August 29th, 2009
Today we’re launching our Green Charter for The Larches. This means we commit ourselves to a 24 point plan to build a greener cottage and support sustainable projects and activities locally and more widely. We are asking visitors to The Larches to help us and to give us their comments on the scheme.
One innovation we’ve come up with after considering a number of options is to provide water soluble biodegradable bags for dog faeces (or ‘dog poo’), as many of our guests bring their dogs. Once filled these bags need to be rolled up tightly to exclude air and then flushed down the toilet.
It’s a small step, but a useful one for all that. We’ve been aware for years of the danger from cat and dog faeces because our neighbours’ daughter lost an eye through toxocara cati. But now we want to be more proactive. Use of the bags will result in dog waste being flushed straight into the sewage system with the bag disintegrating rapidly.
It’s been estimated that if this was done by every dog owner plastic bag accumulation in the UK could be cut by 7 million a day or by 2.55 billion a year. It’s good for the environment and good for our children. Let’s hope the idea is catching!
Posted in Environment, The Larches | No Comments »
August 25th, 2009
It’s good to see that Prime Minister Gordon Brown has been up holidaying with his family in the Keswick area this month and touring some of our favourite haunts round Bassenthwaite and Derwentwater.
The Lake District Herald (15 August) reports that the PM took an evening launch trip on Derwentwater and was particularly interested in Derwent Isle and the house there (See photo above).
He may not have realised that he’s in good company. Another well known holiday maker in the Keswick area was similarly fascinated by the scene. Beatrix Potter, author of The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin, spent several holidays at Lingholm (bottom left of photo opposite) in the early 1900s and had her red squirrels in the book sailing out on wooden rafts across Derwentwater to St Herbert’s Island, 500 yards to the south.
Full details are in Margaret Lane’s excellent book, The Magic Years of Beatrix Potter (pages 108-111). A copy of this is in The Larches’ library.
Posted in Local news, The Larches, Wildlife | No Comments »
August 20th, 2009
We’ve been in Jackson Hole, Wyoming‘s lakeland this last week checking out the differences between Lake District Parks in the US and the UK. (See blog post – Lakeland holiday cottage).
One similarity we’d been expecting was breeding ospreys, but we didn’t get a sight at all – until the day we left. We had noted the strange bundle of sticks on the top of the electricity pole (see photo opposite) the day before but assumed this was an old nest.
Passing the pole on the way out, we could see a head and beak jutting out from the nest and as we stopped there were cries from the young birds. Over the next 30 minutes we were treated to a great display (see below) as parents and young moved around the nest and flew over the ponds.
The difference? Well here in the Grand Teton National Park the birds just get on with their lives oblivious to traffic, noise and humans; and attract little interest from passers by. In Cumbria as one of the prime visitor attractions for the whole of the Park, the ospreys are viewed annually by over 50,000 people from the watch point in Dodd Wood above Bassenthwaite; and for five months they receive 24 hour protection from an army of volunteers.
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August 17th, 2009
We’re in Wyoming this last week for our son’s wedding in Jackson Hole. It’s given us a chance to check out lakeland holiday accommodation US style in the Teton National Park and compare it with Cumbria’s Lake District. Of course The Larches is hard to beat, but our pine built cabin here with decking and a hot tub gives it a close run! At an altitude of 6000 feet and surrounded by aspen trees, we look out across the 8 mile wide Jackson Hole valley.
There are similarities with the Lake District National Park, though here it’s on a grander scale. Grand Teton rises steeply to 12,700 feet just 10 miles to our north and I set off a herd of elk on my run one morning. Yesterday we found the bison. The two parks were founded in their present forms in the years 1950-51 and are roughly the same size. Both focus on conservation and are hugely popular, but the real difference comes with the maps!
Where the Cumbrian fells have often old Viking names, the US maps are littered with a modern vocabulary like Surprise, Solitude and Amphitheatre Lakes, Disappointment Peak, Battleship Mountain, Death and Paintbrush Canyons, Symmetry Spire; or have names of settlers, soldiers or surveyors – Mt Owen and Bradley Lake.
The French trappers scored some hits too with the Gros Ventre (stomach) plain, Rendezvous Mountain [see photo above] and Teton (breast) the tallest peaks in the Park. Teewinot Mountain and Lake Taminah are just two of a few native American names which have survived the settlers’ onslaught!
Tags: Lake District cottage
Posted in Environment, Wildlife | 1 Comment »
August 5th, 2009
In Tuesday’s Guardian (G2 – Arts and Architecture Section, 2 August 2009) a three page article with lots of photos praises Britain’s highest building – the marvellous Hafod Eryri Visitor Centre and mountain railway terminus at the top of Snowden (1,085 metres). With a stone clad steel frame, it was completed recently – replacing a small concrete shack – at a cost of £8.4 million and has quickly settled in to become a natural part of this craggy top. With stunning views and accommodation for staff, it has to withstand winds of up to 150 mph and is closed down through the winter.
Reading Jonathan Glancy’s account of the lure of Snowden for visitors since the 1780s has made me realise that ‘rooftop’ buildings like this are the natural bedfellows of belvederes. Both rise above the hurly burly of life below and have superb views. The difference is that for the former the view may be incidental while for belvederes it is always central.
Below are five more examples of ‘rooftop’ buildings, which are some of those now included in a new photo gallery on this lakelandbelvedere.com site. The photo opposite is of the Visitor Centre in Dinosaur Park in Utah, but there are many more to discover and put on the map. Why not send in a photo of any example you’ve found in whatever continent? If it’s a true ‘rooftop’ building, we’ll include it in the gallery with a credit! Email the image with a short description to ian@lakelandbelvedere.com/
To meet the criteria they must, as well as having commanding height and views, be well designed, fit for purpose, integrated into the surrounding landscape and able to provide overnight shelter and warmth against the cold. A tent or overnight snow-hole is ruled out whatever its position!
1. Dinosaur Park Visitor Centre, Utah USA [1,530 m]
2. Eco house, Isle of Mull Scotland [100 m]
3. Mountain grass house above village, Simien Mountains, Ethiopia [3,900 m]
4. Frontier post shelter on the ‘Rooftop of Africa’ ridge (used in civil war) [4,400 m]
5. Shack with weather vane above Amari valley overlooking Psiloritis, Crete [c 700 m]
Posted in Belvederes, Environment | No Comments »
One innovation we’ve come up with after considering a number of options is to provide water soluble biodegradable bags for dog faeces (or ‘dog poo’), as many of our guests bring their dogs. Once filled these bags need to be rolled up tightly to exclude air and then flushed down the toilet.
