Lake District Tour

Sunday (1/11) began in a rush. The staff at Lancaster had a tripped planned for the international students to see some of the towns and countryside that make up the Lake District. Our tour was scheduled to leave at 9am sharp. My alarm went off at 7:30 as planned, but then I hit the snooze and for some reason the clock I have turns off if you hit the snooze 2 consecutive times. With my alarm off I continued to sleep, but magically woke up at precisely 9am. My flat is about a 10 minute walk to the Underpass, which is where buses normally stop. I sat and debated for a few minutes if it was even worth trying to make it there just in case they were running late. I finally decided to throw my clothes on and run to the Underpass. I made it there at about 9:20am and to my surprise they hadn't left yet. I got on the bus, found an open seat, and collapsed. My hangover had made me pretty dead to the world and my stomach was a bit on edge, but damnit I made it to the tour.

We departed shortly after my boarding and began our trip to Bowness, which was our first stop. I battled constantly to stay awake and enjoy the countryside, although the weather was pretty crappy. We arrived at Bowness and filed into a cafe for a morning snack. Not wanting to tempt my uneasy stomach I got a cheese sandwich and a cup of tea. With a little food in me I was beginning to come back to life. After we ate we headed straight for the pier where we were to catch a ferry across Lake Windermere.


Bowness pier


Bowness pier from the ferry


Sonny freezing his ass off on the top of the ferry


Lake Windermere

The ferry ride was about 30 minutes, at which time we arrived in Ambleside.


Ambleside pier


Ambleside backpackers lodge

When we got off the ferry we went straight to the buses and continued on towards Grasmere.

When we got to Grasmere we filed off the bus and were given 1 hour to freely roam about. Most people filed into the first cafe they could find to get another snack and to get out of the wind and misting rain. I, however, felt like exploring as much as time would allow so I just started walking in one direction and kept going. Grasmere is a beautiful old town known for its gingerbread, which I bought and will attest to its greatness. Grasmere was also home to William Wordsworth who was a very influential romantic poet in the 1700's. Here are some pictures from Grasmere:


A river that runs through the town


Road leading to the YHA (youth hostel)


A street in Grasmere with the mountains in the background


A really cool tree I found

When our hour was up it was back to the buses to drive to Keswick (pronounced kezzick), which would be our final stop of the trip.

Keswick was quite a bit larger than Grasmere, but still a fairly small town. It was very apparent that it was a hotspot for people interested in the outdoors as half of the shops were strickly concerned with selling hiking, backpacking, climbing, or snowboarding equipment. We had 1.5 hours in Kewswick so we just walked around the main thoroughfare and then stopped in a small coffee shop for a warm drink. Here are my pictures from Keswick:







When our time was up we filed back onto the buses for the drive home. I again struggled to maintain consciousness, but I was able to see a fair bit of the rolling countryside as we drove along. It was a beautiful trip even in spite of the weather and I have every intention to go back there when the weather has cleared up. As for the rest of the day, I went down to Trev for a while and hung out with the group before crashing around 2ish.