Rowkin Rovings Blog

27th to 30^th July 2016

Well, what a wonderful few days we have had away from nb Lucy. No offence to nb Lucy though. We had always planned to take a couple of days away and go up to the Lakes District which is north of us. When we mentioned this to Nick he informed us that he had a cousin who lived in the Yorkshire Dales and that we had an invite to go and visit them for a few days – pooches included. We are always into meeting locals.

Our first task was to hire a car out of Liverpool for a couple of days. Off we set to this little town called Feizor which is on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park. The road trip took us just over two hours. Nick’s cousin Chris and his wife Cath were there to greet us in their recently renovated “listed” home which had been extensively renovated. They linked the “listed” home to the barn through a semi-underground passage blending modern with vintage beautifully.

The house is in the right of the picture with just a corner of the barn in the left and a little of the link in the middle. Along with extensive renovations they also had a garden to build and maintain. Another spectacular result.

This is the garden near the main house and the photo below is out the front of the barn.

We can tell you, it was tough to handle staying with Chris and Cath – NOT!!

A view out towards the Dales from the roof of the extension.

The main house which is listed.

The garden was made up with many different rooms with treasures in every one of them.

Our first full day there we were taken up further into the Dales for a five kilometer walk to a waterfall and through the fields. Even though it rained quite heavily and we were five rather drowned rats the mist and rain made up the atmosphere. We dropped into a little pub at the end of the walk which had a wood fire going and blew all the calories we had just walked off.

We can’t begin to describe how wonderful a day we had walking in the Dales. Whilst we were walking we had dropped the pooches off for their groom which was a good idea as they would not have enjoyed the walk in the rain quite so much. They would of liked drying off in front of the fire in the pub though.

A photo of some of the scenery we were driving through with all the stone walls.

The following day the weather was fine which was a nice change so Chris and Kath took us for a bit of a tour further into the Dales. We were weaving around all these tight little one way roads surrounded by the dry stone walls and meeting fellow travellers head on. Good British politeness prevailed and somehow we all managed to squeeze past one another without giving the ducco and ripple appearance.

For those of you who got a giggle out of our Trainspotting blog you will be more than impressed to know that we actually saw 66188 on the Ribblehead viaduct which is on the very scenic Carlisle to Skipton rail line. This viaduct was also used in the Harry Potter movies where you saw the Hogworth Steam train chugging off to the school. Fras and I were beside ourselves that we were able to identify the 66188 and Nick and Cath and Chris confirmed that we were certifiable.

We found another little café to quench our thirst in after visiting a mill with an exhibition of beautiful handmade lace. We finished off the drive with a trip into the town of scenic Settle.

Settle has an annual flowerpot show where all the business make creations out of pots and also the locals get into it. There were some truly inventive designs.

For our final night in Feizor we took our wonderful hosts out for dinner at a perfectly satisfactory establishment in Settle.

Alas, in the morning we had to pack up all the belongings including the pooches and head back to Liverpool. It is a big ask of people whom you do not know to take you in plus your two pooches and Cath and Chris stood up very well to the task. Apart from Maples barking at the resident pooch and Toque stealing her bone and burying it out of sight, things went fairly well with them.

We are all now back at nb Lucy in Liverpool getting ready to head out tomorrow. On our way driving back through the out skirts of Liverpool we dropped into Tesco`s to top up the larder. The boys went across to the museum to finish off their tour that they had to cut short earlier. Tonight we are heading out a little later to go and see the latest AB FAB movie.

Very early start tomorrow as we will be guided out of the Liverpool Docks by the CART people at 8.00am and a long day of cruising will in store.