Date & start time: Bank Holiday Sunday 24th May 2009.

Location of Start : Keswick and then Bowness Knott car park, Cumbria, Uk ( NY 109 154 )

Places visited : Keswick, Hope Park, the Boat Landings and back at lunchtime. Bowness Knott and the Smithy Beck Trail in the evening.

Evening walk details : 3 ml, 850 ft of ascent, 1 hour 45 mins.

Highest point : Bowness Knott Hause 1025ft ( 302 m)

Walked with : Ann and the dogs, Harry and Bethan.

Weather : Sunny, blue skies and very warm.

Reflections on a Bank Holiday Sunday

From the packed hustle and bustle of a tourist town at lunchtime

to the peace and tranquility of the Ennerdale Valley the same evening.

The sublime and the ridiculous . . . I'll leave you decide which.

Busking Gentlemen in the underpass . . . these first few photos taken with my phone !

(Sorry no sound . . . can't work out how to edit the mobile video yet !)

The new landscaping on the foreshore is more or less completed and it's looking nice.

The new steps . . . complete with poetry.

Hope Park and a view towards Skiddaw and Skiddaw Little Man.

Crazy Golf is busy on this Bank Holiday Sunday.

[ I sneaked in to take this photo ahead of the next participants ]

There's a new Golf Pavilion in the park and with it an improved Garden Centre Plant Stall.

Worth a visit if you're local.

Luchinis Ice Cream - worth a visit anytime - local or not.

Oh well . . . it was a nice but brief lunch hour . . . back to work !

- - - o o o - - -

When I got home, Ann and I decided the evening was too nice to miss,

so with the dogs in the back of the car we drove round to Ennerdale.

We parked at Bowness Knott car park on the shores of Ennerdale Water.

Walking back up the road rather than to the lake, we get a view over the wall and the lake towards Angler's Crag.

Ahead are the slopes of Herdus, the western slopes of Great Borne.

A May or Hawthorn tree in full bloom alongside the road.

Our route leaves the road at the stile and follows Rake Beck up the fell side.

An old field wall, now redundant and broken.

Climbing towards Bowness Knott we reach the forestry.

This first section has been cleared in the last year or so and still looks rather a mess.

Somewhere here there's presumably a path over to the viewpoint shown on the map.

Harry and Bethan found the stile before we did.

It looked a rather rough path so we decided time did not allow a fuller exploration tonight.

Behind us the full height of Herdus can be seen, along with the small ravine that has been carved out by Rake Beck.

There's a Wainwright route up alongside the beck, past the well preserved Fox Bield that we climbed a while back.

The view ahead stretches all the way to the head of the valley

with every last detail standing out in the clear air.

( l to r ) Green Gable, Great Gable, Pillar, Black Crag, Scoat Fell (the peak of Steeple just showing) and finally Haycock with Little Gowder Crag.

Close up on Haycock across the top of the lake.

Here a close up on Pillar Fell, with Pillar Rock standing clear of its north facing slopes.

A warm night encourages the 'summer flies' to circulate in a tight bunch over the damp forest undergrowth.

New season Cotton Grass on the open moorland.

Finding a gate through the forest perimeter, we follow a good path down an old firebreak,

but the forest here has been cleared as well and forest tracks no longer agree with the map.

The low sun shines beautifully though the trees . . .	. . . creating long shadows on the track ahead.

The upper Smithy Beck clearing where there was an old settlement associated with an iron foundry in the valley.

A brief stop before we divert off the forest road and onto the Smithy Beck Trail.

The main falls as Smithy Beck descends towards the lake.

Ann on the footbridge just below the falls.

Storm damage as we walk through the woodland, caused by the same big gale that flooded Carlisle in 2005.

A local, this time a hedgehog not a Herdwick . . . The dogs were not impressed by his spikes !

It was really nice to see this fine animal, fit and well in it's own environment, unhindered by roads and the dangers of traffic.

The trail emerges from the woods and we are back at the lakeside.

The walk now follows the lakeside back to the car park, but not before providing us with more beautiful views.

Dappled reflections on shallow water at the picnic site.

Sunlight emphasises the fresh green leaves on the birch tree . . .	. . . and created silhouettes across the water.

Anglers Crag across lake.

Is that Bethan in the water ? Where did she come from ?

Seen from further down the track, the 'picnic spot' trees now glow in the warm evening light.

Here with Pillar Fell and Black Crag behind.	More long shadows as we climb the small rise back to the car.

- - - o o o - - -

Technical note: Pictures taken with with my mobile phone, Cannon G7 or Ann's Ixus 75 Digital camera.

Resized in Photoshop, and built up on a Dreamweaver web builder.

This site best viewed with . . . sunshine on a long summer evening.

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Previous walk - 21st May 2009 Loweswater Farmers Day Out

A previous time up here - 9th Feb 2008 Sunshine on Great Borne, Ennerdale

Next walk - Tues 26th May 2009 Friends, Family and Clouds