Scrabbling for ideas...

The ideas for the Jam & Jerusalem competition are starting to dry up, but with Wibs still posting plenty of pictures I need to think creatively and carry on. The deadline's almost here, but there's time for one last effort, quite literally the words being the subject matter here:



To see all my entries, click this link to see my Iain's Flickr page.
Or to see the whole competition, click this link intead: Jam & Jerusalem competition

Dark satanic mills

My latest efforts on the Jam & Jerusalem theme for the competition have been around the well known hymn, which apparently (I didn't realise this) was originally a poem about an apocryphal story of Jesus coming to Britain whilst still a boy. He supposedly visited Glastonbury Tor (though I guess not for the festival), and this is the 'mountain' referred to in the opening lines: "And did those feet... ...walk upon England's mountains green?"

Anyway, the hymn gives rise to several potential Jerusalem-themed pictures, and here are a selection (some of these were taken whilst in the Lakes a couple of weeks ago):

"And did those feet in ancient time walk upon England's mountains green?":



"Among those dark satanic mills":



"In England's green and pleasant land":

Jam and Jerusalem on the map

I'm starting to think more laterally now for the Jam & Jerusalem competition. My latest entries are based on the places - Jerusalem is obvious, but my 'jam' is the caribbean island of Jamaica!

Here are the two locations on the map:



And this was a still life shot I took using some holiday brochures I picked up from some local travel agents:



So far so good... but I haven't finished yet!

Jam, jerusalem artichokes and a pack of modelling clay...

Sometimes things just become so bizarre it just gets silly.

In honour of Julie's wedding to Stewart, a photo competition has been organised amongst all their friends on the theme of... "Jam & Jerusalem" (apparently making jam has become a hobby of Stewart since they moved to their farm in the Lakes).

Hmmm, not easy. Not, that is until you start thinking laterally...

So here I am, camera primed on tripod, lights in position, taking photos of Jerusalem artichokes containing faces made out of plasticine in a variety of poses which tenuously relate to jam in some way.

First of all the boring one - a still life of Jerusalem artichokes (not the most handsome of veg):

Then one said vegetable gained a character and found himself in a jam:

... and - even sillier - how about this: 'Jammin' Jerusalem:


Whatever next? (watch this space)...

Surprise 'hen afternoon' for Julie

Carole took the day off today to meet up with the rest of the girls, the plan being to surprise bride-to-be Julie with a fun afternoon of girly gossip and pink cakes & champagne (well that's about all I found out anyway).

The wedding is fast approaching now and Julie's excitement levels (or should that say stress levels) are nearing fever pitch... so she certainly appreciated the efforts of all her friends to make a fuss of her, and all in secret too!

All good things come to an end

It's the final day of our holiday and time to show where we've been staying. Thornthwaite is a little village just off the A66 near to the bottom end of Bassenthwaite Lake. This is good mountain country, with Skiddaw looking over the lake from the opposite bank, and plenty of exhilerating walks on the doorstep if only the weather could be guaranteed. Our guesthouse, Jenkins Hill, is small and friendly, serving good food (Carole says especially the puddings) and in a tranquil setting. Our room overlooked the front garden, where the birds seemed to be fed as well as we were.

The last day of our holiday was set to be the nicest day of the week, with lots of blue sky and sunshine. A few weeks before our holiday we'd arranged that on one of the better days, Mum and Dad would join us for a not-too-strenuous walk, so today was it!

We did the same thing last year when we took Mum and Dad to Grange in Borrowdale, where we strolled about 2½ miles around the broad flat valley near to the river and the lakeshore of Derwentwater. This time we'd planned to meet up in Grasmere (where there's plenty of teashops), and follow an oft-visited route around Grasmere lake then over to Rydal Water, about 3½ miles. This would be far enough to walk so the plan was to pick up the open-topped bus back to Grasmere village. See Grasmere and Rydal Water in my Walking Blog for details of the route.

Mum and Dad had brought friends Ian and Sue along too. Ian and Dad were both former scout leaders who had organised several summer camps in the Lakes in the past, one of which was just down the road from today's walk at High Close.

Ian points out the view over Grasmere

With the weather fair the view across both lakes were tremendous and ideal for photographs, meaning that progress was slow.

Eventally we made it to the far side of the lake, where an outcrop of rocks on the 'beach' made for an ideal spot for lunch and a group photograph.

After lunch we continued on to Rydal Water and eventually the main road. The open-topped bus service runs every 20 minutes throughout the summer and a bus soon arrived take us back to Grasmere the easy way. Unfortunately the fare isn't cheap (especially if you've forgotton your pass) and the experience of wind in the hair wasn't everyone's cup of tea.

Talking of cups of tea, that was of course our first stop once back in the village.

Walla fantastic walk!

What a difference a day makes! The weather was set to be much drier today, with just the chance of catching a heavy shower later on. Although by now my plans of tackling some of the bigger fells (Crinkle Crags and Bowfell) had been shelved, I did want to take advantage of the better conditions to at least bag one of the lesser fells, where the views would be no less stunning. The others had planned to have the day off from walking, but when Kevan heard I was heading for Walla Crag, he was persuaded to leave the ladies to their shopping and join me.

Walla Crag is a popular walk, being easily achievable from the centre of Keswick in half a day. The climb is by and large quite gentle and the route straightforward (see Walla Crag entry in my Walking Blog for full details). Before the main climb, a short diversion (which is only a ten minute walk from the Borrowdale Road) leads to Castlehead viewpoint, a magnificent panorama across Derwentwater and the Borrowdale valley. This is really quite spectacular and is something every visitor to Keswick should make the effort to see.

Walla Crag itself is a modest height (Wainwright says it's the easiest fell to remember the height of provided you can count to four (1234'), although modern maps quote a spot height which is slightly higher), but the views are even better than Castlehead, with more mountains in view across the lake, and Bassenthwaite and Skiddaw now completing the picture.

The popular route down from the top is very steep, and we preferred a longer option which took in a third iconic viewpoint: Ashness Bridge. This is the view which appears on postcards and packets of biscuits throughout the Lakes. From here we completed our descent down to the lake shore and headed back to Keswick.

The ups and downs of walking...

The weather forecast was much improved today: the rain would stop periodically instead of being incessant! OK, it wasn't quite so bad - we expected to stay dry until after lunch, when we might get caught in one or two showers. With this in mind, we decided to head down to the western shores of Lake Windermere to a part of the Lakes we'd not visited before. All things being well, we'd be in amongst the forested hillside above the lake by the time the rain came, and hopefully this would give us some shelter.

Today's walk (see Claife Heights and the Sawreys) started from the car park near the ferry crossing point, near to Far Sawrey and not far from Near Sawrey either. Near Sawrey is farther than Far Sawrey although by the time you saw Near Sawrey, Far Sawrey was farther and no longer nearer. Glad that's sorted out!

Near Sawrey is better known as the home of Beatrix Potter, and Hill Top farm is close to the road near the centre of the village. Even on an overcast day in October, there were still plenty of people wanting a closer look, and as the entance charge isn't cheap we decided not to bother.

The gentle climb from Near Sawrey took us to Moss Eccles Tarn, which is a picturesque spot for lunch, well it would have been if the rain has caught us up. And unfortunately there wasn't much shelter so we had to grin and bear it.

Eventually we made it to the woods, but although this sheltered us from the worst of the rain, unfortunately the rain made the rocky ground incredibly slippy (particularly for me and Kevan) and this, together with the overgrown trees and roots that were constantly in the way, made progress very slow. The three miles or so back to the start felt more like six, and the last stretch downhill to the car was both trecherous and very, very steep. On a nicer day I'm sure it would have been much easier, but on a poor day this turned out not to be one of our favourite walks.