Day 8 - Walton to Carlisle

Today is Indy's 21st birthday!

We walked 8.63 miles to arrive in Carlisle.  We walked around town to bring the total to 12 miles for the day.  The trail guide said 11 miles today, but our hostess dropped us off in Newtown, rather than Walton, to start our walk today.

Oakwood Park Hotel

We all enjoyed the stay at Oakwood Park Hotel.  Our breakfast was served at 8:30am, a bit later than our usual 7:30am.  It was generous and delicious!  We got underway about 9:40, being dropped off at Newtown by Wendy.  Rain is predicted, but the day started overcast, cool and dry.

The track is through fields, but very flat.  The scenery is nicely pastoral, but not the spectacular views from the crags.  We have left the wall behind too, so there are not a lot of stops for poking around.  That means we made really good time!  We came upon this Stall-on-the-Wall.  A box of snacks, with payment on the honor system.

The rain came and went, but nothing too much.  Each time someone would put on a rain jacket or rain pants, the rain would stop for awhile.  Our route into Carlisle took us along the River Eden.  It was a lovely walk, even in the rain.

By shortly after 1pm, we had made it to our destination for the night, Courtfield Guest House in Carlisle.  Our hostess was kind enough to let us check in early, so we dried off, had lunch with apples, granola bars and cookies, rested a bit, wished Indy a Happy Birthday and set off to explore the sights of Carlisle.

We started at the Tullie House Museum to see the Roman exhibit and the reivers exhibit.  We enjoyed the Roman exhibit since we had seen much of the same in the past few days.  They did have some new interpretations and did a good job of providing context for the artifacts.  The museum is more about the Carlisle area than just Hadrian's Wall, so we learned more of the history of this area.  Because this city is so close to Scotland and the borderlands, there is a long history of raiding back and forth between England and Scotland.  For about 300 years, this was truly a lawless place.  The city was under siege by various parties from time to time.

From the museum, we visited Carlisle Castle.  With all that raiding, there needed to be a safe place to hole up when needed.  The castle was built in the 12th century and had stood the test of time.  Our last stop on the sight-seeing tour was the cathedral.  Built in 1133 by Augustinian priors, it is a lovely church.  As we entered, an Evensong service was being held.  It was wonderful to walk around to the sounds of organ and the choir.

As we walked back to the Courtfield Guest House, we stopped in at an Italian restaurant for dinner.  We felt that we should continue the Roman theme of our trip.  The dinner was fine, but nothing outstanding.

We have seen beautiful flowers in this land of cool temperatures and constant moisture.  We ran across giant poppies this morning.

Large poppies.  Robert's hand for scale.

Clematis.  Sharon's hands for scale.

This clematis is on the wall of our guest house.




Tomorrow is our last day of walking.  We need to pay attention to the tides and hope to get an early start since we saw the sights of Carlisle today.  The pace should be fairly fast, like today, since it is pretty flat.