On the Sunday the weather is better than the day before. I am on the move before 9AM and whilst the roads are still wet from the night’s rain, things are looking fine, or at least not dire.
It pays to go out early if you visit the Lake District in August: for the first literally 20 miles I have not a single car in front of me, which makes for some 40 minutes of serious fun. The roads are generally very well kept, too, which is in sharp contrast to much of what you see around London. The wildlife is abundant, though, as witnessed by the impressive number of road kill I encounter (squirrels and hares, generally; Peter Rabbit and Squirrel Nutkin, the “locals”, immediately come to mind…). However, you know that the roads are well maintained also because the roadkill is always “fresh”, again a sharp contrast to the hares and foxes in advanced state of decomposition you see in Surrey or Kent.
I had prepared a Pennines itinerary at home and have therefore everything set up for fun: the main roads I ride are the – for great stretches seriously exciting – A6 and its two little sisters, the A686 and the A689: all three of them absolutely bloody spectacular with dry roads and no traffic. The landscape is, as expected, different from the Lake District’s: vegetation is rarer and the still beautiful views do not have, in my eyes, the aha-effect of the green vales of the Lake District; not even in August, when you would expect the region to be at its best. Great fun to drive, though, and I ride twice on the Hartside Pass, home of the eponymous cafe’. The first time there are only three bikes parked outside, when I ride back well past 11 they must be at least two dozen.
I descend from the side whence I had come and, finally, meet my first lake of this holiday: it’s the Ullswater, past the rather nice little town of Penrith. From there, an absolutely spectacular – if slow and traffic-plagued, with the many cyclists now underway making things slower – A592 leads me all along the lakes first and to the excellent, very scenic Kirkstone pass later. From there, I can choose between Ambleside on the right and Windermere straight and I opt for the latter, first out of curiosity to finally see the place and also because I need victuals and think I’ll have a better choice there (I was wrong in this, as I discovered later).
On the road along the like I see coming in my direction a Custom Guzzi, aluminium tank, round cylinder heads. The sound of the bike is heaven and makes me feel shame for the whining sound (nay: the whining whine) of my Boxer. If my bike had that Guzzi sound it would be perfect for me. Without it, it’s like a supermodel with a huge nose always staring at you.
The town is finally reached. Boy, is Windermere beautiful. What I have seen exceeded every expectation, but I wanted to go home and close the morning with a nice meal so I did not spend much time. In the afternoon I will be back, though, because the place truly impressed me.
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The afternoon came, and back I was in Windermere. The town proper has a nice, prosperous village atmosphere, and I ordered an ale at the local pub, “The Queens”. The ale in question – I don’t remember the exact name, only that it was local – was a disappointment, but the village is truly nice. Around one mile down the road is another village, Bowness-on-Windermere, which is whence the boat business departs. The lake is stunning. This village has, perhaps, less character, but still a lot of tourists, swarming the place on a Sunday afternoon and giving it a lot of, so to speak, “village Saturday” atmosphere.
I mix with them a while and then decide to discover the East side of Lake Windermere with the bike: Ambleside, Rydal and, particularly, Grasmere. They are all beautiful – I can see now that Ambleside has a lot of shops, and less of the “Village” character – but Grasmere is, in my eyes, easily the best, and I will certainly return. The famous gingerbread shop, on the main road, has not even the place to park a bike. From Grasmere I trace my steps back to Bowness-in-Windermere, whence I keep coasting the lake towards the south until the southern extremity of Lake Windermere is reached. The east side of the lake seems easily the better one as far as panoramic roads are concerned, and I don’t think I will make an ad hoc ride around the like like I did in Italy for Lake Garda and Lake Como. From the southern tip of the lake I ride fast back to HQ via A590 and A591; which is fast and practical, if not particularly entertaining.
Around 200 miles were covered today, and no motorway at all. Stunning scenery in the Pennines, but I think the Lake District is more beautiful still. Tomorrow the forecast is… lots of rain, but it should be the last day of rain, too.
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