Saturday 25 April 2026 - Penrith parkrun, Falkland Palace and Persie House

After a two hour journey, we rolled up at Penrith parkrun in plenty of time for the 9am start. 

Sue managed a creditable 25:04, and I took 33:10. Afterwards we noticed Lindsay Harrod who told us of her change of career. After an intensive two year course she has now qualified as a vicar and has a position in Carlisle. Good luck, Lindsay.

I started at the back as usual, eventually finishing in position 258 out of 341 participants.

Then we visited Falkland Palace, where Scottish history has taken place over the centuries. The trees were in blossom. 

This is the home of 'Royal Tennis.

Some posh students (who would name their son 'Caesar'?) were using the court, though they were having a bit of trouble with the rules! Jenny turned up and took their group photo. "Hello Caesar!"

Inside the palace, a domain of kings. The house is now in the hands of the National Trust, and is still occupied by family members.

Here's a taste of what it looks like.

Outside, the garden was lovely and my 'Merlin' App recorded about 20 bird calls in the space of half an hour. Swallows had arrived.

Here's a view from Falkland village, before we continued our journey.

After another hour in the car we arrived at Persie House, where 24 of us will spend a week with Keith and Carol in celebration of their Ruby Wedding Anniversary. Here's the entrance hall. 

So, another week in Scotland with a large group - I'll illustrate our activities but entries may be brief.

Thursday 23 April 2026 - Knott and Great Calva

                           Ascending to Little Calva, with Knott in the background

Believe it or not, I've been writiing this diary since September 2007, initially in preparation for keeping in touch during a visit to New Zealand in early 2008. This is posting number 5000, which I've engineered to be a return to its roots, namely descriptions of walks, where possible in the mountains of Europe and elsewhere.

During my time in the Stockport tunnels I pondered over the brilliant spring weather. Driving to the Lakes and back makes Wainwright bagging a tiring occupation, but the weather seemed very obliging. A decision was made, I would tick off a couple of Wainwright summits that I'd not been up before.

The driving proved to be fine, with little traffic on the road and adaptive cruise control offering relaxing journeys.

I had a half hour rest in the middle of both 120 mile journeys, a large latte at Tebay coming first.

Parking beyond Swineside was easy, with a five minute walk up to the Cumbria Way footpath where you could also park at a push. There were some deep potholes to avoid.

First view of Knott

I'm using Graham Uney's Wainwright book, in which he bags all 214 summits in 64 walks. He suggests walking along the track for ten minutes then heading directly and steeply upwards opposite a sheepfold. On my way back to the car I couldn't see either the path or the sheepfold, so I was glad to have spotted a sheep track path immediately after the bridge that the Cumbria Way uses. It was narrow and steep, but a good path all the way to the minor summit of Coomb Height.

There were soon good views back down to the Cumbria Way path, where a group of cyclists coming from the direction of Skiddaw House were nearing the bridge that I'd come over.

Coomb Height, with Knott up to the right

A very gently rising path led from here up to the main summit of Knott, at 710 metres (I had started at 280 metres) the highest point on today's walk, and a Marilyn summit as well as a Wainwright and a Birkett (and more). A Wheatear was positioned on the summit, and Skylarks twittered above.

The view north from Knott.

The view south from Knott, with many Lakeland summits beyond Skiddaw and Blencathra

Descending from Knott, after enjoying half my lunch, more great views. I saw them twice, having accidentally left my walking poles on the summit.

As I descended to the col between Hause Gill and Wiley Gill, the summit of Great Calva blocked the more distant views.

On the way up to the outlying summit of Little Calva I came across a chap who confessed to be addicted to climbing Wainwright summits. He lives nearby and was on his fifth 'round' and had done seven summits today. Fresh as a daisy, he kindly took the picture that appears at the top of this posting.

Great Calva from Little Calva

I spotted a green lizard, then met another chap on Little Calva. He had come from Warrington. There was also someone on the drafty summit of Great Calva, but he was too attentive to his map to have any meaningful conversation. There's a small shelter here, but a cool breeze from the south rendered that pretty useless today.

The summit of Calva is littered with old metal fence posts, but the views are great. I think that's Derwent Water in the distance.

From the summit of Great Calva, a steep path by a fence leads down to a bridge over Wiley Beck, with views down to the Cumbria Way path and the southern flank of Knott. I enjoyed the second half of my cheese sandwich and a banana and Kitkat in a sheltered spot on the way down.

A couple down at Wiley Beck may have been looking for a camping spot.

Looking back from Wiley Beck to the summit of Great Calva

After that, it was a straightforward (the whole walk is straightforward) walk along the Cumbria Way and back to the car, failing on the way to spot the route up Knott that Graham Uney describes in his book.

What a beautiful, cloudless day - a great decision to make the effort at very short notice.

Here's my route - 13km with 600 metres ascent, taking nearly 5 hours.

Then an easy journey home - back at 6:45, having left earlier at 8:15 or so.

Wednesday 22 April 2026 - Stockport Air Raid Shelters

A private, evening guided tour of the Air Raid Shelters was organised for 15 SWOG members, from 7.00pm until approximately 9.00pm, at £ 12.50 per person.

Our guide, warden, Roger Douling has a wealth of knowledge of the ARS Shelters and war times. He proved to be a brilliant raconteur and guide.

Whilst waiting for the others, Sue and I admired the grafitti on the other side of the road.

Made entirely from bottle tops.

After an introductory video, we entered a well lit part of the tunnel. The whole system is a ladder shaped  excavation out of the soft sandstone that lies deep in the Stockport area, where there are similar tunnels built to house thousands of folk from the Manchester area in the blitz of WW2. I'll finish this posting by way of captions.

The boss's office?

When sheltering here, up to 100 people could be seated each side,

with another 100 standing in the middle.

Roger was both informative and very entertaining

Some side passages were out of bounds, and Roger's assistant, Kate,

was positioned to intercept any deviants

It's a huge area, accommodating up to 5000 people.
For most of our visit we needed to use the headtorches provided

Early toilets were rudimentary affairs

Spot the grafitti

Beds were eventually provided. Originally the tunnels were expected to be used for short periods of an hour or so, but they soon became all night refuges

'WOMEN'

This is the hospital, screened for cleanliness, and equipped with a radio
(reception rather limited)

Eventually there was even a kitchen, mainly providing cups of tea

And flush toilets were introduced after a year or two

A warden's office

Well, wasn't that fun! It was dark when we emerged into the street that carries a blue plaque.

This is a popular outing for schoolchildren - fully booked until mid 2027, but visits like ours can be booked at fairly short notice. Roger and Kate do a couple every week. It was all very interesting.