriers and walked over the bridge. We did make a joke that after all this effort we bet Raven Crag would be closed. When we got to the very start of the climb up, there was a notice that we thought was saying just that, but it was saying that rock climbing was forbidden throughout certain times of the year so not to disturb the birds who are nesting in the rocks. Lucky for us, we weren't rock climbing so could proceed...

Thirlmere Reservoir/Dam 

Making Our Way Across The Bridge

The trail at the beginning was very different to when we climbed it. The trees were all cut down for some reason and quite sad to see. It was quite a steep climb, but then again the lower ones tend to be just straight up with not much trail to the top...

The Start Of The Steep Climb

Mr & Mrs S catching Their Breath

The Rock Face Which Was Closed For Climbing

Once we were passed the horrible tree graveyard, we were on a forest path trail, still heading up. Mrs F saw what looked like some kind of big foot print in a wet section - it was really big and bare foot shaped with toes, not a flat boot front, but the toes weren't individual toes....very weird!!

Big Foot Print!

Making our way up

Dead Trees All Around 

We came to a familiar section of the walk where there was a new looking tall gate fixture. We got there first as Mr & Mrs S was taking their time to make their way up the constant incline, plus Mrs F needed to pee out of sight! 😕 Once all together and through the gate, we took a left turn onto some very well placed decking, that looked very out of place but a welcome to the legs. Mr S & Mrs F went up ahead with a good non-stop rhythm on the go and Mr F stayed with Mrs S on a comfortable 'we'll take our time' rhythm 😃 The decking route went on for a little while, which we imagine in wet weather would be quite lethal. Once at the top, the view was great, which was nice to actually see this time around...

Mr S Steaming Ahead On The Decking Steps

The Top!

Mrs F tried to get a self timer photo but it was too windy and the camera fell just before it took a photo! Not wanting to risk damaging the camera and with the weather closing in, we turned around swiftly, bearing in mind it felt like rain was imminent and had the decking to walk down... 

Thankfully, the rain held off with just to odd trickle with the threaten to rain. We followed the same route back, although Mrs F took a slightly diverted route straight down through through the dry fern towards the end. We headed back via a quick stop at the shop in Glenridding where we bought more juice and tins of soup for our lunch...and some chocolate 😋 Back over by the cottage, sure enough it was raining! For some reason, we were under what seemed like the same cloud that followed Linus around in the peanut comics! For that reason, we were quite happy to each have our showers and chill out with our lunch in our lounge wear with  no intent to head back out. It was a bit bizarre to spend most our time in the cottage rather than outside on this holiday and something we all seemed to be ok with...clearly the break of doing not much really is what we all needed. Mr F was on dinner duty that night with the help and assistance of Mr F. We had the most delicious steak cooked to perfection with chips, roasted peppers and salad. There were only two dinners for the week where we sat to the table for dinner ans this was one of them; the rest of the time we just sat with dinner on laps...very relaxed environment indeed 😊

DAY 3: MRS S'S BIRTHDAY!!

             ANGLE TARN PIKES

             BEDA FELL

So we were going to take breakfast in bed for Mrs S's birthday, but instead, we made breakfast for the conservatory where we put all of her pressies and cards and played Stevie Wonders 'Happy Birthday To Ya!' from the bottom of the stairs..on repeat! 😀 We sat and watched pressies being opened in the conservatory with breakfast on a very chilled out morning. Of course there was the usual red squirrel or two rushing around just over the stream which was always really lovely to see each morning. 

Mr F decided that heading over to Angle Tarn would be a nice birthday walk for Mrs S, being the most popular place to wild camp in the Lakes and with Mr & Mrs S being camp fans, it was a good choice. We peeled ourselves away form the conservatory - almost reluctantly - and started the routine of getting ready for the mountains. The weather was set fair but slightly more towards just about alright! The sun broke through the clouds on a quite a few occasions at the beginning of our walk but then didn't come out much after that, but remained bright enough. 

We parked in our old faithful lay-by spot just by The Red Lion pub in Patterdale. From there we had a short walk over a bridge and down what looked like a private road with a few houses on the right. One of the houses had made a swing out of what looked like leather all put together to look like a horse, it was really cleverly done. Towards the end of the road was a massive house and the road carried on bending around to the left where we walked through a gate and the start of our climb. It was a really lovely gradual walk in towards Angle Tarn and one we have walked on many time before, but still really enjoyable with great views and not overly arduous... 

Loving Being In Our Favourite Place Together 💗

Our Gradual Walk In

Our Usual Grouping, Mr S & Mrs F Up Ahead And Mr F & Mrs S Behind

The walk in to Angle Tarn was quite long one. We came to a section of the walk where we could have turned left off the path and head straight for Angle Tarn Pikes or carry on following the path around to Tangle tarn where we connect up to it from there. As Mr & Mrs S hadn't yet been to Angle Tarn, we went with the latter. There was actually a group of people who were pitching up when we got there and as always, a pleasure to see. We were hoping to see some wild deer as we have always seen when over this neck of the woods and spoke with certainty of seeing some, but sods law, this time there were none!

Angle Tarn

From Angle Tarn, we took a left hand turn on a faint path leading up the side of the mountain towards the summit of Angle Tarn Pikes where we had a really good view of the snowy mountains...

Snowy Mountains In The Distance

From Angle Tarn Pikes, we made our way over to our second mountain for the day, Beda Fell. The handy thing was, we had already gained all our height at this point so didn't have to drop down. It was a short walk out and back to the summit, which meant passing Angle Tarn Pikes again to retrace our steps back down...

Mrs F Loves A Low Level Water Shot!

Once we reached Beda Fell, we stopped for lunch in a spot that was out of the cold bit of the wind as much as we could. We had a great view of Hallin Fell from where we were, seeing the same route we took with our family from the car park and back down again. It was actually quite emotional to look at the only mountain and route that Eloise ever climbed 😢 Mrs F was grateful for her hot Ovaltine, as the longer we sat, the colder we got, so we didn't stay put for too long. We up'ed and gathered ourselves, doing what we call an 'idiot check' making sure no one has left anything behind and made out way back via the same way we came up...

Heading Up To Beda Fell Summit

Views From The Top

Our First Group Summit Photo of The Trip 😊

Mr F Looking Over At Hallin Fell

Hallin Fell Just Ahead of Us

Mr F Wearing Mrs F's Hat That Actually Really Suited Him!

A Few Steep Steps Along The Route

The Boys Stopped At A Good Photo Moment

On our way back, we stopped at the bridge just over the road from where the car was parked to play Pooh sticks! We each picked our winning stick and lining up ready to make the simultaneous drop into the river below and rush to the other side to see who the winner was...it was Mr F! 😀

As it was Mrs S's birthday, we planned to have dinner out, once again in our old faithful Weatherspoon pub in Keswick. It was nice to actually get dressed into clothes after a shower and be made up to go out rather than straight into our PJ's. The drive to Keswick form our cottage was a 20 miles round trip; we planned to play a new board game that Mr & Mrs S bought us for Christmas called 'Jumanji' which is based on the new films that we all love. Mrs F spent time putting the stickers on all the dice and reading through the instructins, but by the time we got back to the cottage we were all pretty tired and OK just to chill out for a bit before bedtime. A good birthday day for Mrs S 🎂

A Toast For The Birthday Girl!

DAY 4: CASTLE CRAG 
              KESWICK STROLL

Today was a pancake breakfast day 😛 We always have a lazy 'take it easy' morning where Mrs F has the time to make pancakes...and make pancakes we did. For the first time we sat at the small breakfast table in the kitchen which was a nice change to the conservatory. Our intention today was to climb Place Fell, which is the biggest mountain to where we were staying and one that Mr & Mrs S still had to climb. However there was the issue with the rain. All this week we have found that we can't judge the weather based on where we were because it was generally ok once we go to where we had planned our day. So on that basis, even though it was raining quite hard, we still packed our things and headed out for Place Fell. We parked in the exact same spot as we did the day before in our little lay-by, however the rain was still coming down and dint look like it was easing off. We sat in the car to give it 10 minutes and each time it eased slightly and someone said "It's easing off" it just starred back up again! Mr S was really quite keen to just go for it, putting his case to us that we all had waterproof gear, we weren't fair weather walkers,  we walked in worse and so on. It was like the scene from Peter Rabbit where Peter wanted to put the carrot in Mr McGregor's backside and Benjamin Bunny was telling him no...Mr S: "I think we should go for it" Mrs S: "No, look at the weather!" Mr S: "I think it'll be ok" Mrs S: "Seriously, look at the weather!" Mr S: "It'll be fine" 😃

After much deliberation, we were all in agreement that it was just too wet to be making a big climb, not that we are indeed fair weather walkers, just taking the comfortable option. Mrs F made the suggestion to instead go and climb Castle Crag, which was much much lower, a lovely walk in and a great view from the top - if the rain was easier over by Grange. It was fair drive to Grange (the village where we need to park up for Castle Crag) and the rain had stopped, which was a bonus that meant we were going to at least climb something today! We were going to leave the rucksacks in the car but as the weather was still unpredictable and very moody, we needed to take extra layers with us, so took them with us.

As always, the walk in from Grange was really lovely as always, however we did notice one difference which was the water level which had risen significantly. There is a section along the bank where we could normally sit or walk past on the stones that was now all under water from all the rain that we had recently had. After walking through the short forest walk, we turned left up a bank of water and out inot the open with the big rock face to our left, which i s a very popular place to rope climb. A short walk and we took a left hand turn towards the start of the very familiar and recognisable loose slate zigzag route up to the summit of Castle Crag, which lead out into a short undergrowth of trees that opened up to the top...

Walking Through The Rising Waters

Mr F In His Newly Claimed Hat

The Short Valley Walk Towards The Start of The Slate Route

Mr & Mrs S Making Their Way Over The Streams

Mr F Peaking Through A Dog Hole

Mr & Mrs S Following Suit

Didn't Quite Get Mr S In...Try Again...

...Nope!

A Short Staircase To Walk Up 

The crouched Walk Through The Undergrowth of Trees

The slate walk was broken up into two sections; there was the initial push from the staircase which lead onto a flat open area with a cairn a good view, where we saw a group of people and then we carries on up the slate t the summit...

A Friendly Cairn just Before The Summit

Spectacular View From The Top 😊

Mr & Mrs S Up On The Plaque Rock

Our Second Group Summit Photo

The rain held off completely which was great and gave us a bit of time to just chill out and admire the view with the snacks we were glad we brought in our rucksacks. As Mrs F was tucking into her packet mini cookies, a little Robin Red Breast flew down right in front of her. We imagine he was accustomed to having people feed him and recognised the familiar sound of rustling food packets. Mrs F threw some crumbs down for him which he gobbled up and tried to coax him into her hand and he looked like he was contemplating it, but was disturbed by the group of people who were also making their way up. We soaked up enough of the view and started to make our way back down via the same way we came up. It got quite windy on the way back which gave us intensive to get a move on back to the warm car. As it was still quite early and as per custom, we decided to take a stroll around Keswick where we went into the Old Sweet Shop where Mrs F bought the customary chocolate cups for her Mum, honeycomb for herself and a big nougat bar for Mr F. We then went for a coffee in Costa, courtesy of Mr S 😋 We wanted to go for a local cafe but according to Mr S, the cups are too smal!

Mrs F was back on dinner duty again with the assistance of Mr F, making her famous lasagne and chips. However, we didn't have a rectangular oven dish, so Mr F got creative with snapping the lasagne sheets to make some kind of Chinese puzzle of pasta layers! It was still delicious and well received. This was the only other time we sat to the lovely big dining table for dinner...

Mr F's Creative Pasta Layers!

DAY 5: PLACE FELL

Today was going to be the day to climb Place Fell regardless of the weather! We were out earlier than usual as we had a big day ahead of us and made the familiar route back to Patterdale and once again, was parked in the exact same spot as we have been all week. We made our way along the same long road past the horse swing and big house at the end, through the gate at the end and along the gradual incline towards Angle Tarn, However, we came to the cross roads section of the route where instead of carrying on towards Angle Tarn, we took a sharp left turn and started the long slog walk up towards the summit. It was a really windy day and of course, wet! It was just as wet as it was the day before, so may as well have just gone for it after all!

However, we were committed now and there was no stopping us. The route up was a very clear path that was on the steep side but gradual, so not too painful. Poor Mr F's rucksack rain cover had blown away because Mrs F noticed it was no longer on his rucksack! The amazing thing is he didn't even notice! By this time the rain had eased slightly so it wasn't too tragic. The boys did venture off slightly to see if they could see it, but it was no doubt somewhere in Scotland by now with the hard wind. We carried on to the top, which was further than it looked, almost a false summit and the wind made it so much harder, it was just relentless. In fact, it was so bad that we weren't able to get any photos!!

From where we were it looked like the summit was 'just there'...but it wasn't! There was an incredibly windy section of the route that bend around into what felt like a wind tunnel and a real push through. Just beyond that was an enclosed section with high stone walls either side and a welcomed break from the wind. We were quite ahead of Mr & Mrs S so were sat in there for a good few minutes before we saw them both clutching at each other and pushing through the same section we had just gone through. We all sat there for a while, enjoying the break from the wind and even had a little scooby snack. We were getting cold so reluctantly had to get moving again, back into the wind we go. We were eventually onto more level ground at the top where we made a short walk to the summit, again, battling through the elements. There was no place to have lunch due to the weather and we didn't hang around before making a turn back. We were also mindful that Mr F didn't have a rucksack and didn't want him being caught out in a massive downpour. As we made our way down from height, the wind naturally eased off which was nice for all of us. Once we were back at the bridge just before the car we again played Pooh sticks and this time, Mr S won....so victory on the Pooh stick front for the boys 🏆

We headed straight back to the cottage where we took no time at all fully utilising the radiators. Towards the beginning of the week we could boost the heating up but then it must have been capped remotely because it was capped at 25, which was still hot enough for what we needed. It carried on raining and didn't stop for the rest of the day, which made the stream at the back really flow hard with the rising water. We read in the visitors book that we could turn on the beck lights that lit up the water at night which was really lovely. There was a little baby rabbit that we had seen on our first day in the garden and saw him again taking shelter under Mr F's car from the rain which was really cute.  It was still early afternoon so we had lunch and decided it would be another Netflix day. Mr S had told us about a series earlier in the week that he'd watched a while back called Godless - a western set in the late 1800's with Michelle Dockery (lady Mary from Downton Abbey) We decided that we would watch a couple of episodes and see how we liked it. After the first episode, we liked it so watched the next one straight away. After that, we were hooked and continued to watch the entire boxset, starting at 2pm, stopping only to have toilet breaks, grab drinks/snacks and for Mrs S to make dinner, which was pizza and chips so could just lay it all out on the living room table and carry on watching. We got to the last episode and was going to call it a night but then decided, we're on holiday and we don't have to get up early...why not! We finished watching it all at juts before 11pm!! It was a fantastic boxset...clearly!

The Rabbit Taking Shelter

DAY 6: AIRA FORCE & DRIVE

As the weather was pretty rubbish to start the day (again) Mr & Mrs S decided to drive home that day. We were due to go home the next day anyway and they didn't fancy heading out in the rain and they had lots to do back home. They also wanted to give us a day to ourselves to go to Aira Force and find the log that has the coins our nieces put into it when they came, which was a really special thing to us. We spent the morning together having breakfast and chatting in the conservatory before Mr & Mrs S packed up and headed back to London.

We shortly after headed out whilst it was still raining to Aira Force, but there was a great view over by Blencathra...

The car park was literally just at the end of the long country road from our cottage to the Ullswater road. To use the actual car park for Aira Force, we would have had to pay £4.50, but we were only going to there for less than an hour. So we parked in a lay-by back along the country road where we could cut through another way. It was still raining but had eased off and we were heading through the forest towards Aira Force anyway so it was fine. We have always previously walked to Aira Force through the forest via the car park, over the bridge and past the log with all the coins. However this time we were heading down the steps by Aira Force and back along the path towards the car park, so looping around the other way...

By Aira Force Waterfall

In Fall Swing

The 1958 Step We Spotted When We Came With Family In November 2018

We walked along the path a little whilst looking out for the log. We had a photo of their coins so finding them would be easy once we found the log. The log was literally just on the edge of the path so we would stumble across it along the way. However we were reaching the end of the path and still hadn't seen the log. We walked back as far as the waterfall and still didn't see it and as it was literally on the edge of the path it's pretty unmissable. Mrs F looked at the photo she had on her phone to see where abouts it was and it dawned on us that an empty section of the path that was slightly wider was where the log once sat. We were of course quite perturbed and so walked to the car park where there is a National Trust information centre. We asked the young lady in there where the log was and she said that it had been removed and destroyed, taking the coins and using them for donations to preserve the local red squirrels. This was absolutely devastating news for us. Mrs F couldn't contain how hurt and upset she felt and cried. The lady looked quite concerned and Mr F explained that the log contained a coin that our niece had put in and that she had recently passed away. The lady was really apologetic looked quite upset herself. She explained that banging coins into trees was promoting it around the forest and the copper is very damaging to the trees, so the decision was made to remove the log which would hopefully discourage people form doing so. She did offer for us us write a card and they would hang it on a tree, but we didn't take her up on the offer.

Mrs F said that although we were always going to go back and find Eloise's coin at some point, she'd rather have not known that it was gone and kept the memory to it full as it was 😢 Here are the photos of the log taken when th girls added their coins...

Erin Placing Her Coin In

 

Eloise & Evie's, Which Would Have Been Easy To Spot

We were both feeling really low after that and as it was still raining, we didn't just want to go back to the cottage, so we took a little drive. We stopped off at Glendridding where Mrs F bought a 'proper sized' Tracker bar, not like to small rubbish sizes you get nowadays!

Check That Out!

We then drove to Grasmere where we had a little wonder and Mrs F thought it would be nice for us to have lunch in a little local cafe somewhere. We looked in a few cafe's at the menus before deciding to go to the one we did before with Mr & Mrs S quite a while ago, but remember it being really nice. And really nice it was too! We shared a turkey & cranberry panini and a cup of carrot soup, which was soooo nice! Mrs F had a spiced hot apple and Mr F had a black coffee...or Americano depending where you're from! 😀

After that we had a little wonder in an antique store and Mrs F bought some Gingerbread from the famous Grasmere Gingerbread House for herself and her brother. We still didn't want to head back to the cottage, so Mr F stopped the car by a construction car park just a little way from Pooley Bridge. The new brisge was being built, so cars couldn't go in and out via the old bridge, so we had to park up and walk over. The sign said it was a 5 minute walk to Pooley Bride village, however it was still raining and it was more like a 10-15 minute walk!! As we were upset about the log no longer being there, we decided it would be nice to have a drink in the same pub we all had lunch in with family. However...when we got there, it was all being ripped  out and under refurbishment!! So apart from the cottage we stayed in (that we drove past) and Hallin Fell of course...oh and The Red Lion pub, the memories that we wanted to re-live today were no longer there 😊😭 We went into the gin shop, as not much as open due to the low trade form the bridge being shut, which was quite sad. On our way back, the rain was hammering down! We got back to the car soaked and headed back to the cottage to start the process of packing up. We watched a film on Netflix and had to remember to sign out of Mrs S's account before leaving. Mrs F wrote in the visitors book as we always like to do. Our dinner was a mish-mash of what we had left, although when we were in Glenridding earlier in the day, we bought a small pizza to go with our remaining chips and fish.

The morning of going home came and we always feel sad to be doing so. We headed out around 7am via the Pennine's which is our preferred route to the dreaded M65, which is much prettier too. Until our next visit...

VERDICT OF THE LAKE DISTRICT IN MARCH 2020

Mr F: It is always great to be away however this trip was more about a change of scenery rather than getting up high in the hills. Emotionally wrecked and did not really have anything too brutal in me. Mr and Mrs S were amazing support at this really hard time. Lots of lower Wainwrights ticked off and just some time away. Weather was not too kind but it wasn't really about being out for 12hrs a day...Cottage was great and had everything we needed even a red squirrel every day. 

Not our usual trip for sure but nice to be away with our best friends...

Mrs F: This trip was very different for many reasons. Different because we were both still very brokenhearted after our niece passing away, because we didn't do any hard climbs and both felt quite strong to do so and the amount of time we spent in the cottage compared to being out on the mountains. In all honesty it was what we needed; we didn't need to go full pelt as we always do and made a nice change to just take it easy and recharge our bodies as well as our minds. Just being in our favourite place was enough. The cottage was really cosy and definitely one of our favourites, so spending time inside was actually really comfortable. But we do just love being out enjoying the views and the happy feeling we get, regardless of it being a long hard day or a nice easy walk. We were of course in a different place mentally and the coin log and pub didn't help. We do however have such lovely memories of when Eloise came to our favourite place and will always be thankful to God that we were able to climb a mountain with her. We really loved the cottage and the fact that we had red squirrels come everyday, I even had one right behind me when we were in the conservatory, just sitting in the fence post. We ere slightly limited by the rain, but that's never stopped us before, we just chose not to go out in it as much this time. Place Fell was certainly a challenge and one of the windiest days we've had on the mountain, but the sense of achievement is so much bigger. So even though it was a different kind of trip, different was still good...