Unto the hills

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, whence cometh my help.

(Psalm 121)

Langdale Pikes by Henry Jutsum

An imaginative design

We have a new ‘Piazza’ outside our supermarket. As a tribute to Alfred Wainwright (former Treasurer at the town hall, and writer of the famous guidebooks) seats with slate backs of an imaginative design have been placed there. Each one bears a copy of a page from the guidebooks, together with one of Wainwright’s distinctive line-drawings:

Some yards away are the imprints of Wainwright’s ‘walking boots’:

When you stand in the ‘footprints’ and look up at the slate seats, you can see that the the top edges merge to present an outline view of the Langdale Pikes (one of Wainwright’s favourite scenes)

(sorry that the outline is a bit fuzzy - amateur photographer at work!)




William Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy were fond of the Langdales, too. In Dorothy’s diary, written when they were living at Dove Cottage, Grasmere she mentions them several times:


‘1800. August 30th We looked at Rydale [sic] which was soft, cheerful and beautiful. We then went to peep into Langdale. The Pikes were very grand’


December 4th Coleridge came in just as we finished dinner. Pork from the Simpsons. Sara and I walked round the 2 lakes - a very fine morning. C. ate nothing, to cure his boils. We walked after tea by moonlight to look at Langdale covered with snow, the Pikes not grand, but the [Coniston]Old Man very impressive. Cold and slippery, but exceedingly pleasant. Sat up till half-past one…


‘1801 November 30th Clear and frosty without wind. William went before to look at Langdale. We saw the Pikes and then came home’