Walking walking walking

We've been away with our walking friends again, to Richmond in Yorkshire, to the same house as the previous two years. We had a lovely time. 

Mr L and I visited Richmond Castle in a spare moment. It was probably built from about 1070, though as you can see, there's a lot of it missing now. Presumably people pinched the stone to build the surrounding houses. 

We walked along the river to Easby Abbey

and the nearby St Agatha's Church. 

Inside are wall paintings, including this one, which dates from about 1250. The church was built some time before that, obviously.

The Abbey itself was founded in 1152 but has suffered somewhat, becoming ruined after Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries. It was huge, though, so there's a lot of it left, though it's all walls and no roof. 

The third day was the hardest. The walk wasn't much longer - 6 or 7 miles - but it was very up and down. Once we got high up, the wind fairly whistled and it was a bit wet, but really the weather was much better than had been forecast, so that was good. On the way down, mainly through fields with cows (I don't really trust cows) and sheep, there were a lot of stiles built by 6'5 men with long legs - quite tricky for 5'2 ladies with shorter ones. But we made it. Our ages are 71, 76, 78, 79, 80 and 95 (yes, 95! and she's the fittest of us all!) so we didn't do too badly. 

I didn't take any photos of the hard bits - too busy trying not to fall over. But this is near the end. We still had to go over that ridge and down the other side. 

We had a really great time with lots of laughter. Truly the best medicine for tired muscles. 

 

Home and away

Nothing much happening around here, thank goodness. Unlike in the US and other places. Shudder. Above, Littlest Granddaughter in London decided to have a birthday party for one of her guinea pigs, and to invite four friends. Here she is, making up the party bags. She has another guinea pig, so let's see what she decides about its birthday (we think they're actually from the same litter). The party went well, with everyone entering into the slightly bonkers spirit of the occasion. 

We walked along the river on a sunny day. 

Then we climbed the steps to the gallery, where we had coffee

after which we walked through the front garden of the gallery, with its Landform, and home. 

Mr L has decided that he would like a quilt made from his old shirts, which I've been collecting for some time because you never know when you might need a bit of fabric. 

This is all I've done so far - other busyness has intervened. It's wonky because soft, much-washed fabric has a mind of its own; also, checked fabric shows no mercy. However, I'll put it at the bottom and once it's quilted it'll look fine. Or fine enough. 

Last Saturday, we went for a town walk with our walking chums. For some reason, these photos are in reverse order, but we ended up at Holyrood Park, having lunch in The King's Gallery. It was our oldest friend's 95th birthday! She is absolutely amazing - full of energy. It was only about 5 miles, but I was glad to sit down at the end, whereas she was still bouncing around. You should see her going up hills! Whizz. 

Before this, we walked along a street that I never knew existed, which was interesting. 

And before that, along an old railway line complete with its quite long tunnel, which was, though it doesn't look it here, a gentle slope up. I'm not a great fan of tunnels, especially uphill ones. 

And thus the quiet life continues, while deranged men far away decide that they want power over other people's countries. How have we allowed this to happen? 

I'm sitting listening to Mozart's Alma Dei Creatoris as I type, in preparation for singing it tonight at choir. This is very soothing. 

Cleopatra

Littlest Granddaughter had a wear-your-own-clothes day (as opposed to school uniform) to raise money for Children In Need. So she decided to go as Cleopatra. "They're my own clothes," she reasoned. Well, true. 

On Saturday, we had a lovely walk with our walking friends. One of us always takes a photo of us on any available bridge, so I took a photo of her taking a photo of us. 

It was the walk along the river that Mr Life and I did the recce for a few weeks ago. Mr Heron was there this time. 

It wasn't so pretty as when we did it before, because most of the leaves are now off the trees. 

But we had a great time anyway. Good company, beautiful day and lots of laughs, so the 6 miles passed easily. And then we had coffee at the Visitor Centre. 

Tomorrow I'm back off down to London to spend time with Daughter 2 and Littlest Granddaughter while Son-in-Law 2 appears at the Birmingham Rep. 
 

Richmond again

We've been away for a long weekend with our walking friends to Richmond, in Yorkshire. We were there last year and had a good time so decided to return to the same house. 

We walked both on the Saturday and on the Sunday. Richmond is quite hilly, as is the surrounding countryside. 

It's also wooded. This was a lovely walk - five or six miles, not too strenuous. 

On the second day we walked down through the town to the river.

We admired Richmond Castle as we did so. The building of it was started in about 1070, and we thought we might visit it on the way back. 

This walk was harder: there were about fifteen stiles of various levels of difficulty and wobbliness, a slanting, tree-rooty, muddy path above a steep fall down to the river, lots of steps, miles of muddy and stony paths which were quite hard to walk on. It took us much longer than we expected. 

And by the time we stopped for lunch, we really needed to sit down! 

Still, it was fun, especially in retrospect.

We didn't visit the castle, though. We went back to the house and lay on the bed. One of us (not me) had quite a big nap.