Well, the weather was better than the forecast today, so after some deliberation we decided to go mountain biking from the cottage again this time to the east over Claife Heights and down along the side of Lake Windermere.

We left the cottage and headed down the hill towards Hawkshead, turning east towards High Wray. The sun was even shining a little ! We followed the road around High Wray then turned climbing up past the Basecamp and kept going up hill over Claife Heights. Some of it was lovely, nice forest tracks and some of it was very rocky, rough and not possible to cycle, even for Mike !! Well, it was marked as a 2 on the cycle map - dodgy...

 It was quite nice going through the forest on Claife Heights. We didn't see anyone for ages at all, then as we approached the top, we saw other mountain bikers and lots of walkers. We stopped up on the top by Wise Een Tarn to eat some lunch in the sunshine, which was really nice.

We then carried on downhill all the way to Far Sawrey, well it was almost all downhill. Some of it was pretty stony and rocky and steep so I was very cautious, especially after coming off my bike in Grizedale a few years ago ! At Far Sawrey we emerged onto the road to the Windermere Ferry and cycled past the Hotel & pub, turning left again up another bridleway signed Claife Heights. Yes, it was another uphill route, but this one kept going and going and was stony again. Once at the top, we had some fab downhill, except some of it was just a little bit too steep and rough...

We finally got down the the Lake's western edge though, which was nice. You would have thought it being by the Lake, it wouls be nice and flat and lovely cycling... wrong.... there were hills and the track wasn't right by the lake either, it dipped inland a bit in places. Once we got nearer Red Nab car park, it was better and past the car park was really nice. It was also quieter here. We followed this round and uphill again to Wray Castle (NT - not open) and church at High Wray. Although the castle isn't open to the public, the grounds are all year round.

From the castle, we went along the road a little bit a dropped onto a bridleway back over to Outgate. I'm sure we've been along this one before, but don't remember it ! We met some horseriders who kindly held a gate open for us and ended up the last little bit going uphill (again) on another really stony bit, which according to the map was a 1, doddle ?!! Definitely not... The last bit was on roads back to the cottage. A total of 20.8kms !