Two early April ascents of the Knott – without a walk around the coast to Arnside on either occasion. In between, I drove down to Lincoln and back to fetch my parents for a visit.
Coal Tit.
April is a great time for birding – the birds are busy and the trees still without leaves so it’s easy to see what they’re up to. I have other photos from this walk – blurred, and/or obscured by twigs – of Blue Tits, Great Tits and warblers, possibly Chiff-chaffs, although I know I’m guilty of assuming that all warblers are Chiff-chaffs.
Song Thrush.Arnside Knott pano – click on the image to see a bigger zoomable version.Far Arnside and our ‘beach’.‘Wet oil on seat’ – I wonder who was so public spirited?
This is the second seat at the marvellous viewpoint on Heathwaite. This one is set in a little bower in the thicket of Gorse and so is also wonderfully sheltered. I’m sure there only used to be one bench here, but I can’t recall when this second one appeared. It was great to see that someone is looking after it. There are lots of benches dotted around the AONB and several seem to have been adopted, even, in some cases with plant pots and decoration provided. What a brilliant thing to do.
Far Arnside daffodils.Female Wheatear.
Wheatears are birds I associate with spring and summer walks in the hills, but they are migratory, and at the right times can be seen around our coast.
Park Point and Grange-over-Sands.Mum and Dad at The Quarterhouse.
The second day was my Birthday. They will keep coming around. We went for lunch at The Quarterhouse in Lancaster. B and I both had a platter of smoked meats and fish, which was very tasty, and everybody else’s meal looked good too. I’d go again.
TBH and Mum at The Quarterhouse.Pasteis de Nata
I even had a sweet, which is most unusual for me.
Warton Crag, Clougha Pike and Silverdale from Castlebarrow.
Long-suffering readers will now that I like to climb a hill on my Birthday. On this occasion, it was two hills, although just Castlebarrow in Eaves Wood and Arnside Knott again. I managed something a bit more ambitious the following day.
Arnside Tower.TBH on the Knott.Silverdale Moss and a distant Ingleborough.Arnside Tower, Middlebarrow, Warton Crag, Clougha Pike. Pano looking south from the Knott.The Howgills from the Knott.River Kent and Lakeland Fells from the Knott.
What’s this, some grass, some mud and a large foot in a scruffy none-too-clean shoe? Not my most artistic composition, I’ll admit, but I should also add that this is arguably the most exciting photo in this lengthy post, in as much as, it’s unique; I’m sure I haven’t ever shared another picture quite like this one, which can’t be said for any of the many images which follow. You have been warned!
The outsize trotter is mine and is there for scale. On this particular Saturday morning in late March, before I set-off for my walk – around the coast to Arnside and back over the Knott, for the umpteenth time, you’ll be completely unsurprised to hear – before I set-off, I traipsed down to the bottom of our back garden, probably to dump some vegetable peel and the like in the compost bin. In the lawn, I discovered five large bald patches, with some indistinct paw prints in them and some pretty impressive claw-marks. I know that there were five, because I took photos of them all – of course I did. In addition, there were a number of small holes, with swirls of grass and moss around them, as if they had been made by a twisting motion. I have a couple of books on animal tracks and signs, and between them and a bit of lazy internet research it seems that the most likely culprits are badgers. The small holes are made by them sticking their snouts into the ground in search of their favourite food: earthworms.
They came back and did it again a few nights later, but, sadly, I’ve never seen them and they don’t seem to have been back since. TBH is not quite as devastated as I am, by the fact that our lawn is not being ripped up on a regular basis. She’s already fed-up with the Roe Deer consuming many flowers, particularly, but not exclusively, tulips, and would like to erect a tall mesh fence with a roll of barbed wire along the top and probably towers manned by sharpshooters.
Robin.
And so, leaving our garden; around the coast to Arnside and over the Knott, episode three hundred and fifty-seven (or thereabouts). Other local walks are available, obviously, but I seem to be in the grip of a monomania and, recently at least, only a walk to Arnside and back will do me.
Hazel Catkins.
At least spring was well and truly underway and so there were new things to see relative to other walks this way from earlier in the year.
Sculpture?
I’m assuming that these large metal squares serve some purpose at the cricket ground and weren’t just hung in the tree as a piece of modern art, although I think they pass muster as an example of the latter. I really ought to ask Little S what he thinks!
Louring skies over Arnside Knott.
Rather than walking across the fields towards Far Arnside, as I usually do, I took the road by the shore, hoping to walk on the sand from the little cove known locally as ‘the dip’. However, when I reached the dip, the sand was wet and and not at all firm and so not a very enticing prospect, and I stuck with the road.
A display of white violets on the verge.
I’m glad that I did, otherwise I might have missed a superb display of white Violets on the verge which stretched out over several yards. It was a gloomy morning, but the sun came out just at that moment, just as I was photographing the violets.
Far Arnside Daffs.
If the violets were a somewhat unexpected bonus, the daffodils in the woods at Far Arnside were totally anticipated and half the reason I had been drawn this way. And when the daffs are on display, I also know that I will find Green Hellebores flowering too…
Green Hellebore among the daffs.Green Hellebore.Around the coast again!Gorse flowering.Hampsfell and Grange-over-Sands.The Kent Estuary.
Not only do I love the view that is revealed when I turn a slight corner here into the Kent Estuary, I also like to drop down on to the sands here, where there’s a handy ramp down across the small limestone cliffs…
The slabs which lead down to the ‘beach’.
I hadn’t been doing that of late, because the beach had always been very wet and muddy, and often slightly submerged. It was no different on this occasion, everything was under an inch of water or more, but for some reason I abandoned caution and decided to head down anyway.
Lichened rocks.Seaweed – Spiral Wrack, I think.
Looking back towards Grange, it looked distinctly like it was raining over there. I thought: “Oh look, it’s raining in Grange”. I didn’t make the obvious inference: “Oh dear, it’s about to rain on me”.
Which of course, it did. Quite heavily, but fortunately not for too long.
A heavy shower.
It was quite odd to be walking in an inch or two of water whilst it was also pelting down.
Seaweed – possibly Bladder Wrack, or a mixture of Bladder Wrack and Spiral Wrack?
Jumping forward to the here and now, June, where we are possibly going to get our first rain in weeks today: I went to a talk about plants this week which was organised by the local Horticultural Society. It was a fascinating presentation, and one of the things I took away from it was the fact that seaweeds are not regarded as plants, but rather as multicellular algae.
A muddy path and a faint rainbow over Whitbarrow Scar.River Kent, light catching a corner of Whitbarrow, and the viaduct. Coastguards training.
By the Coastguard Station on the outskirts of Arnside, some of the coastguard officers were busy training. With hindsight, how I knew that’s who they were, and that they weren’t just thrill-seekers having fun, I can’t remember. It did look like fun, although maybe a little bit on the chilly side.
Haverbrack, Beetham Fell, Farleton Fell.
The views from the Knott were rather limited, since many of the Lakeland Fells were smothered by clouds. Still worth the climb however.
River Kent and Gummer How from the Knott.River Kent pano.Gummer How, Whitbarrow Scar, Foulshaw Moss, Scout Scar, River Kent.Silverdale Moss and Hutton Roof beyond.Morecambe Bay.Whitbarrow Scar again.Knotty tree trunk.
I walk past these couple of old, gnarly tree-stumps almost every time I climb the Knott; what possessed me to take lots of photos of their whorled and fissured surfaces on this occasion rather than any other, I couldn’t say.
Fissured tree trunk.Saul’s Road.Arnside Tower Farm and Middlebarrow Wood.
There are Hellebores to be found along the edge of Middlebarrow Wood – to the right they are scattered along the perimeter of Holgates Caravan Park, to the left there’s a single spot where a large clump and several smaller outlying clumps always appear. I chose to head to the left.
Silverdale Moss and Beetham Fell.Green Hellebore – a sizeable patch.
Every spring, I worry that this little clearing, just by the footpath, will have been swamped by the brambles which seem to dominate everywhere else. So far, my fears have been misfounded.
Lots of flowers this year.Rather shy and retiring blooms.Perhaps, a bit nondescript – but I like them.
I’ve limited myself to a handful of the host of photos I took. The flowers are green and rather nondescript, and I’ve posted inumerable photos of them over the years, since I first stumbled upon them flowering, but I like them and I’m afraid I shan’t tire of them anytime soon.
Flooded fields by Middlebarrow Wood.The path along Black Dyke to Arnside – waders required.
Rather astonishingly, I was able to walk this path shortly after this photo was taken, without getting my feet wet. At the time, however, it was very flooded.
Willow catkins.Quince flowerbuds.…and flowering.
The thicket of Quince at the corner of Elmslack and Cove Road wasn’t really flowering in earnest yet, which given that one year it burst into flower at New Year, seemed quite late. The Quince bushes here, and the hedge opposite are one of the many places around the village, including our own garden, where you can reliably hear the incessant chatter of Sparrows pretty much all year round. Despite being called House Sparrows, they are definitely fond of a nice dense hedgerow. Ours nest under our eaves, but seem to spend much of the day hidden in our Beech hedge, chattering away.
The expectation I might have created in yesterday’s post, of another walk around the coast and an ascent of Arnside Knott featuring in this post, was slightly inaccurate. I was misremembering. In fact, whilst I did climb the Knott, the walk around the coast I was thinking of took place the following weekend.
On this occasion, when I passed Hollins Farm and entered the National Trust land at Heathwaite, I noticed a path bisecting the two routes I usually choose between, one of which follows the edge of the field towards Saul’s Road and the Knott, whilst the other follows the other boundary, eventually reaching the large open area at the western end of Heathwaite.
Intrigued, I took the middle path.
Through a thicket.Past some handsome Birches.Cresting the slope.To a bench.
To find that it took a direct, steep route to the bench which has a very fine view southwards along the coast. There’s a second bench, in a sheltered spot surrounded by Gorse bushes. Has that always been there, or is it a recent addition? It’s odd, but not surprising, that I can’t remember.
With a terrific view.
From there, I continued to the toposcope which I think of as the ‘top’ of the Knott, although it isn’t quite. The views were more extensive than they had been the day before. It was clear that the previous day’s showers had fallen as snow on the mountains of the Eastern Lakes.
The Kent Estuary and Cartmel Fell with snowy lakeland Fells beyond.Arnside Tower.
I took a direct route back past Arnside Tower and through Eaves Wood.
Arnside Tower.Flooded fields, Silverdale Moss, Beetham Fell and Farleton Fell.
Later, I hitched a lift with B, who dropped me at the junction of Storrs Lane and Thrang Brow Lane. From there, I walked home via Yealand Allotment, the meadows of Gait Barrows, Moss Lane and Eaves Wood.
Lime Kiln by Thrang Brow Lane.Yealand Allotment.Leighton Moss and a disappearing sun.Cartmell Fell, Whitbarrow and Beetham Fell from Thrang Brow.
The view from Thrang Brow is excellent, but never seems to lend itself to photographs.
Freshly-laid hedge.
I thought I might get a clear view of the sunset from there, but the intervening ‘high’ ground, presumably Heald Brow, was blocking the view.
A sunset, of sorts.
Of course, if the sun sets when you are still a few miles from home, then you will be finishing your walk in gathering darkness, so there are no more photos.
Humphrey Head and Grange from the coastal path to Arnside.
Taking advantage of some much improved weather, and the fact that my covid-inflicted fatigue seemed to be wearing-off, I got out for a longish local wander, around 11 miles, on the second of January. These days, I’m increasingly drawn to the route around the coast to Arnside with a return over the Knott.
And again.
There are lots of other great walks in the area, but the appeals of this one are hard to match.
Looking out into the Bay.Looking back towards Silverdale.
Just in case the sunshine is making you think it might have been a warm, balmy day, this is the first sight that greeted me when I left the house…
Car bonnet frost flowers.A car roof frost spiral.
On the way to the coast at Far Arnside I indulged myself with some old favourite obsessions, which perhaps haven’t appeared on the blog as often recently as they once did…
Robin.Back-lit leaves.Back-lit leaf.Almost seasonal holly berries.Back-lit Bramble leaves.Back-lit Oak leaves.
Leaves, berries and Robins and the like.
Grange and Hampsfell.Turning in to the Kent Estuary.
At the far end of the White Creek shingle beach there must have been rich pickings in an area of rough grass just above the high-tide line; several Chaffinches, a couple of Robins, and a Blackbird were darting to and fro from the low trees nearby to the turf.
Chaffinch.
In amongst the others was a bird I didn’t recognise, and I got overly excited thinking that it was something exotic. In my defence, I did assume that it was a bunting of some kind. It is: a Reed Bunting, which I’ve seen in lots of places locally, but never down on the coast before.
Reed Bunting.The River Kent and Grange.Across the Kent to Meathop Fell.Along the Kent to the Howgills.River Kent pano.Arnside Knott from New Barns.The river, the viaduct and the Howgills from New Barns.Complex channels at New Barns.Looking back to New Barns.Close to Arnside – it was busy.Whitbarrow Scar and the viaduct.Clouds reflected in the Kent.Another Robin.Fungi.
I’ve joined a Facebook group, Fungi of the World, and the weird and wonderful photos which are posted there have inspired me to pay more attention to the varied forms of fungi in our local woods. On my way up on to the Knott, I took a circuitous route, including a wander around Redhill Woods to have a gander at the fungi there.
Tiny, tiny fungi – Ear Fungus fruiting bodies just appearing?Shiny, black bracket fungus.More fungus.Even more fungus.
I found many kinds, but not all of them are here as some of the photos came out a little blurred.
Warty excrescences on a Birch log.
I don’t think these are fungi, but I think that it might be the case that the trees produces these odd growths in response to the promptings of a fungi.
Ingleborough and Silverdale Moss from Arnside Knott.Arnside Tower, Arnside Tower Farm, Middlebarrow, Warton Crag and the Forest of Bowland Fells from Arnside Knott.The Howgill Fells and Middleton Fells from Arnside Knott.Rain in the Lake District pano.
As I often seem to do, I looked at the clouds obscuring the Cumbrian fells and felt vindicated in choosing a wander straight from my door rather than going further afield, but usually this weather based justification is superfluous – in reality I’m looking for excuses for doing just what I wanted to do anyway.
Starting to clear pano.Very short, faint rainbow over Yewbarrow and Whitbarrow.Clougha Pike from Heathwaite.Ingleborough from Heathwaite.Male Kestrel.
Near Far Arnside I spotted this male Kestrel perched on a telegraph pole.
Male Kestrel in flight.
It didn’t seem too happy with my attention and flew from pole to pole, with me following and taking lots of pictures. Of course, after all that effort, it was the first two that I took which came out best. A great way to finish a really terrific start to the new year.
Another cheating post! (Apparently) Which will bring 2022 to a close on the blog at long last.
Actually, these first two photos are from the tail end of November and one of our regular Jenny Brown’s Point circulars.
TBH on her way to Jenny Brown’s Point.
Then we jump forward a bit to a snowy weekend in December and a couple of late local wanders.
A snowy day in Middlebarrow Wood.Ice on seedheads.Beech leaves.Arnside Tower.
The following day, some of the snow had melted in the sunshine, but a little was still clinging on elsewhere…
Eaves Wood.Beech leaves catching the last of the sun.Looking towards Clougha from near the Pepper Pot.Sunset and Morecambe Bay.The Pepper Pot.The Cove.A layer of ice over mud.
I had high hopes that the ice would hold and keep me out of the mud. It didn’t.
Morecambe Bay.Hampsfell from ‘the beach’.
Just before Christmas, Little S tested positive for Covid. Subsequently, I felt very ill myself, but kept testing negative. Subsequently, my GP has told me that I probably did have Covid.
We still met up at Gearstones just before Christmas with all the usual suspects, but I have no photos to show for it because, still feeling rotten, I generally stayed inside and didn’t brave the snowy weather. It was great to see everyone, none-the-less.
Christmas Day Roe Deer.
With hindsight, I perhaps shouldn’t have fetched my Mum and Dad to spend Christmas with us, but it was fabulous to see them and I don’t seem to have passed on the lurgy.
Christmas Day Rainbow.Cold and damp on Morecambe Prom.
The ‘upper’ path from Far Arnside. Third time running I’d foolowed this path, which I don’t usually use.
Long-suffering readers will know that on, or close to, my birthday I like to climb a hill to celebrate. This year, my Lingmoor walk was just two days before my birthday and a couple of days later I was back in the Little Langdale area with TBH, so I did pretty well.
On the actual day, the forecast was pretty ropey. Never-the-less, we managed to persuade the boys to join us for a walk to Arnside over the Knott. Possibly the promise of a pie in Arnside had some influence on their decision.
In Far Arnside, we sheltered behind a tall hedge for the duration of a short, sharp hail shower. It was pretty fierce, but also wind-driven so that in the lea of the hedge it came over our heads and we didn’t do too badly.
Warton Crag, the Bay and Bowland from Heathwaite. I think you can see showers tracking in off the Bay.Taking a Heathwaite selfie. Not sure why Little S wasn’t included.Far Arnside and The Bay. As we approached the toposcope on the Knott, the heavens opened again.Kent Estuary in the rain.River Kent, Cartmel Fell, Gummer How, Yewbarrow and Whitbarrow Scar – bigger fells beyond conspicuous by their absence.
Fortunately, it was another short-lived shower. And the pies and sausage-rolls at the Old Bakehouse went a long-way as compensation for the changeable weather.
Kent Viaduct. Louring skies.Arnside Tower – blue skies!
As I said – a very changeable day.
Quince.
A had been working on my birthday and so wanted to go for a walk the following day. The weather was similar to the day before and although we had originally planned to go to Arnside for pies again, A eventually decided that a short Eaves Wood stroll would have to suffice.
TBH and A at the Pepper Pot.
It’s very handy having some little hills on the doorstep to climb when the weather isn’t conducive to a longer expedition!
Crepuscular Rays over Silverdale from Castlebarrow.Flooded fields, Silverdale Moss and Beetham Fell from by Arnside Tower.Arnside Tower, Arnside Tower Farm and Arnside Knott.A view over the Kent Estuary from Red Hills Pasture.A hedge-laying competition in Dobshall Wood.Gummer How, Yewbarrow and Whitbarrow behind the Kent Viaduct.Patches of sunlight picking out Cartmell Fell and Yewbarrow.Here it’s Whitbarrow catching the light.Whitbarrow and the Kent Estuary from Haverbrack.Heversham Head and Milnthorpe from Haverbrack.Arnside Knott and blue skies after a shower from Beetham Fell.
The day after my late afternoon walk from Yealand and another walk involving a lift. This was a longer local walk on a day of very changeable weather. After I’d passed Hazelslack Farm, the weather took a turn for the worse and seemed set-in, so I took the easy option and called TBH to come and pick me up, which saved me a couple of miles in pouring rain.
Unusually, for my recent posts, all of these photos are from a single lazy local walk, a few miles spaced out over several hours, during which I took lots of photos and stopped for several brews.
Bugle.Sun-dappled path through Middlebarrow Wood.Mayflowers.Arnside Tower doorway.The view from Arnside Tower over Silverdale Moss to Beetham Fell.Green Hellebore in Middlebarrow Wood.I don’t think I’ve noticed the large size of the seeds which develop inside the flowers.Sweet Woodruff.Herb Paris.Reed beds at Silverdale Moss.Paddock near Far Waterslack.Buttercups.Daisies (of the Galaxy?) Dove’s-foot Crane’s-bill.
Quite clever of this tiny flower to incorporate both the names of two birds and two hyphens in its name.
Heading towards Hawes Water.A swimmer.
I managed quite a bit of swimming this summer, but am still jealous of this solitary bather, since I’ve never swum in Hawes Water. It’s quite hard to see how you could get in through the reeds, although a couple of the houses on Moss Lane have private jetties.
Bird’s-eye Primroses growing in some of the cleared land. Vindication of Natural England’s tree-felling policy?Femal Mallard.Tadpoles and fish in the stream between Little Hawes Water and Hawes Water.Azure Damselfly (I think).Bluebells, Gait Barrows.Limestone Pavement, Gait BarrowsAngular Solomon’s-Seal growing in a grike.Looking towards Trowbarrow from a brew stop.Eaves Wood.Inman Oaks.Blue Tit. I watched blue tits going in and out of this fissure last spring. I wonder of it was the same pair nesting this year? This Nuthatch was also in-and-out, of a neighbouring tree, presumably bringing food to a nest.Male Blackbird on our garden wall.
Well, I must have gone back to work. I mean physically back to work, rather than working from home. Until March I’d been out for a walk most days, but then the wheels came off. Working for a living is highly inconvenient. Anyway – here’s most of March:
The 1st
Spring! I’m sure that the celandines had been flowering for a while at this point, and the Cuckoo Pint leaves hadn’t recently appeared on the floor of Eaves Wood…
Maybe it was the blue skies and sunshine which made me pay attention to them. And to the wash of yellow catkins on the Hazel trees.
I do remember showing TBH the tiny red male flowers, like little starfish, on the Hazels, which apparently she hadn’t seen before.
There’s a garden on The Row which has an amazing display of crocuses every year, which I always make a point of going to see.
Obligatory photo of The Cove
The 2nd
A walk around Gait Barrows most memorable for this pair of Buzzards. I’ve become very wary (well frightened, if I’m honest) of these birds, having been attacked a few times by highly aggressive/protective tiercels during the nesting season. On the other hand, they are beautiful birds, and I’m drawn to them, like a moth to the flame perhaps. So here, I was gradually creeping towards the tree they were perched in, hoping that it was too early in the year for them to take umbrage, but also half hiding behind a small hummock, the top of which can be seen in the photo.
The light, unfortunately, was a bit rubbish, which doesn’t really square with these two views of Hawes Water…
…which can’t have been taken very long afterwards.
The 5th
I must have been a bit late leaving the house, since the sun was already setting.
Post sunset light from Castlebarrow.
The 6th
To the Pepper Pot and then The Cove with TBH and ‘Little S’.
One of those days when the a layer of cloud coverage had a very visible edge with clear skies beyond.
The 7th
Green Hellebore near Far Arnside.
A walk around the coast to Arnside for a pie with TBH. No return over the Knott however and not many photos either.
I’m assuming that there followed a couple of weeks of very iffy weather, because I don’t seem to have got out much until later in the month. Or a couple of weeks of extreme lassitude on my part. Or both.
The view south along the coast from ‘the dip’, looking to Know End Point.
A quick stop at home, long enough to pack-up a sarnie and fill an insulated mug with tea, and I was out again, heading for ‘the dip’ where a large tree-stump looked very inviting. It proved to be a comfortable spot from which to enjoy the views and soak up some sunshine and quaff my picnic lunch.
From there I set of along the sands/mud…
…regaining the shore just past Far Arnside.
The insulated mug had been so effective that I hadn’t managed to drink my tea with my sandwich, which gave me the perfect excuse to lay claim to this bench and have another lengthy sun-bathe.
I’d been sitting so long that I was now conscious of the fact that daylight was getting short, so rather than continuing around the coast towards Arnside, I took a steep, direct route up to Heathwaite.
Ingleborough from Heathwaite.And again, with a bit of zoom.The Bay and the Forest of Bowland from Heathwaite.
I wandered up to the toposcope on the Knott, where someone had scattered some birdseed, which this very tame Robin was not going to be deflected from enjoying, despite the presence of several people and a couple of dogs.
Alpenglow on Whitbarrow and the Eastern Fells.The Coniston and Langdale Fells.Around the Kent Estuary and the Howgills on the right.
The small groups of people were there, of course, to watch the sunset.
Beating The Bounds 