GLW2003 : Come Back St George

Monday 23rd March 2020

Record crowds in Snowdonia yesterday with people anticipating a clampdown on movement thanks to the Coronavirus.  We didn't go out.  Today, with the anticipation that the right to roam curtain could fall tonight, we made what might prove to be our last Great Little Walk for some time.  However, we took social distancing to the extreme.  Under orders to find somewhere without people, I plumped for Greenholme.  

"Where?" you may well ask.  It is quite near to the main London, Midland and Scottish railway line and that part of the M6 where the two carriageways are some distance apart.  Put more simply, a remote area a mile or so west of Tebay.

We parked close to the house with the dragon in its garden.  Some years ago (BB1223) St George had also been there, but not today.

Our route headed north, mostly alongside Birk Beck.

It was a lovely day and a very pleasant place to stroll.  

We could clearly see the M6 with quite a few lorries transporting much needed supplies and several trains which we suspected were mostly empty.

On reaching Scout Green we crossed the beck then made our way up to Rampshowe then Gill Farm with its strange stone obelisk.  

There the countryside changed.  No longer in the valley we were faced with moorland and bog.  It wasn't too serious however and we enjoyed a light picnic, taking in the views over to Orton Scar, Mallerstang and the northern end of the Howgills.

At Ewelock Bank, we returned to tarmac and headed back down to Greenholme.

Other than the occasional farmworker we hadn't seen anyone.  The route had achieved that objective.  Except that back at the Dragon House was a person.  The Dragon Keeper.  He was tending his garden.  From a safe distance I asked him what had happened to St George?  He looked at me a little oddly at first as if I was extracting the St Michael.  I mentioned that when I had been there some years ago, St George was in the garden with the Dragon.  That was his entry for the Orton scarecrow competition, he explained

Perhaps he should build a new one- we could do with St George to slay the Covid Dragon.  Then we can get back to more Great Little Walks.  

Don, Monday 23rd March 2020.

 

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