I'll take the high road

I discover that old friend Howard Cottle is walking a bit of the Coast to Coast. He's a day ahead of us so it doesn't look likely that we'll be able to walk with him but we talk of meeting up for dinner one evening. 
Anyway, yesterday, Mick announces at breakfast – the uncles are first in the self-service kitchen at 7am – that he's had an idea. There is talk of chafing (I decide not to enquire further) and Mick suggests that he and Pad drive me down to Grasmere so that I can do a walk with Howard. Sounds good to me, so here we are outside Howard's B&B.
As I suspect, Howard hoofs up the hill at a fair old lick and the beads of sweat are soon flying off my hair and face. I have to find cute Lakeland sheep to photograph, just so that I can stop for a rest.
We meet an American couple called Jim and Jane, in their Seventies, who have been doing the same sections as Howard. In their khakis they wouldn't look out of place on safari.
When we get to the top of the pass, there's a little loch nestling in the corrie. It's Grizedale Tarn, and at the bottom is a river crossing where I have to de-boot. 

We pass the Brotherhood memorial, where Wordsworth last spent time with his brother, who was later killed at sea.

Howard says, we can go down the easy way, or we can go up there. It's St Sunday Crag and he promises the views will be spectacular. Then he points out Jim and Jane starting up the path. Well, if Jim and Jane can do it...
It's not so knackering and anyway, we are yabbering all the way so in no time we're at the top. 


Looking down at the valley below, with its lush green pastures, divided into sections by dry stone walls, with cotton bud sheep grazing, it strikes me that the Lakes are not like Scotland at all. The view from a Scottish mountain would be breathtaking, wild, dramatic, but it would never be pretty.


Back in the valley, Pad and Mick have sorted out the brake lights, which a helpful motorist had pointed out were gone, visited St Patrick's Church in Patterdale (to find a loo), and been on a walk up the Grizedale Beck, the river that comes out of the Tarn up above. Lashings of ginger beer all round.
We zip back to the hostel to change, though it's the long way round after the uncles miss the turning to Keswick, and I shout, 'You've gone the wrong way, you numpties!' Oh dear. Note to self: remember to respect your elders.
We return to Patterdale for dinner with Howard at the White Lion, where you can hear sheep baa-ing when you go to the loo, and the phone box outside reminds me of the one in Local Hero, when he has to get all the change from the bar so he can call America.
Nice butternut, stilton and spinach risotto, too.



On the way back to Keswick we miss the turning, again.