Sizergh Hike

We finally had a day with decent weather so we could have a 3 generation support bubble hike to Sizergh Castle. It's the best way to safely spend time with my mum until things improve. Our walk started on the Old Lancaster Canal along the old tow path and underneath the relict bridges:

After a steep descent from the canal we reached the river Kent. Sherlock sniffed out a painted rock and then led us across Wilson Bridge:

It was far too tempting not to make use of my son as camera man and film my daily whistle dance on the bridge. An interesting experience as the gets quite wobbly when you move around on it...

#WordlessWednesday 3-10-18

Sizergh Castle 321 Trail Route

Last week I met up with some other local ladies to run the Run England 5 km route from Sizergh Castle. Its one I have done before but not for quite some time. The route starts at the end of the car park close to the bird hides:

It then heads off across the fields with a gentle slope to warm you up:

One of the nicest parts of the run is the path through the wood which at the moment smells of wild garlic and the bluebells are coming out:

Reasons to be cheerful: Easter family fun and a cat! #R2BC

I am so glad we still have this week off for Easter as time is simply flying! Thanks for joining in last week and I hope that more of you are back from school holidays to join in this week. Don't forget to visit the other linkers and leave a comment... Here are my reasons to be cheerful this week:

1) Coco

We adopted a cat called Coco last Thursday he is an adorable 9 month old kitten who has stolen all our hearts. He is fitting right in at home and hopefully he will soon feel like this is where he belongs. I have never had a cat before and it so far is a pleasure to have one (especially as its my daughter's job to clean out the litter tray!):

2) Proud Mum

On Saturday we all wet to Parkrun with my wider family. My daughter was the official photographer and took so many fabulous shots. My son ran his best time for 18 months and really is coming back into form again:

3) Family

We really enjoyed having our extended family around last weekend. Things like the park are so much more fun with others to share it with:

4) Family days out at National Trust

I have already blogged about how we have already made use of renewed National Trust membership. We are lucky to have some fantastic properties near us like Allan Bank:

and Sizergh Castle:

#CountryKids Easter Fun at Sizergh Castle

Today my son and I headed over to Sizergh Castle. We wanted to do the Easter trail around the grounds and even though it was damp we weren't the only ones following the signs:

I think it was the best one we have done there yet and there was plenty to spot and clues to solve including this chap on the pond:

The route took us passed the Stumpery which is looking resplendent with Spring growth:

#CountryKids More Easter Trails with the National Trust

Saturday was such fun we decided to do some more trails on Sunday afternoon. We decided due to lack of time to head to Sizergh Castle. The children did this trail on Friday with gramps but I hadn't been. So many others had had the same idea that we had to queue at the entrance for a car parking space. It was cold and wet so it was probably just as well the trail was a very quick one!

There were some simple clues to follow and some obvious things to spot:

My son shot off ahead and we soon lost him:

Fitness Friday: An adventurous run

Today was the only day this week that I could get out and do a really long run as marathon training. Typically this meant that the weather was the wettest we've had all week too! Undaunted I walked with my son to school to warm up and then headed out of town along Brigsteer Road so that I could get up onto Scout Scar:

This is open access land so there are lots of informal paths and I just followed random ones with the hope that I would end up in the right direction! It was pretty miserable up there and I saw only a couple of hardy dog walkers for the entire fell section:

It really felt like proper trail running with paths like these:

#CountryKids A sunny September stroll to Sizergh Castle

It was a glorious September day in Cumbria today so I rounded up two protesting children and dragged them out for a walk! I have been wanting to find out how far it is to Sizergh Castle from ours on foot and it seemed to good a day to not try it (whatever the children thought about it!). The footpath starts not far from our house just along Natland Rd:

The beginning of the route was through a little woodland and it was really peaceful and cool walking under the trees:

Then the route opens up in the farmland which runs over the old Lancaster Canal. At times you would only know that it was a canal because of the beautiful old bridges that seem quite random in the middle of a field:

It was tempting for my children to pretend they were going to jump into the water as we passed underneath them though:

Reasons to be Cheerful: Running Away! #R2BC

I am day late joining in with the lovely hostess Ojo's World as its been so busy! So many reasons to be cheerful so here they are:

1) Kendal Torchlight

I was road marshalling so didn't really see the parade this year but both my children were in it. My daughter was with her Girl Guide district and they won the award for the best foot troop with their scooters all lit up:

2) Hodder Valley Show

My son was fell racing in Yorkshire on Saturday (a full post to come!) and despite the rain we had a fab day out. The fact he won his age category helped:

3) Family Fun

I introduced my son to Boggle, a game that I haven't played for nearly 20 years! Good fun and educational too:

Reasons to be Cheerful Week 17 - 2014 #R2BC

It's been great seeing more people returning to this linky whilst its been hosted at Ojo's World this month - hope you all stick with it when it comes back to me in May! I am feeling kinda shattered after going back to work after Easter so keeping my reasons mostly to a photo edition this week:

1) Time with friends

It was one of the 3 annual get togethers with my secondary school friends this Saturday. There were 5 of us plus 3 husbands and 8 out of 9 of our kids. Plenty of conversation, wine and good food - oh and of course chocolates:

2) Easter Fun at Sizergh Castle

I already blogged here but this is a taster:

3) Four years of Blipfoto

This was my 1460th daily photo in my Blipfoto journal:

Why are you smiling this week? 

#CountryKids Easter Eggs and Woollen Woods at Sizergh Castle

For my family its not Easter without an Easter Egg hunt at the National Trust! My daughter went with my parents on Saturday but as we were away my son and I had to wait until yesterday to go... Our destination was Sizergh Castle just down the road. At this time of year its a beautiful place to visit so everyone is happy. On handing over our £2 we were given a quiz sheet and a world map and told where to start the trail. My son was off like a shot:

Each clue was about countries this year and there were flags with country names on. There was a question to answer each time and we had to mark the country on the map (younger children just counted flags!). My son just about gave me time to look at the beautiful flowers whilst he wrote the answers down:

15 minutes of fame!

Back in October I was asked by Sizergh Castle to review their new Woodland Play trail. This week our local National Trust members letter popped through the letter box and we were in it:

Nice to have been put into print!

Looking back on 2013

Think it's good to start the new year by looking back at my highlights of 2013 which was a pretty good year! 

1) Running

I took up running at the end of January after 20 years! Following the Couch to 5K programme and then 10K runner app I have got myself hooked. I only started logging my distance properly since May and I've racked up 276 km - wow. Included in this was the Cancer Care Star Walk 10 km run, the Preston Race for Life with my daughter, a Grasmere Gallop fun run, the Heaton Park Race for Life with other bloggers and my first serious race the Langdale Christmas Pudding 10 km. Its a revelation that I am enjoying it so much and with lovely landscapes to run through I'm sure I'm going to keep on going...

2) Holidays

We were super lucky this year and actually went on 3 holidays which is unheard of! First of all a bargain half term break at Butlins Skegness as we were lucky and our half term was different from most parts of England so it was cheaper. Then my parents took us to France for a fortnight. We stayed in both Carnac and Seine-et-Marne plus the children had earned us a trip to Euro Disney (have just realised I haven't blogged about that...):

Then we were chosen as Butlins Ambassadors for 2013/14 and so we went to Butlins Bognor Regis at October half term. We will make up for this excess in 2014 as we have no plans for any holidays at all...

3) Fun in Cumbria

We have been lucky and with so much on our doorstep in Cumbria we haven't needed to travel far. Our National Trust membership has been well used with Sizergh Castle, Wray Castle and Fell Foot Park all having multiple visits. We are Forestry Commission ambassadors for Whinlatter and have made great use of that too. Our local ramblers started doing Mini Rambles for families with shorter walks with time to stop and play. Here's to more fun in this beautiful county in 2014:

Of course there was a whole lot more we did but these highlights all stand out. Feel free to browse the archives and see what the Willoughby family did in 2013! Hoping that 2014 is another cracking year.

Reasons to be Cheerful the birthday edition #R2BC

Birthdays definitely have to be one of the biggest reasons to be cheerful and having 2 within 48 hours makes this a fab week! Here is what made us smile about them:
1) Family Night Out
On Saturday night we went out as 3 generations to a ceilidh that was raising funds for a young member of our church to go on World Challenge to Malaysia with his 6th form. 

It was an organised chaos night with everyone having a great laugh and dancing the night away:

2) Family Breakfast

My birthday started with breakfast with 5 of my closest family at a local hotel. It was a lovely relaxed affair and a great way to kick of my day:

It was lovely being spoiled with some home grown roses too:

3) Birthday Fun

After a couple of trips to collect a replacement high sleeper for my daughter from Arnside I joined my children at the Kendal Wool Gathering at K Village:

Then we headed over to Sizergh Castle. After completing the Woodland Play Trail the children made use of new pond dipping nets to have fun at the pond:

#CountryKids Sizergh Castle Woodland Play Trail

Regular readers will know that we are big fans of our nearest National Trust property Sizergh Castle. We have got our membership fee back just in trips here this year with special events and 50 Things challenges as well as using it as a base for walks. One thing it hadn't had was a play area for bigger kids. So when I heard about the new Woodland Play Trail I was keen to go try it out. 

The first challenge was to find out where it was! Cunningly its all part of trail to discover how to get there. The children had to read the clue then follow directions:

The signs took us on a safe route in the car park passing the signs for the Great British Walk:

It was pretty obvious when we reached the actual start of the trail:

My children were so keen to check it all out I had difficulty getting them to slow down enough to get photographs. I was just in time to catch my son going through the tunnel:

Luckily grown ups don't have to crawl as they have kindly put in a Wussy Parent Route:

Once in the woodland itself there were more clues and challenges to follow:

The trickiest bit of the route came next and you had to use a rope to safely descend a slightly steeper slope: 

Next up was a log path, as you can see my son wimped out and decided not to balance on it:

Maybe he had read the warning sign:

What was nice about the route was that I could see the children ahead of me without having to be right on top of them:

Walking on stumps seemed to prove harder than log walking as it slowed them down a little bit:

Some of the clues gave us a chance to look at interesting things (well I looked any way!):

Parts of the course were more simply constructed with these branch arches to pass through (some of these were quite low for an adult!):

The people building the course had gone to great lengths to put in things like this Branch House:

I bet the woodland will look even more superb in the spring when the flowers come out:

And the reward for getting to the end:

Of course we did have to climb back up the mini cliff to get back to the castle. The children made this look easy but I was burdened with handbag and camera:

All in all a fun way to spend time outdoors with the children and to get them active without too much effort on your part!