Category: Trip Ideas
The addressing of oversights or just some new places to explore?
28th October 2009 My day out among the limestone pavements and outcrops near Ingleton had me taking a bus ride through a part of the world where I hadn't been before. Unusually for me, the journey there and away again took me around by Lancaster with a bus ride up the Lune valley to Ingleton itself. Even under grey skies, the potential of the area with its pretty villages (Hornby looked interesting with its castle by the River Wenning) was apparent. Unsurprisingly, there is a trail through all of this and it's called the Lune Valley Ramble and its not the only one either. Its 16-17 miles from Kirkby Lonsdale to Lancaster would make for a long day of walking but riverside hiking isn't as strenuous as trotting over hill and dale and a regular bus service (Stagecoach Lancaster 81A/81B) allows for some some truncation if needed. You might need to find a quieter day for this type of thing though but winter is ahead of us so that may make places less peopled. The combination of easy gradients and proximity has as much appeal on a warm day in Yorkshire as it does in Cumbria or Staffordshire and a few walks have taken me past fleshpots in these counties since the start of the year. Saying that, a quick look along the route of the LVR confirms that the types of gathering spots that allows occasional amblers to congregate are absent so things may never feel as busy as the those lower reaches of Wharfedale on that faultless day at the end of September though that of course does change around Lancaster, an interesting city to explore in its own right and one at which I only have taken fleeting stolen looks. If the LVR ever was found to be busy, then there are other options like the Lunesdale Walk, which should keep you occupied for a few days by the looks of things.
While on the subject of missed walking opportunities in Lancashire, it would be remiss of me if I didn't mention the Forest of Bowland that bounds on the above and the AONB's website has plenty of ideas for active enjoyment of the places, either on foot or on a bike, that I passed while plying the way between Lancaster and Ingleton a few weeks back. In this context, the word "forest" refers to hunting grounds rather than woodland and it is very apt usage given recent history. Until the advent of the countryside rights of way act that established tracts of access land, there were few rights of way through these hills and the establishment of that precious enhanced access involved overcoming any objections from the Duke of Westminster. Since that's changed, there really should be no excuse for my not paying this hilly area surrounded by disparate conurbations like Lancaster, Clitheroe and Settle a visit. Of these, Clitheroe seems the easiest point of approach without a car with bus services B10 and B11 conveying you from its train station. There may be other ways into these uplands but a spot of further research is in order to find out what they might be. That should put paid to any sense of there being hills not at all that far away from me that are not so accessible. They may be quieter too so that should be good enough reason to play the connoisseur and pay them a call.
Up until now, my only exploration of Lancashire's countryside on foot was among the South Pennines near Burnley and pondering alluring locations like the Lune Valley or the Forest of Bowland may result in something happening. For now, I'll retain them as ideas and that has to be better than passing through while going to the delights of Cumbria or Scotland; only skirting them on the way to Yorkshire is an equal oversight and an ironic one given the happenings of history. With the ever shorter days of winter coming upon us, having somewhere new to explore that isn't so far away only can be a good thing.
Retracing old steps and making some new ones
31st August 2009 A weekend promising mixed weather saw me head north to Edinburgh. There is a quote somewhere about the place never truly leaving you, and that seems to be the way with me after living there for a few years before coming south to earn my crust. The Festival Fringe was coming to its annual close, but an old habit of mine is not to get too involved with it, and that seems to have been continued this turn. Saturday started with a mixture of sunshine and clouds and I got to wander about Holyrood Park until I passed through the heart of the city to catch a bus to the Pentland Hills, where I spent the afternoon before returning to reprise more old steps across Bruntsfield Links and the Meadows. There were showers around but also plenty of the sort of light that showed things at their finest, all thanks to the sun coming out between any wettings and the brisk breezy freshness of the day. The walking had been a mixture of urban landmark spotting, even reprising a few photographic opportunities in the spirit of that Cheshire project that I have going, and hill country savouring.
The previous day's exertions certainly led to some fatigue, so Sunday ended up being an easy Edinburgh day, the sort that I used to enjoy when I still lived there. Admittedly, the idea of popping down to Melrose to admire and ascend the nearby Eildon Hills cam to mind, but the weather forecast wasn't so inspiring, and I prefer to see things in the weather that best shows their charms. So, the Melrose option makes its way onto the ideas shelf for future reference. In fairness, yesterday started well and stayed dry until a spell of light rain turned up around 18:00 only to move away to leave a dry night and a bright, cheery start to today. Saying that, the rain didn't take long to come either, with it having arrived by the time of my early departure from Waverly station.
The reason for that early departure was that there were things that needed doing, and I would have wanted to get going before the southbound bank holiday rush really got going in earnest after an experience that I had last year. Speaking of things to do, I realise that I promised to say more about my Aviemore trip and I also want to expand on my Pentlands escapade too. For now, the real-world to-do list will be taking precedence, but I hope to get things moving again on the trip report front in the not too distant future.
If it were done when it were done…
20th August 2009 An alternative title for this piece would be "You always can return and perhaps even should...". It might be the dawning of a realisation as regards how much time has passed but my previously shared assertion that you can always find a different side to any location that you've already visited has been joined by the idea that it's never any harm seeing the same things again. The provocation for this course of thought has been the passing earlier this year of the tenth birthday of the online photo gallery that you find on here. That milestone, a perhaps sobering one for me, has had me casting my eye back over the photos contained therein with some ideas coming to light.
My early forays armed with a 35 mm Ricoh compact camera were made in search of things to see and places to go while also capturing whatever landmark came my way. Living in Edinburgh meant that there were plenty on my doorstep and Cheshire is not bereft of them either. In these DSLR-equipped days, it is immersion in countryside of varying wildness that has held my attention with (hopefully) pleasing landscape photos resulting from those efforts. However, looking at the older photos has been revealing to me how my appraisal of photographic quality has changed over time. A big factor in that is the digital onslaught and the shot in the arm that is the digital darkroom. While sceptical at first, I have been won over by the vibrancy of colours and the crispness of results though I continue to use film from time to time. Speaking of film, I never did make the jump from negative to slide film and so had to put up with printing decisions made by someone else unless I took to scanning negatives and any attempts at that endeavour did leave me dissatisfied; it might have been the technology that I was using. The appeal of the digital darkroom might be small wonder then with all of the control that is on offer.
The conclusion where all of this is leading is towards my engaging in something of a photography project that causes me to revisit old haunts and have another go at recreating some of those earlier images albeit with a spot more success. Cheshire comes to mind as an obvious place to start and that is opportune given that the nights are now drawing in ahead of the shorter days of winter when it is so easy to hibernate. Local escapades that either use my bike (the appeal of cycling is becoming more resurgent within me for some reason or other) or other means of transport sound like good ways to keep active when time for a longer excursion isn't always available. That never is to say that I will not be exploring wondrous countryside for its own sake but savouring the more pleasing examples of what humanity has built in the countryside is no bad thing either, for a bit of variety if nothing else.
Pondering midsummer torpor
6th July 2009 With all the attention given to winter hibernation, it is easy to forget that there is summertime laziness too. Regular readers will realise that I prize the period of the year between the winter solstice and its summer equivalent highly and especially the eruption of verdant vegetation that gives us the wonders of May. The trouble with that is that the wind can evade your sails after the longest day of the year and you get to wondering if the year has passed its best like I did on here about this time last year. This time around, I am less bothered by the matter and I am seemingly more open to the attractions of the time of year and the observation that the countryside still delights even with cloudy skies.
Speaking of last year, July was a quiet month with a perhaps foolish walking trip to Welshpool on an oppressively hot Sunday at the end of the month. Apart from that, it was left to bike rides to capture any episodes of dry or sunny weather because of other preoccupations and distractions about this time; some involvement with dramatic activity in the world of WordPress was only partly to blame.
It's all too easy to have a bout of mid-year lethargy round about now. For one thing, feeling that you have made ample use of any opportunities that arose can only dull the hunger for thrusting oneself into hill country. That can place your motivation at the mercy of other things like the weather. On one end of the spectrum, you have heavy rain showers like those that we have been seeing recently, the type that makes the idea of mobile roof appealing and the heat emphasises the advantages of umbrellas over raincoats in certain conditions. Then, there's hot sunshine and my running hot means that I favour cooler temperatures than some. Also, classic summer weather isn't the best for photography, another mechanism that gets out among those hills. Saying that, pleasant mornings ahead of a rain or wonderful evenings after one often offer the most. These circumstances offer a certain freshness and clarity that is missing from heat haze obstructed equivalents that abound during a heatwave.
The myth may indicate otherwise but July can be a very unsettled month, even in a year not known for a rubbish summer. In 1999, for instance, it was very grey in Edinburgh until the end of the month when a sunny propelled me onto Skye on a multi-day outing that sowed the seeds for many more. Speaking of Scotland, you end up awaiting the departure of the jet stream before settled weather is visited upon the country. In 2003, I called it wrong and had my week up there far too early. Though it felt that I was getting a constant soaking at the time, looking back does highlight its brighter times: a wonderful day spent beside Loch Etive and a dry if dull trot from Kinlochleven to Fort William along the West Highland Way. Staying with hindsight, it might have been better off sticking with reconnaissance on the damper days, but the soakings that I got while travelling between my lodgings in Banavie and Fort William couldn't have been avoided by this approach. However, I did keep it in mind for my Western Isles escapade last year and foul weather alternatives will be placed on file for any trip in August. That isn't to say that July is always damp but 2006 saw a scorcher visited upon us and I extricated something of value amid the uncertainties in 2004 and 2005 too. Last year and the year before were far from inspiring, but dry sunny weather was there to be enjoyed too and that's how I'll remember them.
All in all, that mixture should tell us that it's best not to expect much of July and this year seems to be following suit after the dryness of June. Last weekend mixed in downpours and sunshine so I grabbed the opportunity for a day sailing trip from Liverpool to the Isle of Man. As it turned out, I left a grey Liverpool for a damp Douglas that made me glad that I hadn't committed to spending a lot of time on the island. Along the way, I learnt a little more about what is on offer over there and thoughts are turning to longer trips, more realistically to be occasional but a useful entry on the ideas shelf nonetheless. From what I have seen so far, there seems to be plenty of coastal walking and there's hill country to be savoured too. Public transport on the Isle of Man looks workable too with a good level of service on offer. Sunshine may have been encountered in Liverpool rather than my destination but I am not so easily discouraged. If I was, I might have stopped exploring the British and Irish countryside long ago.
Ideas for that week in August are collecting and they aren't all Scottish either. For one thing, there's always the Pennine Way, but Connemara has come to mind already and now the Isle of Man. Scottish proposals like the Rob Roy Way, extending out from Mallaig, the Cairngorms and the north-west Highlands remain in the running. The options may be more open this year but it's good to have them too. Hopefully, something can come of them.
Irish journeys
3rd July 2009 Last weekend saw me across in Éire for a few days and some chances for spending time among its quieter parts were fitted into what was in essence a social visit. The first one was to Gougane Barra on a day that started out looking grey and damp before continual improvement began to become noticeable. That guaranteed some sunshine whenever the clouds got out of the way. Those clouds kept a lid on the temperatures but it would have been nice to have had more sun for photographic purposes. The second escapade took us across the Shannon estuary to Kilkee in West Clare on a day when the weather predictions were even more dubious. Because I was away from the world of Internet connections, television and radio forecast bulletins became important and the trick was to keep an eye on those flashes of time resolved displays and they are never there for very long. For the Gougane Barra outing, the trick was to have the band of grey dampness continue to the north and it didn't disappoint. The reason for heading to Clare was to salvage some satisfaction before a more concerted band of rain arrived from the south and south-west. Hoping for blue skies and sunshine was out of the question but some pleasant coastal strolling along the cliffs more than sufficed. There may have been drops airborne in the strong breeze but you can cope with that. In fact, steady rain did arrive around 15:00 so we left for home after a good few hours taking advantage of what was on offer; we had got something from the day.
Since the real travels, virtual roving has been going on in my mind. Much of this has been driven by curiosity but poring over maps has increased my awareness of the Irish countryside too. For instance, I have been casting my mind over the area round about Clifden in County Galway. Of particular interest are the Twelve Bens in Connemara (some call them Pins but be aware that others cannot abide that naming) and how walks can be made possible by use of public transport. What led me to this was my discovery of Citylink's Galway-Clifden-Cleggan/Letterfrack service. It seems far more user friendly of the alternative offered by Bus Eireann (services 419 and 421 if you're interested), who well may save time, money and effort if they standardised their timetables a bit more in place of the hotchpotch that is there at the moment (even going for a "stopping at anywhere safe" modus operandi would be better than the seemingly overly formal state of affairs that exists now). What really caught my eye was the way that the N59 rounds the Twelve Bens and the stopping points on any bus services that would provide access points for walking; Canal Bridge and Letterfrack both look promising. As you might have been able to tell, Connemara is not a part of the world where I have ever been before so all of this action is building up the picture for a possible future excursion. For now, it will remain on the ideas shelf until an opportunity for making something of the proposal comes to pass.
Freed of the constraints of temporal reality, the brain can course back and forth in time at will and so this posting ends up with my casting my mind into the more distant past. The cause was my collecting up a number of island ferry websites for the Miscellany. The more well known suspects like the Aran islands off the coast of Galway and Tory island off the Donegal coast coast come to mind though they also aren't places where I have been. In fact, I am of the opinion that I have only ever been on one Irish offshore island and that Sherkin island off the coast of Baltimore in West Cork. It was also a while back when I ended up there as part of my first ever school trip, something that was full of new experiences that didn't mean very much to me at that young age. Lengthy coach rides, ferry crossings and walking around an island won't phase me these days but it was a big jump for a small lad on that sunny June day. Descriptions such as enjoyment and suffering wouldn't have been appropriate but it all went rather over my head at the time. Thinking about it now, it's ironic that these are the kinds of thing that I seek out these days and last years escape to the Western Isles had all of those ingredients. To a point, things have come full circle but you have to be ready for opportunities too.
I have already made one leap from the past to the future in this piece and I am now set to repeat the feat. Looking at Sherkin, Cape Clear Island and other bastions of Irish language and culture has me pondering an Irish island hopping trip for sometime. Unlike some of their Scottish counterparts, the islands aren't big so there's no need to bring a car and any of the ferry services that I have found on the web have been for foot passengers only anyway; smaller vessels with a mixture of open and closed decks seem to be commonplace. Even with smaller sizes, the prospect of appealing mixtures of sunlit seascapes and landscapes can only cause one to find out more and I'll be popping onto the ideas shelf to be pulled off for more inspection from time to time.
One use for all of this mental meandering through the Irish countryside and around its shores would be for that longer summer trip that I have every year. However, I haven't counted Scotland out of the running at all and I have too many ideas if anything. All in all, I think that setting down a list is in order. The next task is to whittle my way through the options in readiness for setting off...
