Pooley Bridge, Rookin House Farm, Keswick

Pooley Bridge, Rookin House Farm, Keswick

 

First thing after breakfast, Mom called Rookin House Farm – a sort of adventure tourism destination over near Ullswater – to book a 90 minute trail ride.  I had planned to either hang around and read or look for a nearby walk, but while she was on the phone, I changed my mind and handed her a note asking “Do they have room for both of us?”  The answer wound up being that they did have room on a ride at 2:45 PM.  Please be there by 2:30. 

 

That left us with 5 hours to figure out what to do with.  We walked over to the Post Office where there is also a cyber café so I could post journal entries and we could both check email.  I learned while there that the internet connectivity they have is a barely reliable two way satellite.  If the picture content of the entries posted on 1 May is a little thin, that’s why.  Their connection kept going out.  The proprietor is very excited that in two months, the phone company will be upgrading the services into Keswick so he can get a decent high capacity landline.

 

While we were doing mail, a bunch of stalls were setting up in the square for Saturday market.  We nosed around there for a few minutes.  I bought a dried fruit trail mix that wound up being lunch.  Mom admired a few sweaters but restrained herself.

 

Since Rookin House Farm is near Ullswater anyway, we decided to drive to the village of Pooley Bridge at the northern tip of Ullswater and walk the first part of the walk I mentioned in my things I hoped to do entry earlier.  We parked at a two hour spot in the village and started along the path.  We were on our way up (and I mean that more literally than it is sometimes used) a fairly lonely track in minutes.  It brought us up behind the outlying farms, letting us see down into their fields.  Pretty soon, we were high enough that the whole village and much of the lake were visible.  We shared the way with a few dozen other walkers, a few cyclists, and a few people on horseback.  I suppose this was the big bank holiday weekend crowd we were warned against. 

 

At the end of the paved road about two thirds of a mile from where we parked there was, of course, a parking area.  It wasn’t on my map, so I had no way of knowing.  Mom sweetly said nothing, nor gave any sign of dissatisfaction at having walked so far so needlessly.

 

We had our dried fruit (including crunchy banana chips) and water lunch at a spot with a great view and noticed that a bunch of sail boats seemed to be lining up for some kind of race.  We never did find out exactly what the event was, but we got to watch the progress of the struggle all the rest of the way up and down.  After about an hour, we came to a stone pile that was on the map and decided to walk on to something on the map called the cockpit.  We weren’t even sure what it was, but it was just far enough away to turn our walk into the round trip we wanted, so we decided to do it.  It didn’t hurt that we were basically on top of the hill now and had a fairly level path to the cockpit. 

 

When we got there, it turned out to be another stone circle.  It’s not in quite such good repair as Castlerigg, but still looks appropriately indicative of a lot of hard work by people using stone tools.  Groups of other people were strewn around the place having late picnics and taking in the scenery.  We congratulated ourselves on having decided to walk to it, then turned around for the quicker and easier downhill walk. 

 

Garmin Facts:  3.27 miles walked in 1:20 minutes of walking with 26 minutes of rest for a moving average of 2.4 mph with 469 feet climbed – about the equivalent of 40 stories of stairs.

 

Because downhill was so much quicker than up, we had some extra time.  We decided to take the scenic route around Ullswater.  Happily, it was not too narrow and terrifying.  I still only caught some of the scenery out of the corner of my eyes, but it was basically an easy drive.  Mom says the views were great.

 

We were still ahead of our time at the farm, so we read on a picnic table while different parties shot clay pigeons, walked their daughter around on a horse, shot targets with arrows, or warmed up these obnoxious little gas buggies for stunt riding.

 

When we went in for our ride, we discovered that we were filling out the last two spots in a groupthat was otherwise made up entirely of a hen party.  If you don’t already know what that is, try to figure it out while you read this otherwise useless sentence.  Hen party is just British for the party a bride-to-be’s female friends throw for her.  Now an organized trail ride is a little tame, if you ask me, but I have no evidence as to what they had done before or were doing next.  The young woman who was playing mistress of ceremonies had sprung it as a surprise on the rest of them, including the added surprise that she didn’t intend to go with them. 

 

Unfortunately for the entertainment value of this story, many of them were nervous riders, so the strain of being on horses kept them from any really noteworthy shenanigans.  It was at least funny to hear a bunch of twenty and thirty-somethings  yelling out “How are you doing, Hen?” from time to time.  The bride is referred to as Hen, and seems to bear it in good grace. 

 

It was a relief to me that I was not the least common denominator so far as riding skills went.  It had been at least 17 years since I’d been on a horse and most of my riding was 25 years behind me, but I didn’t fall off nor was I the slow rider dragging the pace.  Not that I can claim any great skill.  On the sort of trail ride we took, all you have to do to qualify is stay on top and keep the horse from getting distracted.  It does everything else.  As the only man in a group of about 16, I felt conspicuously token, but it turned out not to be a particularly social event anyway.

 

It was a nice change to see the views without either having to walk or fearing for my life behind the wheel.  Mostly, I was happy I could help Mom do something that was really her activity and share it with her. 

 

Easy drive back to Keswick.  We washed up a little then took a roundabout walk through Fitz Park toward town.  Fitz Park includes a cricket ground (the loveliest pitch in England, so post cards inform us).  Tonight, there was a game going on.  We watched for about 10 minutes until boredom began to thicken, then we kept walking around the park and along the river Greta.  Today was much warmer and clearer than weather we’ve seen so far, so we wanted to stretch the day.  Saw lots of people playing with their dogs.  A number of them had long handled, plastic atl-atl sorts of things designed to throw a tennis ball further.  Note: the dog derives no benefit from this if the human is such a bad shot that the ball hits a stump after traveling only 20 feet.  Much running and barking. 

 

Mom bought me dinner at a tasty Indian place called the Red Fort.  We practically opened the place, but while we ate, large tables started to fill up with large groups of men – apparently straight and apparently just groups of friends.  They were all talking about their various misadventures on the fells during the day. Not the sorts of clusters I’m used to seeing at home.

 

After dinner, we decided to walk down to the end of Lake Road to see where the launches tie up.  From there we could see a path that went on around the lake shore for a bit and into a wood.  From there we saw a path on to another wood.  For a change, it wasn’t me urging on a little further, but Mom.  It was a great soft evening to be walking around in, and even at 8:30, the sun was still visibly above the western hills.  I think in the end we went well over 4 miles including the before dinner walk around the park.

 

One amusing factoid – part of the footpath we took was sternly signed as a footpath only, not for people either riding or leading horses.  The head of legal services for the county council whose name was on the sign was a Mr B Walker.  I’m easily amused.

 

Just as it was closing on 9:00, we made our way back up Eskin Street to Hawcliffe House for the night.  I’m finishing up earlier tonight and hope to turn in before long and maybe get up for an early morning climb.  We’ll see.  I may wake up with sore spots from riding I haven’t experienced in 25 years.  I’ll let you know next chapter.

 

Administrative note:  I’ve got a decent connection today, so in addition to posting this entry, I’m also adding pictures to a few past entries.