Our return to England was incredibly quick. Landing at Gatwick, thankfully a day before the Heathrow meltdown, we swept through immigration, bags came out on the carousel quickly, breezed through customs, walked onto a train and jumped on a bus to collect our hire car. A crawl through London brought us to the M1 and our trip to The North (they shout it on the road signs).
We have timed our return to the UK perfectly. Spring is here and the most obvious demonstration of this is the variety of flowers dotting gardens and roadside verges. We see daffodils everywhere and there are pansies, crocuses and even the trees and hedges are getting into the act with their blossoms and buds.
First stop was in Riddington (near Nottingham) to visit Ann, a former work colleague of Wanda’s. She was a wonderful host, great conversationalist and excellent provider of tasty gins and delicious food. We spent a long night catching up on news, laughed way too much and regretfully left the next morning to continue our reunion voyage. Apologies to Ann; we were too busy chatting to take a photo!
Next stop was Leek, where we reconnected with a former travel buddy of Wanda’s and name inspiration for our daughter. It was lovely to spend time with Brigid, who kindly welcomed us into her home at a trying time. She gave us her full attention while also having to organise an emergency overseas family flight. Brigid is also the owner of several cats, which was a lovely salve for the fur-baby-missing travellers.
Putting reunions on pause for a few days, Coniston in the Lake District was our next rest stop, a long-time wishlist place. A few days in the countryside, visiting villages, viewing lakes, walking many footpaths and bridlepaths, marvelling at the miles of stone fences that crisscross the fields, visited many local pubs (and there are an incredible number for us to explore), clambering up Old Man of Coniston (c800m elevation to climb, very proud of that achievement) and watching the shadows change over Coniston Water. An added bucolic loveliness was the fluffy white, brown and black sheep dotting hillsides, as well as brightly coloured pheasants playing ‘chicken’ with the car. These few days revitalised us for the next exciting part of our trip.
Carlisle was the next destination, with a visit to the squat, elegant castle, the 900-year-old cathedral, the town walls, market square and laneways. Seeing the variety of architecture across the town was really interesting (though navigating the pavement work added a degree of complexity!). A quick detour east to Lanercost Priory and the remains of Roman Turret 52A,122AD) of Hadrian’s Wall were additional destinations before we crossed the border into Scotland.
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