Posts in 'Personal Stories'

This month marks five years since I arrived in the Lake District. Two backpacks, no plan, just in need of a place to find my feet again and regroup. I’d recently returned from a backpacking trip in South America, newly single, no job and very little direction.  This wasn’t uncommon for me. I happily spent […]

I had intended to sit down and write this in that gloriously liminal time between Christmas and New Year, which was spent at my mum’s in North Wales. But alas, lazy afternoon games of scramble and walks on the beach took over, and now here we are at the end of the first week of […]

A rainy January afternoon is the perfect time to finally sit down and put the previous year’s memories into words.  Secretly, I write these yearly reviews as much for myself, a window into a previous time, a previous self. But if you are a little bit nosey and a little bit curious like me, I […]

Last December, dreaming up goals for the New Year (many of which often go unfinished) and inspired by past happy memories of Lake District dips during my 3 and a bit years living here, I decided to set myself a challenge for 2022. To take a least one monthly dip in a lake, tarn or […]

I stepped off the last bus from Penrith to Keswick in 2019 with a backpack full of belongings and zero expectations, unaware of the beautiful, incredible adventure about to unfold.  As idyllic as it sounds, I wasn’t in the happiest of places at the time. I was recently back from a 3-month backpacking trip in […]

A few days before Christmas 2019, sitting in Mathelidies cafe overlooking Helm Crag in Grasmere, I set out a vast series of exciting goals for the coming year ahead, goals which now seem whimsical such as visiting one new country, hiking the Cumbria Way, running a half marathon, dipping my toe into freelancing in social […]