W1 St Bees to Ennerdale Bridge

Someone sent a text saying "enjoy your stroll". That is a bit like saying a Mazda MX5 is just a car ;-) This was a walk with everything - elation and exertion, sunburn and soakings, blue skies and thunder. Alas I have no photos of the thunderstorm but for 4 miles it was one of those where it comes down like stair roods, bouncing off the path and creating puddles in the boot - we must have looked sad because a motorist offered Andrea a lift ! We naturally refused and made it to Ennerdale having walked 16.7 miles, climbed the equivalent of 66 floors and completed over 44,000 steps - yes the body is aching - oh for a City desk job :-)

The longer version
We set off from St Bees with an excellent Storehouse Farm hearty breakfast (complete with whisky marmalade ) sloshing around inside us. What we did not realise is that the walk started a mile away on the beach. It was pretty obvious however:

It was then up the cliff to the north with a beautiful view across the bay to Sellafield in the distance

The weather picked up to the point that sun cream was essential. The coastal path is very pretty but its a bit strange walking north west when we are suppose to go east ! Eventually we turned east at a quarry - red limestone quarrying is v popular here. From then on it was away from the sea through the undulating coastal plain dotted with villages and wind turbines. Slightly peculiarly they seem to love pebble dash up here and its difficult to see a brick house. Sheep and cattle are extremely popular but apart from the chemical works at Whitehaven and Sellafield (nuclear) I really do not know what people do. After the ramble through the various villages we started to climb and climb - Dent hill - 350m. Then it was down the other side and straight into the thunderstorm: no little drips here, its more big splosh splosh splosh - the type that almost hurt, with the roads and paths turned in mini streams. We arrived in Ennerdale like drowned rats but very happy our first day is complete

PS  Our B&B room is now a huge drying room: boots, rucksacks, socks, pants etc. And its sunny outside !