Day 36 - Windermere - 13 October 2024

Day 36 - Windermere - 13 October 2024 

Our last day of sightseeing in this amazing land.  We have seen old cities, rolling hills, rugged mountains and stunning lakes.  Today we head northwards to Wordsworth country.  Dove cottage is closed so we cannot see that, however the house where he grew up is in the hands of the National Trust so we thought we could look at that. 

On the way, we decided to stop at a very pretty town of Grasmere and also Surprise Lookout.  Both had been recommended by the assistant at the Tourist Information Bureau.

Grasmere is a very pretty town.  We stopped there around morning teatime and so had a coffee. 

Grasmere Mall

The opposite direction

Murals over the public toilets

The clock tower

We then went to see the building where William Wordsworth and his sister worked as teachers. it is now a gingerbread shop that attracts so many customers. We bought some and it is quite nice.

The gingerbread shop

The plaque

Adjacent to the gingerbread shop is St Oswald's Church which is where Wordsworth and his family worshipped.  He, his friends and family are buried there.  The community raised funds for a daffodil garden as a tribute to William Wordsworth.

Details of the daffodil garden

The graves of the family

The gravestone of Wordsworth

The drive to Surprise Lookout is probably the most challenging drive we have made.  Te road is extremely narrow with passing places every 50 metres.  There is one bridge that so narrow that we probably had about 50 mm clearance on each side.  The view was actually quite spectacular.

The really narrow bridge

The view north

The view south

We drove further north to Cockermouth where Wordsworth was born in 1770 and lived the early part of his childhood.  His father was a land agent and part of his package was free rent of a huge house.  When the company was selling the house, a bus company wanted to buy it. They intended to demolish the building to allow a parking lot for their buses to be constructed.  The town's people raised sufficient funds to buy it and hand it over to the National Trust for preservation.

With the exception of the desk, the furniture in the house comes from that time but was not owned by the Wordsworth family. It was interesting to look through.

The house

His desk

The dining room

The lounge

Cockermouth is about one hour's drive from Windermere, so we headed back after that to start our final pack as tomorrow, we drive to the Premier Inn at Heathrow.

Our final celebration