Buttermere

Scott had work commitments on Saturday, so our forays out into the English countryside this weekend were limited to Sunday after church. The weather forecast was not the best: high in the mid-forties with an 80% chance of rain, but we decided to make the journey to Buttermere anyway. We live in an area of England known as the "Lake District". The locals are quick to tell you that there is only one lake that has the word "Lake" in it's name. Many, like Buttermere, are both the name of a town or village and the name of the lake.

After about 40 minutes of driving on country roads in between miles of sheep farms and with fells all around, we arrived at the tiny village of Buttermere. In the Lake District fell ambling is a huge past time, and Scott has come to really enjoy his time ambling around the lakes and fells. We parked and set off on a hike around the lake. There are actually two lakes in this area, separated by about a half mile of pastures and the tiny village. We began walking and found, after about two miles or so, that we were hiking around the second lake: Crummock. Our guidebook recommended Buttermere as the more beautiful of the two lakes, and also described the walk as an easy, 2 hour, 5 mile walk. So, we doubled back and followed the trail to Buttermere.

The path to Crummock. A very pretty lake, but not the one we were looking for!

Unfortunately, by the time we reached the lake the dark clouds had moved in and showers were threatening at any minute. No matter! We had already enjoyed almost two hours of hiking! We asked a very nice gentleman, who had some very professional looking camera equipment set up on the lake shore, if he would take our picture. We took a short walk to a waterfall, then turned and headed back through the sheep pastures to the town.

Buttermere

We settled in at the Fish Inn, enjoyed a bowl of lentil and carrot soup and a sandwich, and warmed up with some hot tea. While we were there the heavens opened up and the rains began to come down. By the time we were leaving, little ice balls were mixed in with the rain. As is common in the fells, a few minutes and a few miles away we emereged from the heavy clouds into beautiful sunshine, and enjoyed our ride home. We finished off the afternoon sitting on our balcony watching the activity in the harbor.

This week coming up will be a relatively normal week. Next week, however, Scott has work commitments in London. Of course I'm going too! He has arranged to take a day off and so we will leave by train on Monday, the 30th, and return on Friday. We have plans to see quite a bit while we are there, and I'm certain there will be many blog updates as the week unfolds :-)!