Our next walks venue will be
Grasmere
Cumbria’s most popular village
on
Saturday 9th September 2017
0800hrs prompt from the Short Stay Car Park
Grasmere is probably the Cumbria’s most popular village, thanks to William Wordsworth (1770-1850).
Today Grasmere is totally given over to the tourist industry, with
plenty of gift shops, and places to eat and stay. Most of the buildings
date from the 19th or early 20th Century, though the farms around
Grasmere are much older. The Church dates from the 13th Century.
William and his sister Dorothy moved into Dove Cottage, in 1799 and they stayed here until 1808 as the cottage had became inadequate. They moved to Allan Bank,
a large house that William had condemned as an eyesore when it was
being built. They lived here for two years, with poet and friend
Coleridge. They then moved to the Old Rectory, opposite St Oswald’s
Church, a cold and damp house where his two youngest children died. In
1813 they moved to Rydal Mount.
In 1850 William died while out walking.
He and his wife Mary, who died 9 years later, have a simple tombstone in
the churchyard of St Oswald’s Church,
now one of the most visited literary shrines in the world. The Church
stands on the bank of the River Rothay, along whose banks pleasant walks
can be made.
Recently the neglected bit of land
between the church and the river has been renovated and turned into a
place of peace called the Wordsworth Daffodil Garden. Here you can own a
share, and have an engraved stone set in the path.
At one of the entrances to the
churchyard is this small building, which was the village school for over
220 years, from its opening in 1630 A.D. William Wordsworth, his wife
and his sister all taught here in the early 19th Century. It is now home
to the famous Sarah Nelson’s Gingerbread Shop. more.....
more from Grasmere Village web site:
There will be Three walks;
- A Walk led by: Brian Thorne
- B Walk led by: Beverley Kelly
- C Walk led by: John Adamson
walk details will be added as they become available, but by Sunday 3rd September
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