Hadrian's Wall

Went off to admire Emperor Hadrian's handiwork this morning, and found several parts of his wall close enough to the road to look at and climb on. The road we took runs basically along the route of the wall, but as the wall is generally built along the ridges, it's still a fair hike from the car in most places. Saw hundreds of people tramping the moors along the public right of ways and the wall itself, but we confined ourselves to excursions from the car at the interesting bits. Saw forts, watchtowers and homesteads, and plenty of wall. It's not that high - about 2m high and 1.5m wide at most places.

Unlike the Great Wall of China, this wall wasn't constructed to keep the Scots out of England, but rather to mark the northern border of the Roman Empire, and provide a barrier at which you had to pay taxes and charges if you wanted to cross or trade. It was patrolled by 'auxiliary' forces, often giving jobs to local English and Scots.

Had morning tea at Bampton near the end of the main section of the wall, then through Carlisle to Cockermouth where we intended to have lunch. Seemed an odd town. The main footbridge from the town car park to the main street had collapsed, and as we walked down the main street it seemed that every second shop was boarded up, closed or being renovated. We couldn't find a food shop open, and were just starting to make some less than flattering comments about the town when we came across a photo in a shop window from last November with just the tops of the shops peeking out from a spectacular flood. The water was over 3m deep in the main street, which is about 7m above the river's normal level. Almost every shop and house in the town area was destroyed. A few chain stores (banks, chemists, supermarkets) are open again, but most sole traders are still out of business.

With nothing to eat there, we went on to Keswick was is a lovely town in the middle of the Lakes District. Not only is it a well kept, historic town with lots to do (and eat), but it is also on the River Derwent where the world's first pencils were made. I well remember as a kid saving up my pocket money and agonising over which colour Derwent pencil I would buy, only to have the spoilt kids turn up at school with a full box of 64.

Further down the road and past lots more lakes to our stop at Windermere. After checking in we walked down to and along the shore of Lake Windermere. The hostel is an honesty based one where your name is on the door of your room, and you leave your money in an envelope.