History and archaeology.

At a cursory glance, it would be easy to think that the Lake District landscape is natural and has been little touched by human activity. In reality there is much evidence of such activity since Neolithic times. In the Trust, we like to take every opportunity we can to enhance visitor experiences by informing them about the history and archaeology that can be seen in the landscape. To that end, I spent a day last week with Jamie Lund (the Trust’s archaeologist) and a number of outdoor pursuits instructors up Stoneycroft Ghyll. The idea is that we show them the archaeology; we explain its significance and we discuss how to protect it. The instructors will then be able to cascade that knowledge to all the groups they lead into the Ghyll. Hopefully members of the groups will then go on to tell their friends and families.

I’m hoping that Jamie’s enthusiasm will inspire the instructors to weave this aspect of landscape awareness into their daily practice. We have used this method of cascading before and it has worked well. It is very effective at transmitting information to a lot of people we might not otherwise meet. The benefits are twofold; people have an enriched understanding and enjoyment of their surrounding environment so they are then more likely to be protective of an important part of our heritage.

An unexpected highlight of last week was taking a walk up Skiddaw on my day off. Much of the country was shrouded in fog for the day but I walked up into sunshine and looked back over the top of low-lying cloud. It really is a fantastic experience to see just the hill tops emerging through cloud.

I had Daisy with me of course and also Gus and Bryn, her two doggy friends from Derwent Island. They had a great time running around and playing together.

Daisy here.

I’ve been up Skiddaw with my besties. They’re not very good at walking up mountains - not compared to me. It’s brilliant. I’m really fast.