Photo Scavenger Hunt :: July #3 ... Picnic

Hi there everyone 😀

It's Friday again and that means it's time to link up with Astrid for the weekly photo scavenger hunt. The challenge for this week is to post photos along the theme of the word ... picnic.

We've always loved a good picnic ... but never so much as last year when ... for a huge chunk of the year ... it was the only way to actually eat out.

It was lovely seeing so many people getting back to and enjoying this simple pleasure, which was something we seemed to do all the time when we were younger.

The comfy camping chairs and little table pretty much lived in the back of the car last year so we knew that all we had to do was to find just the right spot and we were good to go ...

We didn't need our chairs or table for our first picnic back in June of last year. We found a couple of lovely spots in the walled garden in Elford, which has become a favourite local place for an afternoon visit ...

In July we had a trip up to the Peak District for the day for a walk along Bradford Dale near Youlgreave. This time the chairs and table came in very handy for our picnic at the back of the car after we'd finished our walk ... this was our view ...

There were a fair few garden 'picnics', both at home and at friends throughout the rest of August ... including this spectacular afternoon tea at Lesley & Tom's ...

In September we finally got to go away for the first time since February, when we'd sneaked in our last minute trip to Windsor. We stayed in a holiday cottage in Sidbury, not far from Sidmouth and plenty of picnicking took place whilst we were away ... with some of the loveliest views ever ...

So far this year there have been a couple of picnics ... there was our teddy bears' picnic ...

... and there was another visit to the walled garden, where we managed to eat just before the rain hit with a vengeance ...

I have to say that it's been lovely falling back in love with the practice of picnicking and I think it's something that we will continue to do more of. Whilst it is lovely sitting in the beautiful garden of a tea room enjoying a big slice of cake, it is definitely just as nice finding a fabulous view, getting out the chairs and tucking into squidgy sandwiches accompanied by home grown cherry tomatoes.

I think that's it for me today ... Whilst I was trawling the archive I was pleased to find a couple of nice 'ice cream' photos, which may do well for next week's theme 😀

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A Week in The Yorkshire Dales #4 :: Over Buttertubs to Keld Waterfalls

Hi there everyone 😀

Whilst we are just back from a few days away in the very lovely Peak District, today's post takes us back to our break in The Yorkshire Dales back in May.

It was Tuesday and the weather for the morning looked reasonable to we decided to take a bit of a drive up over Buttertubs, then onto Keld for some more waterfalls before heading back to Askrigg via Muker.

It was a actually a pretty bright start and I’ll apologise up front for the number of photos I took on our drive over the pass ... we pretty much stopped at every pull in ... the views were spectacular ...

As we came down into Swaledale the landscape changed a bit ... it was a little softer, with pretty much every field dotted with an old barn or stone building of some description ...

In Keld we parked up in the village ... waterproofed up ... as the weather looked like it was ready to change and headed out through the village ...

We came to the spot where a decision had to be made ... did we carry on to Kisdon Falls or take the very steep downward track to East Gill Force. A chat with some walkers coming back from Kisdon falls made the decision for us and we headed on down ...

At the bottom of the track was a bridge over the river with pretty views in both directions and we could hear the thunder of the falls on the other side ...

We headed over the bridge and did a bit of scrambling to see how close we could get ...

The sheep were very vocal ... they didn’t seem keen on having visitors at all ...

We carried on up to the top of the falls where the weather took a real turn for the worse and we saw some really heavy rain ...

Soaked through we decided to head back the way we had come ... definitely leaving Kisdon Falls for another time ...

It was a bit of a slog back up the footpath but we took our time ...

... and actually spotted a view of the falls that we hadn’t noticed on the way out ...

Back at the car we decided we would have a short drive along the river to Wain Wath Falls which Martin assured me we would be able to pretty much see from the road.

He wasn’t fibbing ... there was a great view from the road ... 

... but I did scramble down to the side of the river for an even better view ...

We came back through Muker and from there we took another narrow and windy cross top road back to Askrigg ...

It was only when I looked closely at the map when we got back that I realised we were literally a stones throw from .Ravenseat Farm ... home of the Owen Family of Our Yorkshire Farm fame ... which is a real favourite of ours. I wonder if any of the sheep we saw from Ravenseat 😀

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