Yvan Seth's Hole in the Internet

Cornwall, August 2009

Sun, 20 Sep 2009 20:38:00 GMT

I started writing a detailed account of our trip to Cornwall a couple of weeks ago. But since then I've broken the LCD on my poor little abused Asus Eee, I've lost my train-commute writing time for the moment. So, instead, here's a link to my photo gallery from the trip:

* http://yvan.seth.id.au/Gallery/v/Holidays/CornwallLongWeekend/

In brief then, as brief as I can get anyway. The Cornish coast lives up to all the hype, just stay away from anywhere you've heard of (unless you regularly read things like the National Trust guide book, like I do.) For example, Land's End and Penzance are lowlights. But Lizard (the amusingly named southernmost point of England) and Gwithian are breathtaking. But then again, I speak from the perspective of a South-Western Australian who's been thoroughly deprived of decent coastline for a decade! My personal highlights for the trip revolve around National Trust land, the trust owns a vast amount of coastline in the region.

Mouth of Boscastle Harbour

To keep costs low we took our camping gear with us for our overnights in the south. The first was my ideal for a campsite, a field out the back of a good real ale pub. Namely the North Inn in Trewellard, near Land's End, they do the most excellent soups ever! Can't complain at 4 quid per head for camping, including hot showers.

From Boscastle Harbour (including the nearby Tintagel), down the coast to Hell's Mouth and Gwithian (seals!), then avoiding Newquay to get down near Land's End via St. Ives — to our camp-pub. That's Friday, we started the day at 07:00 on the M4 just east of Bristol (M5 down towards Exeter, then A30 east above Dartmoor.)

Hell's Mouth

We were up very early on Saturday and took in Land's End, it felt a bit post-apocalyptic really. A cross between a London-fringe shopping mall and a theme park, but with the ring of an empty wasteland at the deserted time of 07:30. Not impressed we moved on along the southernmost coast, enjoying various random stops along the way. Via Penzance we got to Lizard, and some of the real jewels of the Cornish coast. Lizard and Kynance Cove are beautiful spots. We spent most of the rest of the day in this area, and Yaël and myself took our first swims (dips really) in the Atlantic, that leaves only the Arctic Ocean (depending on which model of the oceans you adhere to) for the both of us — who'll complete the 5 first?

Taking a dip at Kynance Cove

At the end of the day we made a lunge northwards, so I could reduce my driving time to get home on Sunday. This took us up into the south of Dartmoor via Tavistock (I must get back to have a closer look at this town), to reach the Langstone Manor campsite. This one was comparatively pricey at nearly 20 quid for the 3 of us (one pitch, two tents, and a car), but it was a good campsite. The best part of the campsite being the bar, alas it wasn't good on proper ale but they had some OK cider and excellent hearty food (lamb pudding!) I really want to come back here, it'd be a great base for some crisp winter moor hiking. All the better if you have a warm fire-warmed bar to come home to.

On Sunday we bisected Dartmoor on the B3357 then B3212, enjoying a short walk through moorland forest up to a small tor. Once out of Dartmoor we visited the National Trust's excellent Killerton Estate, including the house and garden as well as the mill down the road. I picked up 500g of English flour ground at the mill, which I intend to use to make a loaf of bread sometime soon (oh no, carbs!)

Dartmoor

Then it was the long slog home, M5, M4, M25, and finally the A1(M) – punctuated with the usual abysmal coffees at "services" along the way. It seems most journeys require a long slog of bad coffee… perhaps I should buy one of those vans with an espresso machine in the back, good way to get around?

Lakes Day 7 - Three Tarns

Sun, 16 Aug 2009 19:49:00 GMT

Great Langdale from The Band

We awoke quite early on our final day of real trekking, getting packed up and out of the campsite before our interesting neighbours from the day before even left their tent. It was an overcast morning, and it had rained a little overnight but our 4 inches of rain never showed up. It didn't seem imminent either, good news for the upcoming crossing! We were on our way by 0900.

This day's route took us back to Eskdale, aiming for one of the campsites around Boot. The path unavoidably required a high climb, and I opted for a little extra height rather than a slightly easier gradient route that would have been 5km longer. The ascent was up The Band, a ridge running down into the valley, seeming to bisect it if viewed from the east. In fact the Great Langdale valley turns to the right here and the tributary valley to the left is Oxendale.

Our ascent up The Band to a high pass I call Three Tarns (since that is what is marked at its top) was to be our largest single climb of the trip. Our campsite being at about 100m and the top of the pass just over 700m. Recall that out Scafell climb had started from a wild camp around the 450m mark, though the peak was higher the ascent was lesser.

Pass! The Band to the centre

The path up is mostly well paved with stone, with the occasional near-scramble and short grassy stretches. The first thing of note, once we were above about 300m was the wind. The ridge being quite exposed we got the full force of a very strong crosswind. Strong enough that I could lean my weight into it at about 20 degrees and not fall forward! There was a little rain too, which was somewhat unpleasant. By the top of the pass I was carrying Kat's bedroll as with it on I was afraid she'd blow away! I also almost lost my pack cover, but managed to run after it and nab it before it went beyond recovery. As an indication of the windiness we passed a small waterfall near the top that was blowing upwards and generally into the air, very little water was actually continuing down the watercourse. Despite all this the view back down Great Langdale was superb and made up for the difficulty in my opinion.

Then there is that satisfying point of reaching the top, a feeling of success. The top of the pass is a bit rocky and desolate, except where it is soggy and desolate. There really are three tarns up there, very little ones! We didn't hang around for long as the wind was clearly there to stay, we soon began the trek downhill. Oh, I had began to dread the downhill stretches by now. Very painful on my poor abused feet! I tried to make good time initially, hoping we'd quickly get below the wind. This idea wasn't a success, the wind didn't just hit the other side of the pass and stop, it followed us down the slope!

Toward Eskdale from Three Tarns

It was a very rocky and uneven trek down, the path not so well trodden and totally indistinct at times. It was also very wet, an actual stream at some points, though clearly still the right track. Three Tarns is between Bowfell and Crinkle Crags and it would appear that The Band was a common approach to these from Great Langdale but not well trodden to or from Eskdale via the Lingcove Beck valley.

Where Lingcove Beck meets the Esk there is a narrow fairytale-style stone arch bridge. This is a good point to turn around and admire the cascades of the Esk and the beck. An attractive spot.

Up to Three Tarns from Lingcove Beck

From this point the track back to Boot is quite flat and uneventful, following the Esk most of the way until you divert via a farm and onto the road. The road takes us into "town", well, the Camping Club campsite at Boot at any rate. They're very busy, remember this is the first Friday of the School Holidays for a large part of England. Luckily, because we're on foot and have very small tents, they can squeeze us in on the grass near the reception and shop. Quite convenient in fact! This is on-paper the most expensive campsite we visited, but since they only charged us for one pitch it wasn't bad in the end. The facilities were second to none as well. Untimed showers with good pressure at no extra cost, a huge heated drying room, and a well stocked shop (though we had no use for that.) We stunk the drying room up with our very smelly boots, but that's what it is for really!

We were fairly early getting to the camp, but didn't do much other than generally relax. My feet were in absolute agony that day, so I wasn't keen on moving very far in a hurry. In the morning I'd forgotten to put the insoles in my shoes. Initially this seemed a great thing, more room for my feet! But as the day drew on the lack of arch support became a hindrance, I felt like knives were being stabbed into my feet on every footfall. But I didn't dare stop and put my insoles in, I just wanted to keep on going.

We did a quick circuit through Boot, visiting the couple of pubs there and booking for dinner at one of them. That night we ate a feast, a full 3 course meal of decent hearty English food. Nothing exciting, but entirely satisfying!

Our ride to Ravenglass

That meal pretty much marks the end of our hike. Yes, we had one more night in the tents, but that was no fuss really. The next day we only had to wander around Boot a little then down to the Dalegarth R&ER station. A 40 minute quaint train journey into Ravenglass followed. We trundled around Ravenglass a bit and had some chips and beer at the Ratty Arms. Finally, several hours of train journey took us home, back to Hitchin at about midnight. The landlord at our local waved us into the pub as we passed (a back-door job at that time of night), but we just waved back and kept going – drawn on by the thought of a proper bed. I can't really remember, but I expect we slept well that night.

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A short 16km trek, but a high one! A good finish to our Lake District hike I think.

Now I have to find the time to write about our early August Snowdon climb!

Lakes Day 6 - Great Langdale

Sun, 02 Aug 2009 23:10:00 GMT

River Brathay at Skelwith Bridge

We set out on day 6 with some intrepidation. I'd settled things with the farmer that morning, who was fine with us stopping there ("not to wurry!") He mentioned that the radio weather had put out a warning for the afternoon, expecting 2 to 4 inches of rain during the next 24 hours. That's a lot of rain! The most we'd had was an inch on our first night wild camping (we knew it was an inch because we left our mugs outside for the evening.) Perhaps it was saving it up for a proper effort for us, since the night just past had been our first without rain (a rare night of peace for Lake District tent dwellers.)

Our route for the day was an easy one, following the Cumbria Way up Great Langdale to the National Trust campsite near Old Dungeon Ghyll. Originally I'd planned to take the high ground over the Langdale Pikes, but Yaël's knee made this a rather bad idea. I wanted to give it as much of a rest as possible before our final day of trekking, which unavoidably required crossing a 700m pass (climbing more than 600m, our highest single climb of the trip) if we were to take the quickest and (in theory) easiest route. (Next trip we'll leave Yaël's knee at home!)

Waterfall

The walk up Great Langdale via the Cumbria Way is mostly flat, entirely firm, and extremely attractive. Especially the section of the river Brathay after (west of) Skelwith Bridge, where the river is in a treed ravine complete with waterfalls.

We made our way to Elterwater in good time, and stopped there for a beer in their pub. Yet more excellent Cumbrian ale! While we were sitting there the rain started in earnest and we were reluctant to move on in a hurry, which was fine as we didn't have very far to go this day. In a short while the rain cleared and we move on.

The next leg of walking was just under 4km, getting us to New Dungeon Ghyll. This pub was just a bit too polished for my liking, with the sort of shiny printed menus and little sauce packets that scream out "chainpub" to me. It felt just a little too much like it was designed to make the cityfolk feel "at home." On top of this it probably had the least inspiring range of ale I'd seen in a Cumbrian pub. They did good chips though!

The Band (right) ramp to tomorrow's pass

From New Dungeon Ghyll it was a mere kilometre to the Great Langdale National Trust campsite. The campsite was quite busy, school holidays were about to begin and the vanguard of early-leavers had made their way here to claim their ground already. We walked as far away from the amenities as we could to find a fairly lightly populated area at the western extremity of the site, near what I called "the yurts." (Some sort of large permanent tent, complete with chimney. Camping for people who don't really like camping I guess. The people we saw wandering between the yurts, "yurt dwellers", and the amenities certainly didn't seem all that camp.) There were some others scouting out the same area, so we politely let them choose their ground first. They were an intriguing couple, dressed in a metal/goth style. Apparently they come up this way every year, and just chill out in their tent and do a bit of hill walking. The parts of the ground that were known to flood were pointed out to us, and we choose a slightly higher patch on a good slope (since we were expecting the worst from the rain overnight.)

Once our tents were up we wandered out of the campsite to the pub at Old Dungeon Ghyll. This was a real pub, with several good ales available. We sat here for a little while and enjoyed a couple of pints before returning to the campsite. The campsite is a particularly pleasant one, especially our spot below a bank planted with coniferous trees of some sort. I wandered up into the trees to gather sticks for our little wood burning stove and took several photos out towards "The Band" our route up to the pass we had to cross the next day.

Pitch at Gt. Langdale NT Campsite

We chilled for the rest of the evening, our most relaxed evening so far I think. We'd got to the campsite very early, by our standards, and as a bonus it wasn't raining on us! The main entertainment for the evening was watching a couple nearby arrive quite late and then set up their tent. A massive and insanely complicated construction that they'd clearly never put up before (brand new from the shop I expect.) Both our little tents would have fit inside it and not even touched the walls. These people had everything they even pulled a full sized gas BBQ out of the back of their suburban assault vehicle. It took them a full couple of hours to get their tent up, thwacking pegs with mallets well into the evening.

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An easy walk of just over 10km this day, very pleasant and relaxed overall. No massive downpours so far!

Lakes Day 5 - Pottering About

Sun, 02 Aug 2009 21:37:00 GMT

Aside from beginning and ending in Eskdale/Ravenglass we'd reached our only definite destination of the hike: Beatrix Potter. OK, so a dead author of childrens' stories isn't a destination per se. But Hawkshead is home of the National Trust's Beatrix Potter Gallery, and just down the road in Near Sawrey you can find Hill Top, Beatrix Potter's home. Yaël was particularly keen on visiting Hill Top, so it became a mandatory part of our Lakes hike.

Naughty Peter Rabbit!

We spent some time that morning in the gallery in Hawkshead, which contains a lot of original artwork and writing by Potter. Most interestingly it reveals a side of Beatrix Potter that I wasn't aware of: she was quite the naturalist! She had an interest in mycology and also the breeding of sheep, the latter of which seems to have become a particular occupation of her time in her latter years. I have to admit I find this much more interesting than Peter Rabbit; though her stories of rabbits, ducks, kittens, and whathaveyou are a memorable and maybe formative part of my childhood.

We hopped on a mountain goat (bus) to Hill Top from Hawkshead, today was to be a day of rest. Especially considering the state of Yaël's knee. Hill Top revealed further interesting things about Beatrix, a singularly interesting woman!

At Hill Top

Another point of interest is her involvement with the National Trust, which she lent a lot of her time to. Not only that though. One of Beatrix Potter's more unusual hobbies was collecting farms, well that's what it looks like she did. The royalties from Peter Rabbit and friends giving her the means to do this. She was particularly interested in maintaining the rural landscape and culture she loved, and I guess it made sense that one way to do this was to own it all! When she died she left her land to the National Trust, all of it I believe. It amounted to 4000 acres of the Lake District! I knew she was well off from her writing, but I'd never have imagined she'd owned such an insane amount of northern English countryside.

After perusing all the interesting artefacts in Beatrix Potter's house we had an off-ration lunch at the pub next door, Tower Bank Arms if Google informs me correctly. Excellent steak and ale stew and crispy battered fish with chips. Very hard to fit it all in though, after a few days on pack rations. How come every pub we went to has a brilliant range of real ale? Those Cumbrians seem to have excellent taste in beer!

Windermere (from the vehicle ferry)

From Hill Top we walked down to the passenger and vehicle ferry that crosses Windermere, a bargain at 50p per person! This took us to Bowness where we stopped briefly to post items bought from the National Trust home so that we didn't have to carry them around with us.

Our next leg of travelling was by boat again, a ferry ride from Bowness to Ambleside at the north of Windermere. It was nice to just relax and watch the scenery pass by for a change. The scenery included a couple of very low fly-overs by pairs of modern airforce jets, unexpected but interesting. We got to Ambleside at about 17:30, unfortunatelty this was too late to find an open chemist, we'd hoped to pick up a knee brace for Yaël. So we trekked through the town, noting the strange high density of camping and climbing stores. Is there a huge local interest in camping and climbing, or do tourists come all the way to Ambleside to buy their gear? Bowness had a similarly high density of such shops.

Windermere (from south of Loughrigg Fell)

From Ambleside we crossed the ridge south of Loughrigg Fell, destined for Loughrigg Tarn on the west of the ridge. This crossing provided some particularly wonderful views down Windermere. Yaël's knee was giving her obvious pain though, despite the mostly restful day. I actually think that being easier on the knee for a day probably just made it feel worse in the short term (these things tend to seize up when your rest them I find.) Though it may also have something to do with the fact we were climbing over yet another ridge! It was quite an easy one though, with a steep but solid road up, a fairly flat walk at the top, then a friendly gradual descent. Once over we reached Tarn Foot Farm, the location of our campsite this night.

Pitch at Tarn Foot Farm

We were a bit unsure about this campsite. There was a sign on the door of the farm saying we needed to be there by 18:00, and it was 19:00 by the time we got there. We rang the bell, but nobody answered – though Yaël said she saw someone looking down on us from a window above. We were about to give up and, out of respect for the wishes of whoever wrote the sign, trek off for the next campsite about an hours walk away. However a couple of campers showed up at that point and assured us the farmer would be fine with us sorting it out in the morning, so we settled there for the night. A small campsite on good high ground with a bank and some trees between it and Loughrigg Tarn.

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We didn't really walk much at all this day, with the distance between Hawkshead and Near Sawrey being by bus and the stretches over the lake by boat (obviously!) I haven't measured the walking distance precisely, but it seems to be roughly 8km, probably a little under. Our only real uphill of the day was out of Ambleside over the ridge south of Loughrigg Fell, and that was just barely over 200m.