We took a ong weekend trip to the Northern Lake District in Northern England close to the border with Scotland with Bill and Gail. Keswick is situated on the Derwentwater Lake near the Skiddaw Mountains.

We all rode the train from Euston Station in London to Lancaster where we picked up the rental car and drove another 1.5 hours to the town of Keswick. Grandma Gail or "Gramail" her new name - is reading Harry Potter to Ethan on the train.

Our bed and breakfast was located less than a 2 min. walk from the local obstacle golf (mini golf) course and pitch and putt. Mini golf is one of Ethan's favorite activities. We did this every day during the trip. Pitch and putt was also great fun. Here are some golfing shots.

Here Ethan and Grandpa Billy tally up the mini golf scores. Grandpa Billy won this round with Ethan in second place and mom in last.

The morning after we arrived, William looked up a hike for the group in his trusty Ordinance Survey and 15 Walks from Kewsick. He picked out a 7.5 mile hike with a vertical gain of 3000 feet. The hike started with a boat ride from the Keswick launch to Brandelhow Point. Bill and Gail took the boat ride with us to Brandelhow Point.

At Brandelhow Point, Bill and Gail hiked back to Keswick around the lake and me, William, and Ethan set off for our 7.5 mile adventure. Bill and Gail at the start of their hike around the lake ...

Here we are at the start of our hike!

We followed the directions as best we could, but ended up adding an extra peak ascent into our hike. We quickly found ourselves ascending a very steep hill. On the way up, we conferred with another walker about our location. It turns out we were ascending Cats Bells (not part of the original hike). This probably added about a mile to our hike.

This is an example of one of the Cairns on each of the peaks we climed.

King of the hill...

Putting a stone on the Cairn

From the top of Cats Bells, we were able to talk with some other hikers who helped us get on track to our intended route. Walking is very popular in the Lake District, so there were always plenty of people to stop and ask if we needed directions.

Buttermere - the end point of the hike.

The next day we took a short hike to the Castlerigg Stone Circle. This is a smaller version of Stonehenge. The difference is that it is not nearly as croweded, and you can walk right up and crawl around on the stones ....

Here is the full group at the Stone Circles -

We took a beautiful hike back to Keswick a different direction from our hike to the stone circle. Here are some scenes from the hike back.

At one point on the hike back, William and I opted to take a bit of a longer route around the lake back to town. Here is William on the trail ....

The trail back took us through a cow enclosure. I think the cows thought we were going to feed us, because they all started running in our direction which was a bit scary. I took this picture of the cows after we had cleared the fence.

We also went to the Cumberland Pencil Museum, learned about how pencils are made, and saw the biggest pencil on record.