Levens Hall, Grange over Sands and Cartmel

Starting at Kendal Leisure Centre, six tandems and one solo left the start, to head for elevenses at Levens Hall café, around seven miles away.  They serve some delicious cakes which we enjoyed.  If we had more time, the Hall and gardens would be well worth a visit.  The house is the home of the Bagot family who have lived there for over four hundred years.  It has a topiary garden, which is made up of bushes and hedges cut into unusual shapes.

Here, another solo rider had ridden from Barrow in Furness, to meet us, a distance of over thirty miles.  From Levens, we headed west towards Grange over Sands.  This is a flat section of the ride for a change, with good views of Whitbarrow Scar, which is always a spectacular sight.  We enjoyed quiet lanes through Meathop and then climbed through Grange to arrive at Flookburgh for lunch at Brook Supplies Café, which is situated in a garden centre.  We met two more riders who had come to meet us from near Ulverston.

The route home took us to Cartmel village.  The road from Cark to Cartmel, is a pretty one, running through this delightful valley.  Here we had a short break to look at the priory, where we received free sticky toffee pudding and ice cream, which was very welcome, as it was getting quite warm by this time.  It was “Ice Cream Sunday” at the priory.  Cartmel is a most interesting old village.  It has a racecourse, and, if you like fine dining, it is the home to L’enclume restaurant run by Simon Rogan.

Sadly, we had to move on, and the road home climbed steadily through Field Broughton to Lindale, where we enjoyed a fast descent.  We retraced the lanes through Meathop from the morning ride. The riders were offered a refreshment stop at Gilpin Bridge, but this was declined.  In hindsight, this was just as well, as it started to rain soon after reaching Kendal, around 4.30pm. 41 happy miles!

Paul Rodman