We started our morning—look at that glorious sky!—at our last standing stone circle of the trip. This one is on a high hill surrounded by much higher mountains. I learned absolutely nothing about the ritual landscape…other stones, where settlements were, other architectural elements…. Sigh. I bucked up, though, and on we went!

We motored up a hill, and discovered even the cattle enjoy lake-views…

…and watching sailboats….

Remember, this is the Lake District, and people here tend to be flush and indulge their notions…can these be considered garden follies?

We motored along winding roads into the nearby Yorkshire Dales, which we found stunning, yet rather sere in comparison, with rock outcrops and different land-use patterns.

With last weekend, we realized we had hit the summer festival season. I think this apparent gypsy wagon is advertising one.

That stone barn…there were lots of these in the valleys and often not very far apart, although each was in a different stone-fenced paddock. I pondered this quite a while, and eventually postulated that they were part of a transhumance pattern, with summer graze on the heights of the ridges, and wintering near these barns, which always had some height and at least two stories, I assume for storing winter fodder. Just a theory, though….

I doubt I’ll see any sheep close-up during the rest of the trip so one last sheep photo…and isn’t this a darned winsome sheep?

This entry was posted in anthropology, archaeology, outdoors on Monday, 8 June 2015 at 2:38 pm.
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