Hey - it's my turn to write! After all I can't let Denise have all of the writing fun, can I?
The first puzzle of the day was finding a place to get a new tire for the rental car. Unfortunately, our flat on Saturday was a bad one, one that meant a new tire was needed. And no, that's not covered by insurance. Denise tells me that it wouldn't be covered on her own car either. She called Hertz, and they referred her to the company that does tire replacements for them. Then she called that company, and they actually suggested finding a closer place since they were in Carlisle which is about 40 miles away from here. Those phone calls happened yesterday, and this morning Denise asked one of the people at the front desk for a suggestion. They sent us to Harold's Tyres in Penrith, and before we knew it we had a new tire (or tyre?). Great service!
I'm really glad we didn't need to go to Carlisle because the 15 mile drive to Penrith took a long time. Denise was really surprised when she was handed multimap directions that said "distance: 14.13 miles, about 39 minutes". And yes, it did take that long to traverse a mostly 2-lane (or maybe I should say less than 2-lane) road.
As long as we were in a larger town, we stopped at a real grocery store to pick up some fruit and other snack food. The selection of fruit in the little shops in Glenridding has been abysmal, and Denise said she had a severe case of banana withdrawal. I convinced her to get some ginger oat biscuits; that combination of ingredients sounds really good to me. Funny, I forget to tell her to get some chocolate.
I thought it was time to head back then, but the ruins of Penrith Castle jumped out in front of us. We had a quick stop there. Well, it took a little longer than it should have because we parked the car along the side of the road in an area with signs saying you needed a disk to park there, and that all of the local shops had them. Denise tried three places. Each one said they didn't have any and suggested we try the next shop. After that she decided to chance it and just hope that we didn't get a parking ticket. It was our lucky day, no ticket.
Then, it was time to head down the road again, to try to understand the signs as we circled two roundabouts, back to the very narrow route A592. Our first stop on the way back was at Dalemain. At first I thought it was a bit odd that we were stopping there; Denise tends to want to wander outside and she usually skips house tours. Oh! I see why she turned in here. She wanted to try to capture a field full of sheep with the big camera. She's going to keep tryng, but I don't think she's going to be happy with the results. It was a fabulous stop though. As long as we were there, Denise started to walk towards the house. She saw a field full of deer, a bit too far away. She kept walking, and there was a garden area with a sign saying that visiting was welcome. She walked in because she saw a cage housing what looked like a squirrel, a squirrel dresse in pure white. And there was a man standing at a fence feeding some fallow deer. He saw Denise with the camera, and he asked if we'd like to come closer. We went right up to the fence. And oh! the deer were beautiful. There were funny chickens running around too, chasing each other, grabbing and dropped food.
Once the deer had scattered, conversation continued in the garden, and the man we were talking with filled his hand with seed and held it out for the birds. A couple of birds came and snatched a seed. It must not have been eating time since they spent more time jumping and flitting among the flowers.
Ah, finally, the spot for our short hike through the woods to the tumbling waters of Aira Force. It's a waterfall where the Aira Beck tumbles down a steep slope, There was a bridge a bit below the falls, reachable by traversing a set of very steep stairs, a good place to stand to view the falls from afar. And there was a bridge sitting above the top of the falls too. And Denise did her usual wander off the path to try to catch a closer glimpse of the quickly moving waters. I barked to tell her not to walk on any slimy rocks. After all I didn't want to go swimming in what I suspect was very cold water.
On the path between the bridges, there were steps of stone, tall steps. There was one that was as high as Denise's knee. Wow, that was a really big step for her, and I don't think that I could have bounced that high by myself.
Denise just reminded me that if you know the version of English from the west side of the Atlantic Ocean, you might not know what a Beck is. A Beck is a stream, in the case of Aira Beck, a quickly moving tumbling stream...The shores of Ullswater beckoned a bit later, and we headed down to the lake to have some conversations with two pairs of mute swans paddling about.
It was a good day of wandering, a good day of talking with strangers, and a much-needed light activity day. Resting can be a good thing.
Tomorrow? One more day of walking on our own. And tomorrow evening will be the start of our photography seminar.
--- Rover
