The Lake District

We are to spend a week in the Lake District with John's cousin Elaine and her husband Alan. They have been here many times and are keen to show us around. It is the home land of William Wordsworth well known for his poetry....
"I wandered lonely as a cloud....." Frankly, the clouds around here have far too many friends.
We have a great cottage in the tiny village of Dockray with a view of paddocks with sheep and on occasion, 3 Highland Coos.

 

We walked a lot, in and out of the rain, and in the land of many cups of tea, I drank coffee. How contrary can one be. We also drank beer....

This is an area of high traffic with tourists, mainly walkers. They are littered along walking paths around lakes, up and down dales, on top of mountains and generally all over the roads. I think they like to keep the sheep company.
It was a busy week doing, made more interesting by Alan's challenge for John. You know John likes a challenge, more particularly, when it involves beer. Alan invited him to drink 20 pints of local beer in the week, but each one had to be a new experience, one never tasted before.
Did he succeed......silly question.

We visited Hadrian's Wall which was a defensive fortification in Roman Britain. Begun in AD 122, it ran 117.5km extending  west from  Segedunum at Wallsend to near the village of Bowness-on-Solway, which is pretty much the width of Britain, a huge undertaking, which was pretty much completed in 6 years. The wall was constructed to keep the barbarian Picts from Scotland out of Roman Britain.



The Wood fired bread oven...really!



In amazing condition



It is as straight as a di too

A lot of the wall remains intact today with markings made by Roman soldiers still visible today, if you know where to look.
It was a week of seeing a lot of new things which we enjoyed and a good few jokes thrown in for good measure.
Thanks Elaine and Alan....