LAST DAY IN WINDERMERE

Time to move on.  Our biggest challenge of the day is to get everything that came out of the suitcase back in the suitcase.  Not too exciting.  Our only plan is to go out for dinner at a nice pub not far from where we are staying and it has a nice views of the lake.  I had discovered the pub on a walk and although close to the busy area of Bowness on Windermere it's in the opposite direction of the shops and the downtown.  Consequently a lot of tourists I don't think find it.  It was a lovely way to end our stay.

Made our last trek up the hill to our abode.

We had a cup of tea together and then we adjourned to our very own bedrooms ( don't think that will happen again) to sort out the packing .  

This is when I wish I still wore that 28AAA bra.  Every inch is precious.

Tomorrow we will be picked up by a cab and we will be off to Harrogte.  The journey is about 2 hours through beautiful countryside. I wonder what adventures await us there.

A few parting shots of Windermere.

Our home away from home.  Not great pictures but you can see what a nice place we had.  Four bedrooms, 2 baths, kitchen, diningroom, and livingroom.  The diningroom remained pristine during our visit.

Not so pristine.  Help yourself breakfast.  

Just a few scenes.

And now we're ready.

AMBLING IN AMBLESIDE

Rain, rain, rain.  We waited a bit and decided that if we were going to get out we had best get on with it.  We donned our rain gear and headed to the bus stop to catch the 599 to Ambleside.  The 599 appears frequently so we were not concerned about whether we'd be spending another day at bus stops.  We went prepared:  Visions of lovlliness as befitting the Beautiful Women from Iona.  

We are obviously in disguise.  

None of us were hungry yet, very hard to believe so we decided to just wander around the quaint village.We did a little looking, buying is really out because room in suitcases is scarce.  Sharon however found a shirt that rolls up into it's pocket.  Certainly room for something like that in a bag.  I volunteered to carry it for her in my backpack so she could rid herself of the package.  I told her I would only carry it however if she rolled it up into the "pocket bag".  Here she is demonstating it on the streets of Ambleside.  I should have captured the man standing there laughing at her but I would never take a picture of an unsuspecting person.

Well, maybe sometimes one just has too.

No trip to town, or anyplace for that matter would be complete without a stop at the local pharmacy.

I remember when no trip to town would be complete without a stop to find out what was happening in the clubs.  Now it's  what happening with drugs, which one will help backaches, colds, allergies, red eyes, need I go on.  I could, you know. 

We were finally hungry and of course we had done some restaurant recon while we were out browsing and had a place all picked out.  

We were taken to our table and ordered a glass of wine while we studied the menu.  Oh I forgot one person didn't order wine.  Miss " Goody Two Shoes".9

And here's two of the lushes.  There were three.

We ordered and our food was delivered.  Here's mine -

 Yes both bowls.  I did share a couple of carrots and one potato.  Generous aren't I? It was delicious.

Wait a minute.  What is this? See what happens when you don't drink wine you have to take pills.

Our waitress was a doll and gave us a few tips on what to see before leaving Ambleside.  We were ready to go.  Almost...

Toilets and Drugstores.  Two of our most cherished signs.

The wait staff was so cute and when they heard I was doing a blog they wanted their pictures posted.  I could hardly blame them for wanting to be on my site.  I don't know what their mothers' would think since here in our apartment we cannot view our blogs because they have TALK TALK, their home safe settings blocking it because of content.  I told Sharon to clean up her act so we can acess it at our next place.  ( It has to be Sharon's that's causing the problem!)

We headed to our first destination, Bridge House.  This house was built over a river so that the owner would not have to pay land tax.  If they charged by the square foot and he had built this on land I really don't think he would have had to pay much.  This has to be the worl's smallest house, It did sleep a family of eight however. Notice the outside staircase leading to the 2nd story.

We were just heading to our next destination when ...

No! that is not one of my Alaska pictures that got in here by mistake.  That is a dog, believe it or not.

Believe it.  I would not try to fool you.

We next headed to St Mary's ,one of the oldest churches in Ambleside.  It is currently used by an Anglican and Methodist congregation.  It looked very old from the outside but had a light, more modern appearance in the interior.  

It was a good day and I have to sit back and reflect on a couple of things.  A few years ago, well maybe more than a few " The beautiful ladies from Iona" phrase might not have been so funny.

JoAnne woke up this morning and after getting dressed and joining us in the livingroom  bragged that she had all clean clothes on.  When did that start to be a topic of conversation.

That's it folks. Lights out!  

DAY WITH A BUS

You are probably thinking the title of this blog is in error.  It should be A DAY ON THE BUS.  That's what I would like it to have read but the truth is we spent more time waiting for the damn bus than on it.  We were on our way to Keswick for the day.  We hopped right on our bus here at Bowness and went to Windermere to catch the 555 to Keswick. Yippee a day in the lake crountry.  Well... we waited, and we waited a bit longer. and a bit longer.  Finally, you know what happens after breakfast and you've had a few cups of coffee.  We were all rather desperate to find a toilet.  Big problem, many choices - wait (could result in disaster down the line), run to the toilet and run the risk of missig the bus for Keswick, or just go and catch another bus going someplace else. We decided to avoid any accidents (panty liners were not made for these accidents, only Depends can be relied upon and we had failed to purchase any for this trip.  We are saving that expenditure for our next trip here in 10 years.)  Again, way too much info.  After we finally found a toilet and used the facilities I am happy to report that the 555 to Keswick had not yet arrived.  Weren't we lucky.  So we waited, waited, waited... 

( I do want you to know that we didn't just stand around and wait, we asked mulitple bus drivers, by standers, and anyone who would listen to us, if the 555 would ever come.  Each assured us "it's on it's way, traffic is bad".  Finally, we made the big decision to take the bus to Ambleside which had just pulled in.  Buzzard's luck.  No sooner were we on the bus than the 555 to Keswick arrived.  You should have seen us jump off that 599 bus and rush to the 555.  No one would ever have believe we were almost ready for Depends.  

You may have wondered ,why did it matter where we went and why had we felt it necessary to get to Keswick.  It was the pencil Museum.  Our castle mates had told us about it.

 Here we are starting out our day. Don't we look happy and relaxed.

At the bus station in Bowness.

Much later.  Waiting for the 555 in Windermere.

At last we made it Keswick and had a great little lunch becase we were starved.  Waiting for buses will do that to you.

Finally, we found the Pencil Museum.  It was surprisingly very interesting.  Pencils were used during WWII to get maps to POW's and others behind enemy lines.  They were specially made pencils with a hollow interior and maps made out of silk or other materials that wouldn't make noise were inserted into the pencils and a small compass was hidden in the top where the eraser is located.  They had to look and feel exactly like a standard pencil.  Graphite was extremely dear and because of this it was sought after and stolen.  Consequently the term "Black Market" came into being.  Theives who handled the stolen goods found themselves with black hands from handling the material.  Just a few of the interesting tidbits we picked up at the museum.  We were also given a free pencil. Well, not exactly free we had to pay € 3.50 admittance fee. You don't have to be one of the beautiful ladies from Iona to get that low cost you just have to be a concession , translated, senior citizen.  

The rest of the day we just  moseyed around and enjoyed the little town of Keswick.

Went to the bus stop early so we could catch 555 bus going to Windermere.  Surely we would not have the same problem again.Well...

Here's Ginger thiking that if she read the bus schedule again and again maybe, just maybe, the 3:13 bus would arrive by at least 4:15.  

The bus did arrived and we got off in Windermere and found a little restaurant, ate some dinner and walked home.  It was a lot of steps!!!!!!

I decided to sit down by the Lake for awhile and watch the sunset and the swans.  

And so ends another night in the Lake  District.

EXPLORING

We were told Monday was to be a beautiful day and so we had decided to take advantage of it and take a boat trip on Lake Windermere.  Imagine our disappointment when we looked outside and it was overcast. We looked on the bright side and decided to dress warm and go out on the lake anyway.  It wasn't raining and that was a plus!

We boarded a steam engine boat and proceeded on a lovely trip up to the Lakeside area of Windermere.

Truly beautiful scenery and some magnificent homes with  lovely grounds.

Although a bit chilly initially the sun was starting to come out and by the time we docked it was turning into a beautiful day.  We had a great little lunch at St. Martins Tearoom and then split up.  JoAnne and Ginger elected to stay in the home port and Sharon and I decided to take the bus to Grasmere.

On the bus we met a local who heard us talking about getting some exercise and doing some walking. She recommended we get off at Rydal and hike the "coffee trail" to Grassmere.  " A lovely hike , about a mile , mile and a half."  We got off the bus and began looking for the trail. We asked a couple of people where the "coffee Trail" was.  We finally met someone who thought it began at the top of the road.  We were lucky enough to meet some hikers coming out of their hotel and we asked them where the "coffee" trail was.  They asked if we meant "the coffin walk?"  ( Oh, these foreign languages). We decided that must be it.  

Before starting we discovered we were right by William Wordsworth's home Rydal Mount so decided to buy a ticket and tour it. It was his home for 37 years from 1813 until his death in 1850. Pictures were not allowed inside but we were able to take some of the gardens. The garden was designed by the poet and is considered to be an outstanding example of a romantic style garden.  The home us owned by the direct descendants of the poet and remains a family home.

Finishing our tour we headed out to start the coffin walk. After looking at the hill we had to walk up to get to the "easy" trail we knew why it was named the coffin walk.  

That doesn't look bad but believe me it was steep!

We finally started our walk and were anxious to see all the beautiful vistas.  It really was beauiful but here was my view most of the time.

Yes. I was staring at my feet which were trying to navigate the rocks,water, inclines and declines.  Not easy for a beautiful woman from Iona who happens to be getting on in years.  When I did manage to look up I did see some wonderful scenery and the walk was worth it.  We met people along the way.  

We slowed down to let these teens pass us.  Teenagers have such a time with self image these days.  We wanted to do our part to make them feel good about themselves.  They could go home that evening and tell their parent's how they overtook two old ladies on the coffin walk.  (Good deed done for the day).

You are probably thinking that a lot of these pictures show Sharon from the back so I must have been behind her the whole walk.  Let me assure you those pictures were staged.  

We volunteered to take a picture of a mother and her daughters if she would take one of us. We are selfish that way.  We only sat down for the pictures, we were not in the least bit tired. oh if I have to be honest, Sharon was :-)!

We finally came to the end of our walk and there was a stone which we thought for sure had to be for the walkers to rest on.  We learned that the stone was actually used to rest the coffin on while the bearers rested.  Knowing that we trudged onward into Grasmere. 

At last relaxing and quenching our thrist.  

I had been looking for a hotel that I stayed at years ago with Terry and some friends from England and was just about to give up when we happened upon it on our way out of town.  It had changed of course but still had the lovely feeling about it.  It was that visit to the Lake District that made me want to return.

And so our day ended.