Lancaster Castle to Lowther Castle and Gardens, Penrith

Apologies for the delay since my last post.  I got totally freaked out by those witches at Lancaster Castle and then got caught up in the 'small gathering' of folk who stayed with me in the castle grounds for the next few days.  I did, though, get going as planned on Wednesday and arrived at Lowther Castle and Gardens in Penrith in the afternoon.  I'd have got back to you soon except that I got myself a little indisposed. 

Before I get on to that, I'll say a little about the ride here.  Although Wednesday was still fairly warm, it wasn't anywhere near as hot as it had been over the long weekend, which I was relieved about because it'd have been much harder work cycling the 77km in that heat.  It was still very warm in Pop-Up Gym and I was thankful for the air conditioning.

I started the ride alone, having slipped away from the crowds at Lancaster Castle without attracting attention in fear of attracting the attention of those dreaded Pendle Witches again.  I was only a little out of Lancaster when Drew - our esteemed leader (founder) of PUG - came to ride alongside me for half an hour or so.  It was nice to have a companion to chat with for a bit, but I picked up speed, wanting to be sure I made good time getting to Penrith, and he was soon out of sight...or maybe it was because I was so tired after an exhausting weekend that I found myself cycling with my eyes closed and frightening the life out of the personal trainer in the gym.

Yes, I was very tired on Wednesday, and because of that I'd been expecting the ride to be really tough.  The lethargy and sleepiness certainly didn't help me, but when I eventually picked up speed the ride wasn't as bad as anticipated, and I completed the 77kms in two hours and forty one minutes.

Most of the route was quiet, and skirting the edge of the Lake District was beautiful, with the mountains in the distance.

I spent a lot of my childhood summer holidays in the Lake District so it feels almost like home when I'm there or even when I see it from a distance.  I'm not home, of course, and I needed to make sure that I made a little temporary home for myself when I got to Lowther Castle and Gardens, so I set up camp.

I'd decided to camp here rather than accept any invitation to stay in the castle immediately after my experience at Lancaster Castle, but it turns out that I'd have been unlikely to be offered a room in Lowther Castle as there aren't any rooms.  The castle is a very pleasant ruin.  It's looks grand and intact from the outside...

But this areal view shows its distinct lack of roof...

And again from ground level...

Still, it is a very lovely place, and very extravagant too.  Originally built by the Lowther family in the 17th Century as a family (mansion) home, I think it may have been knocked down and rebuilt in its current style in the early 19th Century, and was designated as a castle due to its style as a 'castellated mansion'.  The head of the family was the Earl of Lonsdale, and it seems that the 5th Earl spent all the money and the castle was closed in 1937.  It wasn't left to total abandon though, as the castle was used as a tank regiment in the Second World War, but then in the late 1940s the castle's contents were removed, and then the roof was taken off in 1957.  I can only guess that it was in a bad state of repair and it was cheaper to remove the roof and have the castle as an open ruin than to repair and maintain the roof and building.  However, it all still belongs to the Lowther Estate Trust.

I decided to pitch my tent right in the middle of the castle, rather than in the gardens, so that I can say that I have stayed in Lowther Castle, but it is definitely 'open plan'...

The gardens are extensive, and had been carefully cultivated by several generations of the Lowther family, but in 1935 they were sadly abandoned.  in 2005 work began on the gardens (and the castle too, in fact) to restore them to their former glory, using detailed notes (I think) left by the 5th Earl of Lonsdale. The restoration programme is on-going, but both the castle and gardens were opened to the public in 2011, which is great news for me as it means that I haven't had to break in!  So, some photos of the gardens...

Once I'd set up camp and had a little mooch around the gardens I realised how hungry and parched for a cuppa I was. Luckily the cafe was still open...

I sat down with a big cup of tea and pondered what to have for an early dinner...

When in Cumbria (the county in which Penrith resides) there is only really one possible option - Cumberland sausage.  I ordered myself a whole ring of it with onion gravy and a side helping of mash...

...and then crawled back to sleep off the excesses and the exercise.

I woke as fresh as a daisy this morning so I decided to go for a small adventure into Penrith.  I have to confess that I didn't get very far...only as far as The Toffee Shop.  I mean, what more do you need?  Toffee is surely good fuel for a 1022.5 mile cycle ride, even if I am doing it in smaller stages...

The guy through the back making the toffee today looked rather familiar...

I'm sure I've seen him some place before, but I'm equally sure he wasn't making toffee at the time.  Some folk are just multi-talented, I suppose.

Seeing as the toffee was so fresh, and seeing as I'd cycled from the castle into Penrith, I figured I deserved to try some.  I started with a nibble of butter toffee...

...but then had to compare that to the butter fudge...

...and seeing as I'd tried both of those I thought it rude not to try the treacle toffee, which was a favourite as a child (in fact any kind of toffee was a favourite when I was a child)...

I couldn't decide which I liked best so I bought a box of each.  I was about to leave when it occurred to me that it wasn't far off lunch time, and as the sausage last night had been so big I figured I could forego anything savoury and dive straight into pudding - sticky toffee pudding...

It was de.lic.ious! After that I was well set for the short ride back to the castle...

...and once I got back I decided to have a little ride around some of the gardens I hadn't looked around yesterday.  One of the most exciting things I came across was a reconstruction of the castle in wood and was a children's play area...

I was so nearly tempted to give that metal tube slide a go until I remembered what happened at Yarrow Valley Country Park.  I wonder how many adult are stuck inside this slide. I could easily have romped in this castle for hours, getting up to huge amounts of mischief, but I sensed I was being watched...

I got back on my bike, trying to pretend that I was a perfectly normal visitor to the castle, definitely not wanting to play on the children's climbing castle, and definitely hadn't had toffee for breakfast and cake for lunch.  But having just reminded myself about the toffee shop and the packets of toffee in my panniers, I couldn't get the thought of them out of my head.  I found a quiet spot by the garden steps I'd come across yesterday and had a wee taste...

...only one wee taste lead to the next, and the next, and the next.  Before I knew it I'd scoffed all three boxes of toffee and I was buzzing with the sugar rush.  There was only one way to burn off that buzz that I could think of and that was to cycle.  I ventured into the one last part of the gardens that I hadn't already been in...

...only the sugar rush buzz meant that I wasn't paying full attention and without realising quite how it happened, the next thing I knew I was in the water...

You'd think that the realisation would have meant I'd have done something about the situation, but no.  I kept on riding, and the water got higher...

...and higher...

...yet still I cycled on.  I didn't stop.  I couldn't stop.  I was too high from the sugary toffee goodness to stop...

I was a mud monster and I was loving it!

All the while, I kept on cycling, my wheels intermittently getting stuck in the mud, the pedals tangled in the weeds, and the resistance of the water adding to the difficulties, but I was on a sugar high!

Eventually, I was running out of lake or bog, or whatever it was, and cycled up the bank and clambered back onto dry less wet land...

...but I wasn't done yet.

Or so I thought.

As fast as the sugar rush had hit my blood stream, it vanished.  There I was as happy as Larry (who is this Larry bloke?), pedalling through the gardens, admiring this old trough...

...when all my energy was suddenly sapped from me.  I even lost the energy to use the breaks.  I crashed into the trough, went head over heels into the trough and haven't been able to get out since...

I think I might be here for the night, unless I find a muddy, bog-soaked piece of toffee still in my pocket that I can snack on to fuel a crawl out of the trough and back to the tent.

I'll let you know whether or not I get out of this trough tonight in my next blog post, by which time I'll have crossed the Scottish border!  I'll see you there, but in the meantime please remember to sponsor me at my Just Giving Page, and that it's all to raise vital funds for Pop-Up Gym that provides exercise and rehabilitation for those in the north of England with spinal cord injuries and other neurological conditions.  All donations are greatly appreciated.