I was out and about in Hawkshead for much of the summer, recceing for a very different kind of tour, having been invited by HIS Miki Travel UK to meet Japanese tour groups from a coach in Hawkshead, to show them Hill Top, Near Sawrey and Hawkshead as part of their two-day itinerary in the Lake District…
Putting together a guided tour can be like putting on a show: a fair bit of script-learning, lots of pacing the boards beforehand, getting to know what goes where, working out when to cue in the actors, making a story-line, then most of all, praying that it will be “alright on the night”…
A pilgrimage and most of the lakes in just two days (12 &13 May), starting with a late Sunday morning pick-up in Carlisle and a leisurely afternoon visit to Dalemain House near Ullswater, in search of history, heritage and blue poppies…
The new year is a great time to reflect, and I am starting this one by remembering last year. Although in recent years, the tourism season in the lakes is getting longer, with visitors coming as late as November and as early as March, things are still quieter in the winter months. This leaves…
Following the success of a similar study programme in 2022, Hidden Lakeland and The Lake District Foundation have partnered a second time to offer Japanese university students a taste of the Lake District and Cumbria…
Goodbye to a group of four wonderful women, determined not just to see the lakes but to experience it whole-heartedly. Their tour highlight – and mine! – was a day’s weaving at Heron Corn Mill in the pretty village of Beetham, tutored by Slovakian artist, Erika Sojkova Grimes, using Erika’s exquisite hand-spun, non-dyed yarns, made wholly from local fleeces.
This September saw Japanese visitors enjoying a ten-day study programme in the Lake District. In a partnership between Hidden Lakeland and The Lake District Foundation, nine undergraduate students on the University of Tokyo’s Global Education for Innovation and Leadership programme…
It’s not often I take my own advice, but I “top-tipped” the Rannerdale Valley for bluebells in May when blogging about a winter walk around Crummock Water in mid-February, so it only seemed fair to head that way myself on my last day off.
I’m celebrating my first “live” tour of the Lake District since March 2020 today, after an amazing day out with @the_apoke on May 16th, one week ago. Blessed with fine, sunny weather for our trip out to Dalemain, near Pooley Bridge at the northern end of Ullswater…
Early morning sunshine led the way down from Rannerdale Knotts, at the start of a blissful circuit of Crummock Water in mid-February. This walk ticked all the boxes, with the modest high of the Knotts offering stunning views of three lakes (Buttermere, Crummock Water and Loweswater), and…