Visiting the Lake District and Scotland

[Bobf]

The Brits will know what the crowds will be like, the place is set up for mass industrial tourism. We were very lucky with the weather and the crowds were minor -- non existent really -- in mid-September.

Mid-September is good as all the kids have gone back to school (1st Monday in Sept), and there is as good a chance as any of good weather. It's often a case of: if you don't like the weather now, hang about for half an hour and something different will come along (not necessarily better you understand, just different...). July and August are school holidays so avoid like the plague - ditto Easter and August Bank Holiday.

Ken: May is also a very good choice but there are a couple of bank holidays (7th and 28th) this year which means those 3-day weekends will be busy if the weather is fine (or even if not fine - they breed a hardy bunch in the north-west ).

Keswick (pronounced Kez-ik - a lot of place names around there are from Anglo Saxon times so matching spelling to pronunciation is often optional) in the north is less busy than Windermere or Ambleside. This gives you fairly easy access to the northern lakes, and Derwentwater is on the doorstep. A boat trip around Derwentwater or Windermere is a good option for the elderly - there are a few stop-off points you can jump off at and explore, then take a later boat to finish the trip.

A drive from Keswick along the Derwentwater shore and down in to Borrowdale (a very picturesque valley), continuing round and over the Honister Pass (1st gear required in parts) passing (or stopping in) the slate mine and along Buttermere (a beautifully situated lake) to Buttermere village for a pub lunch in the village followed by a leisurely walk/photo-op around the lake (3-4 miles mostly flat) is a mighty fine way to spend a day... The approach to the lake from the village is quite rough: 300 yards of farm track - stones embedded in clay/mud - very easy to twist an ankle. However, there is a pay car park (you will spend a small fortune on car park fees in the Lakes) owned by the farmer at the other, Honister Pass, end with much easier access to the lake shore.

Put "Buttermere" into google and hit "images" to get some idea. Go back to Keswick the way you came - you can complete a big circle by turning right just before the village but the scenery is less interesting and the roads are even narrower...

This is up/down country on narrow country lanes with the road only slightly more than two car widths wide in parts (sometimes less) sometimes with sheer drops on one side (but usually guarded). The roads were made for horse-drawn carts and no one ever got around to widening them...

Have fun, Bob.

[Frank Petronio]

I lost the damage deposit on our rental mini-van -- I wacked the side view mirror on the stone walls several times, cracked the airfoil under the bumper on the hills (dumb design) and taught the 80-something church-going grands some new parts of the English language. So if you drive those narrow roads, try to get something smaller rather than larger, or just be patient and go for the lowest insurance exemption.

[CP Goerz]

Hey Frank,

Its no accident that the most beautiful part of England happens to be next to Scotland....it only gets better the further North you go.


CP Goerz

[Ben R]

I love the lake district, got quite a bit of work from there on my site www.beni-art.net, but I went there last week and it almost put me off completely, horrible amount of tourists, litter everywhere including an abandoned tent even! Driving was a nightmare. My best shots there are from the winter when it's snowing and it's probably no wonder why. On the other hand almost all my Scotland stuff is mid summer. Scotland is far better in mid summer, the days are so long that when you are shooting early and late most people are safetly tucked up in bed or out of the way, Scotland is big enough to cope with the tourists, I found that the Lake District was too small and claustrophobic mid summer for any artistic mind set never mind photography!

[Helen Bach]

If you are going to visit Northumberland, fight your way past the other tourist and see Alnmouth. The entire town was almost destroyed when the awful pirate John Paul Jones, so-called 'Admiral of the American Navy', fired a single playful cannonball from the Bonhomme Richard at what his pilot (a Scotsman, taken on board at the mouth of the Firth of Forth, ie near Edinburgh) may have thought was Bamburgh (pron. Bambruh) castle. He missed Bamburgh and hit Wooden Farm, just outside Alnmouth. The cad. Later he sailed south to beat HMS Serapis at Flamborough Head in a very unfair fight (the Serapis was a fine, well-armed, new copper-bottomed Royal Navy ship and the Bonhomme Richard was a weedy old armed merchantman with unreliable guns). He must have been a naughty cheat as well as a cad. Well, he was born in England. The Wooden Farm American Revolutionary Cannonball may still be sitting beside someone's fireplace. I'd ask for it back if I were you. Imagine how much you could get for it on eBay.

On the other side of the country, ie not so far away, is the quiet Solway Firth. Just north of the Lake District, but usually a million miles from tourists. Here famous photographer Raymond Moore took many of his famous pictures. Silloth, Allonby - once these were resorts. That's one good thing about the central Lakes - they corral all the tourists into one place. The fringes north and south are usually much quieter.

Enjoy yourself,
Helen

PS I'm from Northumberland, and used to spend almost all my free time climbing and walking in the Lakes - I had a tiny cottage beside Buttermere.