Doves

In the evening we went out for dinner with friends. We met up at the Villa Columbina next to Dove Cottage (well it IS Dove Cottage if you are 2000 years old :-)

It was our first time at this Italian restaurant and I was extremely impressed. We got excellent Italian food at reasonable prices and service that was absolutely immaculate.

Children are made more than welcome – they are treated like adults and this seriously impressed 10 year old TT. They also get child sized portions of main dishes if they want and doggy bags too. It was a 20 mile round trip, but well worth it to find a restaurant where they have such a complete but apparently natural understanding of what represents excellent customer service and value for money for families.

We’ll be back!

Ospreys

On Wednesday we went up to Keswick to see the ospreys at Bassenthwaite. Last year they nested across the lake from the viewing area, but this year they’ve moved house and you can get a lot closer. We just missed seeing the male bringing in a fish, but shortly after we saw Mrs No Ring flying and her mate took to the skies again shortly afterwards. It was quite simply magical. These birds are just so majestic that even a glimpse is worth the wait. Unfortunately there is as yet no camera on the nest, and although the foliage around has been cut, you can only get a glimpse when they are sitting.

Bank Holiday Blues

But for us in the Lakes it was the sky and not our mood! The North had a great weekend for weather (although looking at the BBC weather bulletins you’d never have know as they seem fixated by the weather South of Birmingham!)

A Bewildered Bride

So last week I was up at the lodge doing some work that needed a bit of seclusion.

I woke up early and took the dog for a walk up around Dubbs reservoir on a clean crisp late spring morning. It was so quiet when I stopped walking and stood fro a moment – all I could hear was the noise of the birds and the sheep. The sheep are SO LOUD. I never thought I’d write that but everything is relative and the sheep were by far the noisiest things around.

Halfway along the path I came across a wagon full of nettles – so odd that it needed a photograph!



And all along the walk there were the hawthorns, decked with may blossom. One blown over by the wind lay like a bewildered bride against a backdrop of the new green.

And all around the goldfinches swooped, the lambs leaped and the calves watched me walk past, so seriously, as though they knew the reason why.

Spring in the Lake District fills you with such constant wonder. You’d have to have no soul not to be affected by it!

Green Tourism

An interesting article on the BBC news web site today

"Leo Hickman, the Guardian's green guru, has just written a book, the Last Call, questioning if our love of travel can be sustained.

Predicting that surging oil prices might put paid to budget flights anyway, he advocates a "Goldilocks approach" to tourism: a three-year cycle of - flight one year, Europe overland the next, and holidaying in Britain the next."

We did it!

Well we took two days away on Tuesday and Wednesday to attend the annual Cumbria Tourism Awards as we had entered for the "Tourism Website of the Year" award.

We had a super time at the Castle Green Hotel in Kendal where the awards were hosted. We had a lovely view from our room and the service was impeccable.

We had lunch at The Watermill at Ings - one of the traditional Lakeland pubs where they serve bar food and great beer without any airs and graces - highly recommended!

In the afternoon we went for a lovely walk up Jenkyn Crag. The ransomes (wild garlic) are out and the scent was almost overpowering.


We were up against some very stiff competition for the web site award from 3 very professional outfits - Mullin Design, English Lakes Hotels and South Lakeland Parks who own Limefitt Park.

Nobody was more surprised than me when they read out the winner's name and it was US!!

The web site has taken up a lot of my time, and it was fantastic to see the effort rewarded like this. It was also really gratifying to see the way in which the other competitors were so generous with their congratulations!



We rounded off the trip with a visit to Levens Hall which was looking stunning in the spring sunshine. Well worth a visit!

What a weekend!

At last the weather has turned and we had a lovely warm weekend. We made full use of it and spent Saturday afternoon sailing on Windermere.

Well, as Captain "Birdseye" Mike observed it was more of a float than a sail as there was no wind, but there aren't many more beautiful places to float than halfway down Windermere!

A couple of pints at The Mortal Man and then home for a barbecue to round off a lovely day.






Next morning we took TT to Windermere to do some skateboarding at the skate park and then had a picnic down by Windermere and went kayaking.

I'm not sure about those ripples on the water now!



















Mid afternoon the weather turned quite dramatically and we drove home through an amazing thunderstorm with forked lightning everywhere and rolling crashes of thunder right on top of us.

What a great way to forget work for 2 days!

Walking

The QI section of the Telegraph recently had an article about walking.

It pointed out that a darts player can walk up to 15 miles in the course of a tournament (and that's presumably just on the return trips to the bar).

It also quoted St Augustine "solivitur amnbulando" - It is solved by walking. How many times have you gone out for a walk with something troubling you, only to find that by the time you get back you have resolved the problem and know how you will deal with it?

Nice weather for ducks

It has rained a bit of late and even the ducks have been taking refuge on the roofs! Still - it has been said that "There's no such thing as bad weather in the Lake District - Just the wrong sort of clothing".