Safe Return Doubtful

For a few days I’ve been camped up at the end of a single track and steep road that winds its way towards the Eastern fells of the Lake District. My only neighbours are holiday homes, one private that a guy from London bought a year or so ago for 1.2 million, and just a bit further up a rough track, the two properties that make up Carhullan. Both are holiday rentals, and have just gone on the market at 2.5 million. None of them are currently occupied, so I have the place to myself. Visitors to the Lakes rarely find there way up here.

If the name Carhullan sounds familiar, it’s because there’s a book, called The Carhullan Army by Sarah Hall. It’s a sort of feminist dystopia set here, in which women are so badly treated by men that they have taken to forming resistance groups that launch violent attacks on the men’s settlements.

This is the area I’ve lived in for the last six and a half years. I’ve returned to see some friends who were up staying until yesterday, and this week to get some work done to the van, and to do some work myself. It’s rained almost non-stop since I got back. The rivers and streams are full, and to accompany the rain there has been a strong westerly wind, so much so, that yesterday’s wild burst was christened Storm Betty.

My other neighbours are a herd of fell ponies. Roja and I have known them for years, and towards us at least, they approach and are very friendly. They came down from the fell before the storm, and now, just as the sun breaks through on Sunday afternoon, they are off, back higher up. They are with 6 foals that I can see. These are farmed, so in due course the foals will be sold.

Yesterday the wind was too wild to venture very high, but we put together a good loop around the old farms nearby; only one of which is a farm anymore, the rest are holiday homes. Today we got up the Kops, Low and High and Kop, but above 2,000 feet it was still pretty wild, with heavy squally showers.