A wide range of things to do in the Lake District
The extent and variety of the lakes is one of the greatest attractions of the Lake District; what is not immediately obvious, however, is that that extent has been steadily diminishing since the last glaciations, with the deposition of river silt and other material leading to the reduction in area of many lakes and the complete disappearance of others.
Elterwater is a good example of a lake which was once much larger in area; its irregular reed fringed shoreline is slowly being in filled, and the marshy lake flats around its feeder streams point to the gradual encroachment of silt and, in time, its disappearance from the landscape. This has already happened higher up Great Langdale, where the glacial lake above Chapel Stile has completely vanished.
Borrowdale the Lake District
In Borrowdale, the shallow lake hich spreads around the middle of the valley near Rosthwaite must have been particularly attractive, with little islands such as The How, the rocky knoll close to the site of the present village. The erosive power of the River Derwent spelt the end of the lake, however, for the river cut the' present gorge through the Jaws of Borrowdale and produced an escape route for the water which had been ponded back by a rock barrier.
In Eskdale, too, there is considerable evidence that the dale, a favourite with many despite its lack of water as a focal point, once boasted a number of lakes. Near the head of the valley, immediately below the brooding crags ofEsk Buttress and the majestic face ofScafeli Pike, the infant River Esk meanders through the flat bowl of Great Moss, where there was clearly a postglacial lake of some magnitude.
Eventually the Esk broke through the rock barrier below Green Crag, where the river now cascades down Esk Falls, to arrive at the second lake site, around Brotherilkeld. Once again the evidence is clear: terrace features around the fine seventeenth century farmhouse define former lake beds, and there is even a fossilised river channel cut into one of the terraces.
Lower down Eskdale, there were yet further lakes associated with the glacial period, when melt water from the Eskdale glacier, whose snout perhaps reached as far as Eskdale Green in late glacial times, was trapped between the glacier itself and the tremendous sheet of ice which covered the Irish Sea region. Eventually water from both the Eskdale lake and the adjacent Lake Miterdale escaped through ice marginal channels and the water level was gradually reduced until the lakes were drained and Eskdale assumed its present character.
In a number of cases deposition by mid valley streams has severed the original long finger lakes of the postglacial period and produced valleys with two major lakes. In Borrowdale, Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite Lake were once one, but have been separated by the dumping of alluvial material from the River Greta on a bar of resistant rock. Deposition by the River Derwent is now insidiously reducing the extent of Derwentwater.
The same pattern of an alluvial flat separating two lakes is apparent in Buttermere, where it is easy to imagine the winter torrents of Sour Milk Gill and Sail Beck bringing down boulders and other finer material to build up delta fans which progressively narrowed the central section of the lake before finally bringing about the present separation into Buttermere and Crummock Water.
Glaciers in the Lake District
The clearest evidence of glacial deposition lies in the heaps of debris which litter many of the Lake District's dales and mark the limits of valley glaciers at certain points in time. This glacial drift, or moraine, either lines the side of the valley or curves right across the valley. In the former instance, the lateral moraine forms hummocky areas of little hills and intervening hollows such as that in the deep trough of Mickleden in Great Langdale, or around Dunmail Raise at the highest point of the great through route of the Lake District, from Windermere to Keswick.
In Borrowdale, too, there is glacial drift of this kind in the area between Seathwaite and Stockley Bridge, seen but not generally noticed by thousands of walkers each year as they make their way to Sty Head.
Deepdale and Wordsworth
And at the head of Deepdale, Wordsworth's 'craggy and gloomy abyss', fresh green mounds of recent moraine litter the valley floor. The terminal moraines which mark the temporary end of the valley glaciers are perhaps of even greater interest. Examples can be drawn from most of the main valleys, from the far northwest, where a tree topped ridge in the Cocker valley north of Lorton marks the point where debris from a melting glacier was deposited, to the far southeast, where a terminal moraine can be spotted just above the hamlet of Sadgill in Longsleddale; another former lake occupied the flat valley floor hereabouts. Lower down Longsleddale, the chapel just to the north of Ubarrow Hall, an ancient stronghold with a surviving pele tower, sits astride a moraine deposited during a glacial cold spell when the valley glacier advanced further down the dale.
Borrowdale and Rosthwaite
Back in Borrowdale, a series of morainic ridges around Rosthwaite indicates variations in the limits of the Borrowdale glacier as it waxed and waned. Thornythwaite Farm sits on the most impressive of these ridges of drift, but a number of others exist, including one which runs in a long curve from the Stonethwaite Beck to Borrowdale church, and which near Long¬thwaite has been eroded by the river to reveal the amalgam of boulders, gravels and fine silts and clays dumped at the temporary edge of the glacier.
Amongst the minor landscape features associated with the glacial period the oddest are perhaps the erratics, boulders which were picked up by the ice and deposited large distances away, in areas where they were completely foreign to the country rock. The Bowder Stone, a 2,000 ton boulder perched in the Jaws of Borrowdale, is the most famous of these glacial erratics, though there are others which have travelled much further: boulders composed of rocks from the Borrowdale Volcanics series have been discovered as far south as Cheshire.
Between the River Derwent and Rosthwaite, quite near the Bowder Stone, is an example of another glacial oddity, a roche moutonnee a rock whose upstream surface has been smoothed by the passage of glacier ice but whose downstream face has been eroded away to form a craggy, uneven surface. The passage of the glaciers is also indicated by striations grooves scratched out by rock trapped in the ice; there are examples of these scored rock surfaces in the dales, as in Mickleden, and also higher up as high as 760m (2,SOOft) on Scafell.
And on the mountain summits, too, there are less dramatic but nevertheless fascinating indications of glaciation, including the stone polygons on the summits of Grasmoor, Skiddaw and Blencathra.This sorting of rock fragments by frost action, especially noticeable after a succession of sharp frosts in hard winters, is a reminder that the last glaciation was a mere
10,000 years ago, and that its effects are still very much with us.
The history of the fens and landscapes of the Lake District is a fascinating subject, and one which continues to attract visitors to Cumbria. Wherever you stay in the Lake District you will find a wide range of hotel accomodation, guesthouses, romantic hotels and hostels, which can be pre-booked before you arrive. Leave your troubles at home and discover the beauty of one of England´s most beautiful regions, and book into a spa hotel in the Lake District.
Elterwater is a good example of a lake which was once much larger in area; its irregular reed fringed shoreline is slowly being in filled, and the marshy lake flats around its feeder streams point to the gradual encroachment of silt and, in time, its disappearance from the landscape. This has already happened higher up Great Langdale, where the glacial lake above Chapel Stile has completely vanished.
Borrowdale the Lake District
In Borrowdale, the shallow lake hich spreads around the middle of the valley near Rosthwaite must have been particularly attractive, with little islands such as The How, the rocky knoll close to the site of the present village. The erosive power of the River Derwent spelt the end of the lake, however, for the river cut the' present gorge through the Jaws of Borrowdale and produced an escape route for the water which had been ponded back by a rock barrier.
In Eskdale, too, there is considerable evidence that the dale, a favourite with many despite its lack of water as a focal point, once boasted a number of lakes. Near the head of the valley, immediately below the brooding crags ofEsk Buttress and the majestic face ofScafeli Pike, the infant River Esk meanders through the flat bowl of Great Moss, where there was clearly a postglacial lake of some magnitude.
Eventually the Esk broke through the rock barrier below Green Crag, where the river now cascades down Esk Falls, to arrive at the second lake site, around Brotherilkeld. Once again the evidence is clear: terrace features around the fine seventeenth century farmhouse define former lake beds, and there is even a fossilised river channel cut into one of the terraces.
Lower down Eskdale, there were yet further lakes associated with the glacial period, when melt water from the Eskdale glacier, whose snout perhaps reached as far as Eskdale Green in late glacial times, was trapped between the glacier itself and the tremendous sheet of ice which covered the Irish Sea region. Eventually water from both the Eskdale lake and the adjacent Lake Miterdale escaped through ice marginal channels and the water level was gradually reduced until the lakes were drained and Eskdale assumed its present character.
In a number of cases deposition by mid valley streams has severed the original long finger lakes of the postglacial period and produced valleys with two major lakes. In Borrowdale, Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite Lake were once one, but have been separated by the dumping of alluvial material from the River Greta on a bar of resistant rock. Deposition by the River Derwent is now insidiously reducing the extent of Derwentwater.
The same pattern of an alluvial flat separating two lakes is apparent in Buttermere, where it is easy to imagine the winter torrents of Sour Milk Gill and Sail Beck bringing down boulders and other finer material to build up delta fans which progressively narrowed the central section of the lake before finally bringing about the present separation into Buttermere and Crummock Water.
Glaciers in the Lake District
The clearest evidence of glacial deposition lies in the heaps of debris which litter many of the Lake District's dales and mark the limits of valley glaciers at certain points in time. This glacial drift, or moraine, either lines the side of the valley or curves right across the valley. In the former instance, the lateral moraine forms hummocky areas of little hills and intervening hollows such as that in the deep trough of Mickleden in Great Langdale, or around Dunmail Raise at the highest point of the great through route of the Lake District, from Windermere to Keswick.
In Borrowdale, too, there is glacial drift of this kind in the area between Seathwaite and Stockley Bridge, seen but not generally noticed by thousands of walkers each year as they make their way to Sty Head.
Deepdale and Wordsworth
And at the head of Deepdale, Wordsworth's 'craggy and gloomy abyss', fresh green mounds of recent moraine litter the valley floor. The terminal moraines which mark the temporary end of the valley glaciers are perhaps of even greater interest. Examples can be drawn from most of the main valleys, from the far northwest, where a tree topped ridge in the Cocker valley north of Lorton marks the point where debris from a melting glacier was deposited, to the far southeast, where a terminal moraine can be spotted just above the hamlet of Sadgill in Longsleddale; another former lake occupied the flat valley floor hereabouts. Lower down Longsleddale, the chapel just to the north of Ubarrow Hall, an ancient stronghold with a surviving pele tower, sits astride a moraine deposited during a glacial cold spell when the valley glacier advanced further down the dale.
Borrowdale and Rosthwaite
Back in Borrowdale, a series of morainic ridges around Rosthwaite indicates variations in the limits of the Borrowdale glacier as it waxed and waned. Thornythwaite Farm sits on the most impressive of these ridges of drift, but a number of others exist, including one which runs in a long curve from the Stonethwaite Beck to Borrowdale church, and which near Long¬thwaite has been eroded by the river to reveal the amalgam of boulders, gravels and fine silts and clays dumped at the temporary edge of the glacier.
Amongst the minor landscape features associated with the glacial period the oddest are perhaps the erratics, boulders which were picked up by the ice and deposited large distances away, in areas where they were completely foreign to the country rock. The Bowder Stone, a 2,000 ton boulder perched in the Jaws of Borrowdale, is the most famous of these glacial erratics, though there are others which have travelled much further: boulders composed of rocks from the Borrowdale Volcanics series have been discovered as far south as Cheshire.
Between the River Derwent and Rosthwaite, quite near the Bowder Stone, is an example of another glacial oddity, a roche moutonnee a rock whose upstream surface has been smoothed by the passage of glacier ice but whose downstream face has been eroded away to form a craggy, uneven surface. The passage of the glaciers is also indicated by striations grooves scratched out by rock trapped in the ice; there are examples of these scored rock surfaces in the dales, as in Mickleden, and also higher up as high as 760m (2,SOOft) on Scafell.
And on the mountain summits, too, there are less dramatic but nevertheless fascinating indications of glaciation, including the stone polygons on the summits of Grasmoor, Skiddaw and Blencathra.This sorting of rock fragments by frost action, especially noticeable after a succession of sharp frosts in hard winters, is a reminder that the last glaciation was a mere
10,000 years ago, and that its effects are still very much with us.
The history of the fens and landscapes of the Lake District is a fascinating subject, and one which continues to attract visitors to Cumbria. Wherever you stay in the Lake District you will find a wide range of hotel accomodation, guesthouses, romantic hotels and hostels, which can be pre-booked before you arrive. Leave your troubles at home and discover the beauty of one of England´s most beautiful regions, and book into a spa hotel in the Lake District.
Labels: Borrowdale and Rosthwaite
posted by Windermere Boutique Hotels | 07:01
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