Trip to Lake District -- Sheep land

Here is my vacation recap.
We reached London on thursday morning (17th) and slowly made our way north to the lake district.
We had a rental, a nice four door automatic Puegot with the biggest gas tank I have seen. I slept till about lunch-time while animesh drove. Then I drove and Animesh panicked over my driving. We were headed for Troutbeck, a small village north of Windermere - which is the largest town in the Lake District area. We reached Troutbeck after it was dark... and all I could tell was that it was a tiny village, with narrow steep streets and very very quiet at night.
We were staying at the 'High Fold Farm B&B' which we found easily enough. The B&B is run by Susan and Les Bradley (http://www.highfoldfarm.co.uk/). We were welcomed by Susan, who showed us our room and told us about a nearby pub where we could get dinner. The pub is called the Mortal Man (here is a picture http://www.go4awalk.com/userpics/waynehill86.php ) and is about a 1/2 mile away from High Fold. It would have been a beautiful walk, but it was pitch dark and we had to keep shining the torches Susan gave us so that we wouldn't fall off the side of the hill. Anyway Mortal Man was a typical pub selling good beer, fried fish and some absolutely fabulous pudding. I loved it. Animesh is a snob and kept looking for better places to eat throughout our stay.

The next morning we came down to the breakfast room. Before I proceed I have got to say that one of the best views of the lake district is from the bay windows at the High Fold Farm breakfast room. We were there first so we sat by the bay windows drinking in the sight. There was a heavy mist on the hills... but this is something england is famous for during off-season. If you are cheap and travel off season, you have to contend with crappy weather. Les was serving breakfast. We chatted for a while. The best way to see the lake district is by taking 'walks' (what the english call walks in the country side are actually extensive hikes that can take up a good part of a day. Beware of the english proclivity for understatement!). There was a 'walk' that started very close to High Fold, went over the nearby 'pike' along well marked 'cairns' and finally would up in the nearby village of Ambleside. It offered very good views of the 'fells' (our vocabularly was severely tested over those four days :-) Les was worried that we (New Yorkers) would not be able to enjoy the walk in our (unsubstantial) footwear! We were very indignant at that. We thought it would be a breeze... I mean, we've hiked to Grinnel Glacier in Montana, for God's sake. Anyway, Les proved to be right.

We started the walk soon after breakfast. We walked up the rolling hills with grazing farmland on either side. There were sheep and the occasional cow... but happily for me, they were on the other side of the cairn (a cairn, if you haven't figured it out yet, is a rough wall made by a pile of rocks. It looks just like a wall... but they don't use cement or any binding agent to hold them together. Naturally I tried to shove them apart... but years of accumulated mud and moss hold it all up. Its actually very cool). As we got high on the fell, a really heavy mist descended. That was our situation for most of our remaining hike. But I have to say we passed a lot of people on the hike and almost everyone was going faster than us. I could say that we stood around looking at the sheep... but really, our shoes were shitty. On the way downhill, I slipped twice. Both times sliding on my back ignominiously, leaving a large mud track behind me for all to see. We reached Ambleside, pissy, exhausted and totally covered in mud. I was covered in mud, Animesh wasn't. I'm taking some cover in pluralizing :-) After a quick lunch and some-cleanup, we headed back to Troutbeck. Ambleside was a typical small english village with mostly tourists. It had a prominent 'I' in the center of town (which is the UK standard information center for tourists) and lots of shops selling lake district wool and farm products. The hike walk was much better because it was less steep and we were better prepared. We had also given us all pretense of being able hikers. We got off the cairned path on top off the fell and were completely hidden by the mist. Actually we had a lot of fun on the way back and didn't once fight. We got home around 6pm... quickly showered and went to Bowness by Windermere for dinner. This was a fancy steakhouse kind of place that Les had recommended for Animesh's birthday dinner treat. Bowness is a very lively town, full of pubs and restaurants. The restaurant we went to, Jackson's Bistro, was so-so. Animesh liked it... which is important, but I thought it was overpriced and stuffy.

The next day, we had much better weather and we had toned down our expectations. After breakfast, we drove to Ulswater on the North-east. There we did a short hike to Aire falls... it was a completely paved path, so nothing to worry about. After Ulswater, we took a quick stop at Pooley Bridge (where animesh filmed me from over a bridge while I sat on the banks of a narrow river and made a color sketch of pooley bridge). We drove to Keswick for lunch (pronounce Kes-sick) and then drove south towards home. We stopped at a small village called Hawkeshead. Hawkeshead is called a picture postcard english village and has won numerous awards for being such a 'chamattu kutti'. I think it was very pretty but that Troutbeck is prettier and is lesser known. Here is a site that talks about Hawkeshead and how William Wordsworth spent most of his childhood there http://www.lakedistrictletsgo.co.uk/townsvillagers/hawkshead/hawkshead_main.html. We started on a 3 hour walk from Hawkeshead to Tarn Howes. 'Tarn', in old english/welsh is a small lake and Tarn Howes was by itself nothing remarkable. But the views on the walk were great. We went though farmland, again, and through some really pretty village. The cottages and farm houses are all built of the same black stones as the cairns. The cottages also had extensive and well kept gardens. Greenery just seemed to abound everywhere. Here is a picture of Tarn Howes : http://www.go4awalk.com/userpics/glynntrueman24.php. But no talk of this hike is complete without a full description of the SHEEP-RIOT. Animesh and I had (playfully) been baaa-baaaing at the sheep on our walks. The sheep would look up, confused and sometimes baaa-baaa back. So stupid, we said, and kept on baa-baaing at them. Anyway, somewhere between Hawkeshead and Tarn Howes there was this big farm with lots of sheep. We stopped at the wooden gate, and while animesh filmed them, I did a courtesy baa-baa. All of a sudden they all looked up, and started baa-baaing and running towards us. I can tell you I was very nervous. What protection is a flimsy wooden gate when a full horde of sheep is rioting towards you? And they kept coming, I kept panicking and animesh, the consummate reporter, kept filming. Then suddenly the sheep went past us, running at full speed, god knows where. Later on, when we came to the end of the farm, we saw all of them huddled by a ditch of drinking water. Must have been mealtime :-) ! Whew!
That night we got very ambitious in our quest for superb food. We went to Windermere looking for THE pub that Frommer's guide recommended. Animesh cannot stand to stray from 'lonely planet' and frommer's guide'. Its depressing. Anyway, we went to windermere, then bowness, then windermere, then finally back to Troutbeck. Defeated, we finally came to the Mortal Man at 9.20pm.... 20 mins after they stopped serving dinner.
The next day, after a heavy breakfast (we finally tried 'black' pudding, which like marmite, you either love or hate), we headed back to London. We stopped near Sheffield, at Ramani mama's house, for lunch. That was great, especially because he had taken all the pains to make the food and all himself. It was sweet. We reached London at night and headed to Leicester (pronounced les-ter) square to a Pub Dhiru likes. Then we went to 'Chowki' an indian restaurant that Lourdes and I had been to some 4 years ago. I liked it... animesh was turning up his nose all the time because there were so few people there. It was 11 pm!!
The next morning, at 5.30 am, we left Dhiru's house and headed back to New York. We didn't have time for breakfast... which was real bad luck. See my other post about the British Airways screw-up. We got back very hungry and tired, but glad to be back in New York.