Trans Pennine - North East bound!

I left Windermere and crossed my last Lakeland pass of the trip, Kirkstone pass, it was mean and moody today, shrouded in mist and rain clouds, did wonders to clear my head though as I felt a bit groggy from an uncomfortable night's sleep.

Ullswater

I stopped along the shores of Ullswater for a photo opportunity before leaving the hills and stopping in Penrith for a MacDonald's coffee

If you look really hard you can see the road... 

The road over the Pennines from Penrith to Alston is the A686, described by some as one of the best drives/rides in the country... And I agree, it's brilliant! Smooth surface, swooping bends, not busy, great scenery and it climbs and climbs into the moors and mists... At the top is a nice cafe, (Hartside Top), I recommend the cheese scones.






Alston is nearby, and is the highest market town in England, cobbled High street and plenty of atmosphere, and then a glorious decent of Wear Dale, more sweeping corners and hardly any traffic - I will be back!

Darlington FC... welcome to the lower leagues...

Before I got to Stockton I passed two curious landmarks; a football stadium in the middle of nowhere, (Darlington FC's ground, surely the best stadium belonging to a non league team!), and a brick sculpture of the famous "Mallard" steam train appearing from a bank of earth. Hmmm... Strange!    

A train of bricks... 

Resting with the folks now, back to Notts. tomorrow.

Road trip!

This is a short test run for the blog to make sure I can remember how to do it later in the summer when we go to the Far East!So it's the first day of my holidays and its time for a road trip! I thought I'd go up north to my parents in Stockton, but take a detour to make the journey interesting...I've always hankered after seeing Antony Gormley's "Another place" figures which are sited off Crosby Beach just north of Liverpool - so on the way to an overnight stop at Windermere youth hostel I took a detour...At low tide they look like this...When I got there today it was 1:05pm, and high tide was due at 1:14pm, so what I saw was this...Bah! So I had a really tasteless "Jumbo hotdog" from a catering van and headed for the Lakes.When I got to Windermere I was so hot in my biking kit that I did a discrete little strip tease in a back street car park - for a long journey the armoured knees and hips of my "Hein Gericke" gear is great, but for a slow "pootle" in today's heat I'll take a risk on my jeans. I found the hostel and left my stuff and went for an explore.The "slow pootle" I had in mind was a traverse of 3 high lake land passes; Hardnott, Wrynose, and GreatLangdale. I've ridden them before, but they're so exhilarating that I keep coming back for more!

After 270 miles I finally rolled into Bowness to find a pub that does food and Wi-fi. The food was good but the Wi-fi didn't want to work. Ah well, I'll sort something.Posted with Blogsyx