Dodd, Long Side & Carl Side, Keswick, Cumbria, England

With all the noise being made about them during the Foot and Mouth scare in 2001, it came as a surprise to me to see Herdwick sheep grazing in the lowlands. After all they are famed as hill sheep who know their own parts of the fell where they are meant to be. Therefore, so much was made of the impact of this being lost due a cull at a time when pyres burnt across Britain, rights of way were shut and disinfectant baths were everywhere. There may have been questions surrounding the government's handling of the situation but it all petered out as the year grew warmer with no return when it cooled down again. The scene that you find here was captured on film around two years later in the middle of a very sunny March, during which Keswick and its surroundings saw a lot of me. It was all terra incognito to me and I made the most of it, so much so that I couldn't find a reason to visit the area at the end of January (2010) and ended up in Patterdale instead. Still, there is the lure of Skiddaw and its attendant hills, some of which you see above, that may draw me back yet.