MY HOLIDAYS IN THE LAKE DISTRICT

For the first week of the easter holidays, my family and I went to the Lake District. We stayed in a cottage in Bassenwaithe near Keswick. From the window in the living room we could see a nice view on a farm.Here is what we did during the week:

DAY 1 – Dodd Summit

This morning we took the car to the entrance of Dodd Wood.The walk we did was called Dodd Summit Trail.It was nearly 3 hours so near the middle we stopped to have lunch (a sandwich and crisps) as well as stopping multiple times during the trip. At the top of the summit we had a lovely view on the valley and lakes in the distance. At the end of the trail, we went to Keswick and because we had walked so well we got an ice cream and to climbs on a climbing wall. When we got home the easter bunny had left me hot cross bun truffles and 6 small chocolate rabbits.

DAY 2 – Sale Fell and Keswick’s Old Railway

This morning we had planned to climb Sale Fell, which is a 2 hour walk in total (ascent+descent). It started at the bottom of a hill and you had to climb to the top. When you were at the top the top of the hill rolled into another hill. The hills kept doing this until you got to the top of Sale Fell, then you had to take a small winding path all the way back down to the car park. In total the walk was about 4km with 359m in height

In the afternoon, we decided to do the Keswick’s Old Railway walk which is a path that used to be train tacks but were destroyed by Storm Desmond in 2015. The whole walk was 10km in total (there and back) but it started raining near halfway so we had to turn around and go back to the car. In total we did nearly 6km of walking.

DAY 3 – Pencil Museum and Catbells

As it was wet, we went to the pencil museum this morning.It is like one giant room split up by displays and fact boards. In some of the displays, there were even machines that were paused in time to show the different stages of pencil making but I think the best part was that the Derwent Pencil Museum is home to the biggest pencil in the world (exactly 7.91m long). This was displayed right in thee centre of the gallery. They even got a Guinness World Record for it.

In the afternoon, it was a lot sunnier so we decided to climb Catbells. Near the top of Catbells it was so rocky and slimy that we had to crawl on all fours to get over big slates of rock. In the end we managed to get to the top and the view was amazing! If you haven’t done Catbells yet I highly recommend you to go do the walk but if your still quite young the top where it is quite rocky might be a bit hard. to get back down we had to take a path down and eventually we got back to the car.

DAY 4 – The Puzzling Place and Dash Falls

It was on and off raining this morning so we decided to go to The Puzzling Place which is a museum with loads of illusions in it. One I quite enjoyed, was you span a wheel and fixed the centre and after 30seconds you looked at the back of your hand and it looked all blurry. Another really funny one was when you went into a room with tilted floor but even roof so when you stood on the higher part you appeared a lot taller but when you went on the lower part you looked like a tiny mouse. The funniest in that illusion was when my younger sister looked taller than me!

This afternoon, it had dried up so we decided to visit Dash Falls which is a big waterfall. Just off the side of it is a path so you can get a great view on the waterfall itself. At one view point we could even see the water hitting the rocks and turning into a foamy liquid. At the top of the hill me and my sister each got a chocolate twist as a boost to go down the hill. Before we got to the car we had to walk through many fields of sheep. At one point we even saw a baby lamb and

IT WAS ADORABLE!!!!!!!!!

DAY 5 – Aira Force National Trust Park

Today we went to the Aira Force National Trust Park. It is a big area of land protected by the National Trust and full of different walks. We did a walk where we started on the car park and walked up then over the waterfall (using a bridge). Then we walked along the river which was the waterfalls water source. Finally we got to a field which was absolutely FULL of mud. It was so muddy that I nearly lost a shoe! Then we went up a hill which is 481m high and nearly 100% mud. It is called Gowbarrow Fell. Because it was such a long walk we paused at the top of the Fell to have lunch before going backdown to the car.

DAY 6 – The Lake District Wildlife Park

Today we visited the Lake District Wildlife Park. It is a big zoo part of many conservation projects to help save critically endangered and nearly extinct animals and birds. Some of the animals we saw were : tortoises, alpacas, ring tailed lemurs, zebras, lynxes, otters, meerkats, red pandas, eagles, owls and the best part : Scottish wildcats. Every hour there was a talk on certain animals; we went to the ones about meerkats, ring tailed lemurs, otters and red pandas. We also went to the flying display (they even took out a vulture!) At the red panda talk the red panda actually came out even though something really sad had happened two weeks ago : he lost his friend because she died of old age.