Our England and Scotland Adventure: Day Three (19 August)

We said goodbye to the Burton house early Sunday morning

and made the three-hour drive to Grahame and Jo's other house in Penrith, at the edge of the Lake District. Although the weather continued to be a bit less than summery, the landscape began to hint at the beauty that lay ahead.

When we got to Penrith, Bob instantly made himself comfortable in the living room,
but was roused out of his comfortable chair when we decided to head out for a pub lunch at this homey establishment,
complete with a field of grazing cows right beside the car park. In addition to reminding us that we were in Low Hesket, this sign also informed us that we were 292.5 miles away from London (gotta like that half-mile):
Sunday lunches at this particular pub are generally quite crowded, so Grahame called ahead to reserve a table. After our delicious (and enormous) meals, we were very glad he did! (I went with the Sunday standard of roast beef
while Bob had the steak-and-ale pie . . . with some additional ale on the side, of course.)
After lunch, we passed by Long Meg and Her Daughters--a distinctly different set of Cumbrian residents. Long Meg is a large red sandstone and "her daughters" are a large set (some say 65; some say 69) of smaller granite stones which form a nearby prehistoric circle, close to 400 feet in diameter. Legend has it that it's impossible to count the stones twice with the same result; I don't know about that, but I certainly found it difficult to take a photo that showed the impressive scope of the circle! (For two great aerial photos of the circle, have a peek here.)
Long Meg is an imposing stone on its own,
and its spiral markings are pleasingly distinctive.
Next up was the lovely town of Appleby (full name: Appleby-in-Westmorland):

Grahame knows Appleby well, since he was evacuated there for three years during the war; in fact, this is the very house in which he lived:
The oldest part of St. Lawrence's Church dates from the 1100s

and its organ (containing parts from the 1500s) is the oldest working organ in England.

Just as we were leaving the church, Bob and I noticed a small, dimly lit room that seemed to be full of clutter. On closer consideration, it turned out that it was what I'll call the bell-ringing room, with numbers on small squares of carpet
underneath the pulleys that controlled various bells.
Imagining someone climbing onto the stack of wooden boxes, grabbing a pulley and then aiming for a particular square of carpet made me wish I could see the real thing! The River Eden flows all around Appleby, contributing to the relaxing atmosphere of the town:


Today was only our first day in the Penrith area, and the distinctive red sandstone of the region was definitely endearing itself to us.
I liked the names and images on many of the cottage nameplates

and Lady Anne's almshouses (founded in 1651) were beautiful, making good use of red doors to highlight the sandstone's rich hues.
After we left Appleby, we made one more short stop at Mayburgh Henge, a large stone set in an amphitheatre-like valley,
thought to date back to 2000-1000 B.C. as a community meeting-place. On a far less historical note, the reddish Cumbrian stone walls that crisscross fields throughout the region seemed equally (even more?) picturesque:

Our day of rambling meant that we had earned an evening snack of cheese and biscuits--not just any cheese, mind you, but Hartington Stilton (for me; Bob doesn't like blue cheese and had an aromatic Brie instead):
I am happy to report that Hartington Stilton is indeed delicious and that I was lucky to have it more than once during our time in Penrith!

Our England and Scotland Adventure: Day Two (18 August)

Grahame and Jo took us for a bit of a ramble today, turning a misty, rainy day into a lovely afternoon of villages, delicious treats, and (of course) picturesque scenery, including Sudbury Hall

and the stone walls and livestock of which we never get bored.

Even when we got caught in a bit of a traffic jam, there was a curious puppy watching from his window to keep us amused.
Our first destination for the day was Hartington, a quaint village of stone houses with a pond at its centre.


Grahame headed straight for Hartington's Old Cheese Shop
to stock up on a few cheeses, including their award-winning Hartington Stilton, and then we headed across the street to have a pub lunch at a friendly spot that offered food and warmth to the large numbers of walkers that had been out in the surrounding countryside.
My lunch was fantastic: a whole rainbow trout with veggies and beet-infused couscous.
Jo and Grahame had other ideas for dessert, so we left Hartington after lunch and soon arrived in Bakewell, which we learned is famous for its “Bakewell Pudding.” Although several places in town claim to serve the original Bakewell Pudding (also known as Bakewell Tart), our guides steered us right to the most authentic place in the village, appropriately called The Original Bakewell Pudding Shop.
The menu was filled with tempting desserts, but we figured we should try the shop’s signature dessert, so we ordered a Bakewell Tart for four:
An amazingly addictive concoction, Bakewell Tart was first made around 1860 when a cook apparently misunderstood a strawberry-tart recipe, layering the egg mixture on top of the tart instead of mixing it into the pastry. I can’t really describe the wonderful gooeyness of a slice of Bakewell Tart covered in hot custard, but let’s just say that we were very pleased to have been guided to this dessert. We had a quick browse through the downstairs shop before we left, admiring the different sizes of tart that were available to take home (I’m not exactly sure how we resisted buying another tart, but somehow we did).
On our way back to Burton, we drove past seventeenth-century Chatsworth House, where we enjoyed views of the house
and the surrounding “wildlife”

before continuing home to gaze out at the rain from the warmth of the cosy living room, with hot drinks and conversation to complete another relaxing day in the country.

Our England and Scotland Adventure: Day One (17 August)

Bob and I caught our 10:25 A.M. train from London—the trip was as smooth as could be, with the usual sights

and the added perk of free tea and coffee on board, even for lowly second-class passengers, with the train only making one stop before we reached our destination of Derby at 12:05 P.M. Bob’s relative (first cousin, once removed, to be exact) Grahame kindly picked us up at the station and once we arrived at Grahame and Josephine’s home in Burton (full name: Burton-upon-Trent), we were treated to a delicious lunch, dumped our bags in our cosy room,
somehow managed to tear ourselves away from our amazing view of Jo and Grahame's expansive back garden,
and headed out for Branston Water Park. Now in Canada, this would mean that we would have taken along our swimsuits in preparation for twisty water slides and splashing around in several chlorinated pools, but in England the words water park mean just that: a park that centres on water. Built on land reclaimed from a gravel pit, the park’s paths are lovely places to escape from the nearby highway
and the water part of the park isn’t bad either, with plenty of birds enjoying the open space.

We came across a canal and were sad to see that we had just missed out on watching a boat go through the lock,
but were pleased when we turned the other way and realised that another boat was just beginning to make its way through scenic Tatenhill Lock.

Grahame, Jo, and Bob got involved in the physical labour of getting the boat through the lock (I was, um, busy with the camera)

and we chatted with the boat captain, who thought we were taking a break from our own boat. He asked me where our boat was, and I said, “Well, right here!” and pretended to step down onto his boat, before admitting that we were just taking a stroll through the water park. Next thing we knew, the couple offered to take us on a ride down the canal, as far as we felt like going! Bob asked Grahame and Jo if they were interested in a ride, and they said they wanted to walk down the canal toward the car park, but encouraged us to enjoy our ride, so off we went for a brief stint on the water and even at the helm:
We felt lazy compared with Jo and Grahame,
and except for a bit of nervous steering every time we came close to another boat (I handed off to Bob when this happened), we thoroughly enjoyed our cruise down the canal.
A quick goodbye to the real captain of the boat (a coach driver who de-stresses by going considerably slower along canals on his days off)
and the boat itself
and our new friends were off.
We returned home for a bit of a relaxation before supper
and went for a lovely early-evening walk afterwards, through a bit of Burton and the surrounding parkland.

We saw quite a few swans on our walk,
including this rather oversized one in Stapenhill Gardens:
At the end of our first day away, we definitely felt like the rush of London was behind us.

You'll See It First Right Here, Folks!

Well, we got back to London last night, still a bit stunned at all the wonderful places in Scotland and England that we saw in the last two weeks, and even more surprised this morning to find that it's already September--how did that happen? Anyway, check back soon as photos will start pouring in (once I get myself organised), including one of the Loch Ness monster! Yes, WE FOUND NESSIE and will no doubt be collecting our millions of £s as newspapers, magazines, and TV programmes around the world clamour for our photo. I did an oral presentation on the Loch Ness monster when I was in grade 4, in which I concluded that Nessie did not exist and anyone who believed otherwise was a very silly person, much to the dismay of a few of my believing classmates. Is my grade-4 self ever embarrassed now!