Coniston travels with Philip and Sheila

Another video from our recent holiday in the Lake District. The morning looked promising, but with rain forecast for the afternoon, so we walked from our holiday cottage in Coniston along the former railway line down to the lakeside, and then back along Coniston Water. Its hard to imagine that Coniston, now a peaceful village surrounded by fells, was once the centre of the copper mining industry, with the copper ore being taken by railway down to the coast and then transported by ship to refineries, including those at Swansea. Our walk takes us through woodland, where we learn about coppicing, and then to Coniston Water, the scene of the disaster when Donald Campbell was killed trying to achieve the water speed record in his rocket powered boat Bluebird in 1967, and also the setting for Arthur Ransome's book Swallows and Amazons.

We pass Coniston Hall, which William Wordsworth described as "grotesque and beautiful" with its "huge round chimneys" which particularly interested him. We end up at the Bluebird Cafe for a welcome coffee and lunch - and then the rain came, so we hurried back to our cottage.

Thank you again, Philip and Sheila! We have enjoyed this short trip, and you managed to avoid the rain!

These railway walks are most attractive and the wonderful violets and lakeside too! It looked chilly at times Sheila, with your hood up, but I think you had better weather than we had that week.

I think we will all now feel energised and refreshed. Thank you both.