Sunday, March 6
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| Group pyramid on the dock, notice Hope right in there |
Ambleside is a quiet little community in the lake district of northern England. The edge of town sits on Lake Windermere, which is the largest lake in England. It is about a mile wide and about 10-11 miles long. It is a beautiful lake surrounded by green hills. This is the area where Wordsworth retreated to in order to write some of his best poetry.
We stayed at a large youth hostel in Ambleside. Probably the poorest accommodation we stayed in during the trip, but maybe the nicest hostel you could hope to find anywhere. And they served us both breakfast and dinner each day--which was good and plentiful. I need to write more about what constitutes an "English breakfast" but for now I'll just say that you don't need to eat again until dinner time.
The pic to the right is the view from Wordsworth's cottage (Dove Cottage). He rented the cottage for the princely sum of 8 pounds a year--about half a normal person's wages at that time. He stayed there for 10 years writing. Below you can see one of the flowers already blooming and the garden seat at the top of the hill where we took the picture on the right from.
After we visited the cottage, we drove down to the town of Windermere, walked around and enjoyed the small shopping village a bit and then took a boat back across the lake to Ambleside.
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| The swans and ducks weren't a bit afraid of people |
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| About to leave on the boat |
The boat ride was beautiful and rather fun. The pilot of the boat acted as something of a tour guide, telling us about the lake, the people that lived around the lake and the area. One of the more amazing things he talked about was the cost of property. He said that people often ask how much a boat house on the lake costs. He said they seldom ever come up for sale, but one just recently sold for a cool million pounds (that's about $1.6 million). And that's just a place to park the boat, not a place to live.
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| The large building on the left is our hostel |
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| Sunset on the lake |
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| A relaxing time together by the lake |
The pic to the right is the view from Wordsworth's cottage (Dove Cottage). He rented the cottage for the princely sum of 8 pounds a year--about half a normal person's wages at that time. He stayed there for 10 years writing. Below you can see one of the flowers already blooming and the garden seat at the top of the hill where we took the picture on the right from.
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