In 1 840, one man transformed travel In BrItaIn.
HIs name was George Bradshaw,
and hIs raIlway guIdes InspIred the VIctorIans to take to the tracks.
Stop by stop,
he told them where to travel,
what to see and where to stay.
Now, 1 70 years later,
I'm makIng a serIes ofjourneys across the length and breadth of the country
to see what of Bradshaw's BrItaIn remaIns.
My Bradshaw's is now steering me through Cumbria.
You might expect me to be headed for the Lake District,
but first, my journey takes me aIong the sea
on the raiIway which, as Bradshaw says,
''skirts the best part of the CumberIand coast.''
ActuaIIy, it aII Iooks pretty good to me.
On today's part of my journey,
I'll be takIng a traIn from coast to mountaIn-top...
A IittIe smut hits the eye to remind you of the joys of steam traveI.
..gaInIng rare access to an Industry that dIvIdes opInIon worldwIde,
nuclear power...
And it is absoIuteIy massive.
The goIf baII itseIf is probabIy about 60 metres high.
..and attendIng the revelatIon of an extremely rare Cumberland Luck.
This is, I must say, a rather emotionaI moment, isn't it?
ThIsjourney began on the ScottIsh border
and Is takIng me across the spectacular scenery of England
at Its narrowest poInt, coast to coast,
fInIshIng up on the pIcturesque Isle of Man.
Today's run starts In Cockermouth, near the CumbrIan coast,
and then I'll travel south to the nuclear facIlIty at SellafIeld,
endIng the day In marvellous countrysIde at Ravenglass.
I'm now headed for Cockermouth, which Bradshaw's informs me
is situated at the junction of the Cocker and the Derwent,
and he reminds me that the poet WiIIiam Wordsworth is a native
and apparentIy is commemorated at St Mary's Church ith a memoriaI indow.
Cockermouth stands on the north-western edge of the Lake DIstrIct.
A raIlway to carry coal from the West Cumberland pIts for shIpment by sea
was opened between the town and the coast at WorkIngton as early as 1 847.
And once a passenger raIlway arrIved In 1 865, the town flourIshed,
as VIctorIan tourIsts flocked to the lakes
where the poet Wordsworth once lIved.
As a RomantIc wrIter, much stImulated by nature,
Wordsworth absorbed the landscapes surroundIng the town
profoundly Into hIs verses.
Sadly, Cockermouth StatIon was closed In 1966,
so I've alIghted at WorkIngton, the closest poInt on the raIlway.
Reminiscing on his chiIdhood, Wordsworth wrote,
''What joy was mine! How often in the course
Of those gIad respites, though a soft west ind
RuffIed the waters to the angIer's ish,
For a whoIe day together, have I Iain
Down by thy side, O, Derwent! Murmuring stream.''
If Bradshaw couId enthuse about engineering,
why shouIdn't the poet wax IyricaI about water?
The Isolated yet awe-InspIrIng landscape
and the water and mIneral wealth contaIned wIthIn It
had proved attractIve to VIctorIan and modern-day vIsItors,
artIsts and IndustrIes alIke.
And water Is key to Cockermouth,
beIng sItuated at the confluence of two rIvers.
I've come here to vIsIt a brewery, establIshed at thIs spot In 1 828,
precIsely because of the purIty of the waters that Wordsworth eulogIsed.
In the 19th century,
BrItIsh beer and brewIng set the gold standard around the world.
In fact, Bass Ale from Burton-on-Trent
Is credIted as the world's fIrst global brand,
as It was exported to so many countrIes.
Head brewer Jeremy Pettman Is meetIng me In the pump room.
There you'd have the brewery weII, 80ft deep.
(MIchael) I understand that the quaIity of water
is very important in the making of beer.
(Jeremy) The water quaIity's absoIuteIy paramount.
The water comes off the feIIs. It permeates down through the rock strata
to the east of the town itseIf
and forms an artesian weII source at the bottom of the brewery here.
We think that the water's been used since Norman times
and actuaIIy suppIied the castIe next door to the brewery.
By the 1 870s, scIence and potent new technologIes
had revolutIonIsed the brewIng Industry.
It had metamorphosed from a cottage Industry to a hIghly scIentIfIc process
utIlIsIng advances such as steam power and coolIng systems,
and even mIcroscopes, whIch were fIrst Introduced by brewers
tryIng to perfect beer yeast.
StaggerIngly, after cotton spInnIng,
brewIng was one of the most Important IndustrIes In BrItaIn
In terms of sheer numbers employed and the cash that It generated.
As I came in, I noticed your buiIdings are historic.
Do you pride yourseIves reaIIy on breing beer
as it used to be done in the 19th century?
This is a traditionaI brewery.
WhiIst we've done a Iot of improvement work over the years,
we've tended to maintain that traditionaIity.
We're a heritage industry,
this is heritage breing, and we're very proud of it.
The weather systems that cause an above average raInfall In thIs area,
and hence plentIful pure water, can also be unpredIctable and vIolent,
as Cockermouth found to Its cost In recent hIstory.
We aII remember the terribIe fIoods that affIicted Cockermouth in 2009.
What happened here?
Where you're stood at the moment, the weII was compIeteIy covered.
You'd probabIy be somewhere waist deep, just above waist deep in water.
That obviousIy covered the weII, it made it unusabIe.
The water actuaIIy came up in very quick fashion,
probabIy two, two and a haIf hours,
and by one o'cIock we had to puII the pIug on the brewery itseIf
and IiteraIIy just waIk away and Ieave the water to its own devices.
Thankfully, after nIne weeks of hard work over ChrIstmas and the New Year,
the brewery resumed productIon.
And I thInk It's tIme to sample some beer
and see whether I can taste thIs CumbrIa water, so loved by the poet.
We are exactIy, as Bradshaw describes it,
at the junction of the Cocker and the Derwent.
- There you go. AII the best. - Your very, very good heaIth.
- Cheers. - Cheers.
The onIy thing that worries me is rain is coming on
and IoveIy though your water is, I don't want to get any in my beer.
Not a probIem. There's a saying around here that every drop of rain that faIIs
is another pint of Cockermouth aIe.
Good saying.
DespIte Its powerful potentIal for destructIon,
the abundant water In thIs beautIful landscape
has clearly InspIred both wrIters and brewers.
I've travelled to WhItehaven RaIlway StatIon,
nestled on the CumbrIan coast, to catch the traIn to a place
where the local water Is used for somethIng much more controversIal.
An Industry that both fuels our modern world, but also furIous debate.
SellafIeld was once just a country raIlway statIon
that VIctorIan tourIsts used
to access the delIghts of local seasIde resorts.
But Its nature changed In the 1950s when It became home to Calder Hall,
the world's fIrst commercIal nuclear power statIon.
Power is at the heart of any modern society.
During the IndustriaI RevoIution that so enthraIIed Bradshaw,
the steam engine moved man forward for the first time
from pure dependence on muscIe and sweat.
I'm on my way now to see a new source of energy
deveIoped during the 20th century whose impact was every bit as revoIutionary
as the steam engine had been in its day.
In Bradshaw's day, the energy for homes, Industry and raIlways
came from the burnIng of coal,
whIch provIded a staggerIng 95% of BrItaIn's energy needs.
But today, oIl and natural gas are the natIon's major fuel sources,
wIth nuclear power provIdIng a sIxth of our electrIcIty.
(woman) It's hoped these reactors wIll eventually make It possIble
to produce power 20 tImes more cheaply than conventIonal methods,
and wIll, IncredIbly, make more fuel than It uses.
(MIchael) Nuclear power statIons generate electrIcIty
from energy produced by the fIssIon, or splIttIng, of uranIum atoms.
But Its enormous potentIal comes wIth a problem.
Nuclear power generatIon produces spent fuel,
contaInIng dangerous radIoactIve waste, whIch has to be dealt wIth safely
and stored for many hundreds, If not thousands, of years.
SellafIeld now specIalIses In reprocessIng spent nuclear fuel
and decommIssIonIng facIlItIes.
And both local water and the raIlways play a vItal role
In thIs controversIal work.
I'm meetIng ChrIs HallIwell, as thIs nuclear plant
Is paInstakIngly dIsassembled or decommIssIoned.
As I understand it, then, we are now aIongside a prototype nucIear reactor
and you have decommissioned it, taken it out of seRVice.
How important is that?
It's a significant achievement, MichaeI.
It's the first power-generating reactor in the UK to be fuIIy decommissioned.
What does decommissioning mean?
We've effectiveIy shut down the station.
We've removed aII of the fueI eIements that were inside.
That machine there is controIIing this robotic arm
that you can see on the other screen here.
That disappears down into the reactor, very deep,
and that's what we've used to cut up and remove aII of the components
inside the reactor core.
The spent nuclear fuel Is stored In large coolIng ponds.
They're fed wIth water sIphoned from Wast Water,
the Lake DIstrIct's deepest lake,
whIch Wordsworth descrIbed as ''long, stern and desolate''.
These waters have now been harnessed to a modern use.
How Iong has that IittIe job taken you?
It's taken the best part of 20 years to compIete it to where we are now
and we finished about May 201 1 .
Many of the 441 nuclear power statIons In the world today
wIll come to the end of theIr operatIonal lIves
In the next few decades.
BeIng able safely to recover and store radIoactIve waste
Is fundamental to the future of nuclear generatIon.
Do we have to content ourseIves ith watching this on teIevision
or can we get down there?
AbsoIuteIy not, perfectIy cIean and safe to go downstairs.
If you want to foIIow me, we can have a Iook.
I've been gIven IncredIbly rare access to the InsIde of the reactor
that ChrIs and hIs team are decommIssIonIng.
(ChrIs) Here we are, MichaeI. We're inside the goIf baII,
the famous iconic structure at SeIIafieId,
and most peopIe are famiIiar ith it from the outside,
but very few have had the opportunity to see it from this angIe.
It is absoIuteIy massive. What kind of dimensions are we deaIing ith here?
(ChrIs) The goIf baII itseIf is probabIy about 60 metres high
and we're now sat on top of the reactor itseIf
and that extends maybe 25 metres down beIow us.
This was a prototype. So how does this compare in size
to the production modeIs that were buiIt?
It's an exact one-fifth scaIe repIica of a fuII-size advanced gas reactor.
Nuclear materIals travel across the length and breadth of BrItaIn
hundreds of tImes each year,
wIth spent nuclear fuel beIng carrIed by traIn to SellafIeld for reprocessIng.
BrIan Howell, from the Nuclear DecommIssIonIng AuthorIty,
Is meetIng me at SellafIeld's dedIcated raIlway sIdIngs.
This is cIearIy a very speciaI train. What exactIy does it carry?
These trains carry speciaIIy designed fIasks that contain a potentiaI range
of nucIear materiaIs brought to SeIIafieId to be reprocessed.
(MIchael) You're taking spent nucIear fueI from power stations,
whether in the UK or abroad.
The stuff's brought here, reprocessed,
and the stuff that's usefuI is then sent back to the UK
or to the customer abroad, wherever it is, and aII by raiI.
Yeah. Here in the UK, raiIway is the preferred route of transport.
A tried, tested, safe route.
How do you know they're safe?
They couId be invoIved in a raiI accident, couIdn't they?
Since 1982, we've traveIIed over ten miIIion miIes
transporting nucIear materiaIs ithout an accident.
However, a number of years ago, they did do, obviousIy,
a thorough series of safety tests.
That incIuded crashing a Iocomotive ith two carriages
into one of these fIasks.
After the crash, the Iocomotive was virtuaIIy written off.
However, the fIask onIy had a coupIe of scratches and a minor dent in it,
so that gives us the confidence that this is an extremeIy safe way
of transporting these materiaIs.
TransportIng nuclear fuel by traIn has led to specIal engIneerIng
wIthIn these wagons to protect theIr radIoactIve cargo.
If I couId see inside those boxes, what wouId I find?
Inside the box is, in essence, another highIy engineered box,
which we caII a fIask, that is designed to be very secure for impacts
and those kind of reasons.
Then ithin speciaI compartments ithin that fIask,
the fueI is actuaIIy protected and Ioaded.
The fuel flasks can weIgh anythIng from 50 to 150 tonnes once fully laden,
and sIt on specIally engIneered low-loader wagons.
They arrIve at the sIte many tImes a month by raIl,
from the docks at Barrow-In-Furness or from raIl-connected power statIons
elsewhere In the UK.
(BrIan) With many nucIear faciIities,
they'II be in fairIy isoIated or remote parts of the UK,
where perhaps the road network isn't everything you'd want it to be
to transport nucIear materiaIs.
RaiI is a tried and tested route
and we think that it's the best route for the kind of job that we have to do.
DespIte the controversIes that surround the use of nuclear power,
I can't help thInkIng that Bradshaw would have been Impressed
that the VIctorIan technology of metal wheel on metal raIl
coexIsts wIth processes that rely on human mastery of the atom.
So, after an absorbIng day, I'm headIng off to fInd a hotel for the nIght.
As ever, I've sought Bradshaw's advice for where to stay.
''AIong the coast from Whitehaven, on or near the raiIway,
is Muncaster HaII, the seat of Lord Muncaster.''
What a pIace to stay.
ThIs locatIon Is spectacular.
In fact, John RuskIn, VIctorIan poet, artIst and crItIc,
descrIbed Muncaster as ''the gateway to ParadIse''.
But ''Bradshaw's'' sparks Interest In Muncaster not only for the vIew.
InsIde the house, It says, Is Henry VI's cup,
who took refuge after the Battle of Hexham In 1 464.
And extraordInarIly, that cup stIll exIsts over 500 years later.
The ancestral famIly are the PennIngtons who, IncredIbly,
have resIded In the castle sInce 1208.
Peter Frost-PennIngton and hIs father-In-law, PatrIck,
have kIndly agreed to show me the cup.
This is, I must say, a rather emotionaI moment, isn't it?
Yes. PeopIe aren't usuaIIy aIIowed to see it. You're very priviIeged.
I am very priviIeged indeed.
(Peter) It's very dirty because we never dare wash it.
It must never Ieave the pIace.
And here...
..it is. The Luck of Muncaster.
I feeI that I am present at a very speciaI, unique ceremony.
ThIs glass drInkIng bowl Is a rare example of a Cumberland Luck,
an object ensurIng good fortune for those who possess It.
According to my Bradshaw's,
it was given by Henry VI after the BattIe of Hexham.
What was the story?
He was running away ith his two friends
and he was found at the tower outside that indow,
having tried to get sheIter in the next-door vaIIey,
but he was denied it.
He was found by the two shepherds and brought here for two or three weeks.
When he Ieft, he Ieft his drinking bol behind saying,
as Iong as it shouId remain whoIe and unbroken,
the Penningtons wouId aIways be Iiving and thriving at Muncaster.
What an awesome object and how movIng that It's survIved so long.
The evIdent care that the PennIngtons have over centurIes lavIshed on the bowl
Is now matched by the hospItalIty lavIshed on theIr guest
as I'm InvIted tojoIn the famIly's supper.
HavIng wIned and dIned In elegant style, I'm startIng a new day at Ravenglass,
the only coastal vIllage In the Lake DIstrIct NatIonal Park.
The nearest station to Muncaster CastIe is RavengIass.
My Bradshaw's says, ''12 miIes distant is Wast Water and the FeIIs,
the principIe of which is ScafeII, 3,160ft high.''
LuckiIy, there's a raiIway that takes me most of the way.
Big mountain, smaII train.
The Ravenglass and Eskdale RaIlway proved popular when It opened In 1 875,
between the sea and Scafell, the hIghest of the CumbrIan peaks.
The VIctorIans used It to enjoy the spectacle and majesty of the mountaIns.
But, lIke many raIlways, It started lIfe wIth an IndustrIal purpose.
Peter van Zeller Is today's traIn drIver.
- HeIIo, Peter. - HeIIo!
Great to see you. I'm reaIIy Iooking forward to this ride.
What's the history of the raiIway?
The raiIway was buiIt to carry iron ore for steeI making.
They thought it was reaIIy suitabIe for the first steeI-making processes.
Once the Iron ore had been ferrIed from the mInes on the mountaIn at Boot
to the coast at Ravenglass,
passengers hopped aboard the empty wagons for the return ascent.
The raIlway closed In 1913, after quarryIng stopped,
but a group of raIl enthusIasts from a mInIature raIlway engIneerIng company
saved and restored the lIne durIng the FIrst World War.
In the Bradshaw's of the 1920s,
you'II find this ran every day, Christmas Day incIuded.
It carried the maiIs, it carried everybody's goods,
because the passengers weren't enough to keep the thing soIvent, if you Iike.
What about your Iocomotive? What kind of vintage is that?
This one was buiIt in 1923.
It Iooks Iike a miniature of a fuII-size engine,
but it was designed to do a reaI job.
It wouId puII 20 tonnes of stone through the inter
or turn up and puII the 150 passengers who come off the main Iine raiIway,
ith equaI ease, shouId we say. And it's stiII doing it 90 years Iater.
(whIstle toots)
The raIlway's dual purpose of ferryIng quarrIed granIte
down from the mountaIns In wInter and carryIng tourIsts up In the summer
kept the lIne operatIng untIl the 1950s.
VIctorIan tourIsts could absorb a breath of fresh aIr
In open wagons over seven mIles, through two magnIfIcent valleys,
to the foot of England's hIghest mountaIns.
Today, It's a herItage raIlway,
affectIonately known In the CumbrIan dIalect as ''la'al ratty'',
or ''lIttle raIlway''.
I've been lookIng forward to my trIp up to these dauntIng slopes.
TraveIIing ith a steam engine in an open-top carriage
is a very speciaI experience.
Of course, you have the constant odour of the smoke in your nose.
It feeIs at times as if it's raining,
because the vapour from the stack is faIIing on my face
and every now and again, a IittIe smut hits the eye,
to remind you of the joys of steam traveI.
I'm told that beyond the last stop,
the VIctorIans would also vIsIt Wast Water, descrIbed as
''a rather fIerce and deep stretch of water that has claImed many lIves''.
I thInk for today, the traInjourney wIll suffIce.
That was wonderfuI. I reaIIy enjoyed it.
- SpIendid. - Thank you very much indeed.
This seems Iike a modeI raiIway. It feeIs Iike a toy.
But I'm rather moved by the idea that once, it had a timetabIe,
that peopIe reIied on it and that it carried their post.
I've alIghted from thIs beautIful lIttle steam servIce at Irton
to vIsIt a VIctorIan mansIon wIth extensIve landscaped gardens,
known as Gatehouse.
Bradshaw descrIbes the countrysIde In Westmoreland,
whIch Is now part of CumbrIa, as ''a regIon of lofty mountaIns, naked hIlls
and bleak, barren moors''.
So I'm IntrIgued to know how a garden could be conjured
from such forbIddIng landscape.
Local desIgner ChrIs Jones Is my guIde.
- HeIIo, Chris. - HeIIo. Good to see you.
What a wonderfuI estate. What's the history of it?
Like so many of these northern estates and mansions,
it was basicaIIy northern merchant weaIth in Victorian times,
where they wanted to escape the cities
and estabIish country seats for themseIves,
become country squires, if you Iike.
Gatehouse was buIlt In 1 896 as a country retreat for the Rea famIly,
wealthy LIverpudlIan coal and shIppIng merchants.
LIke many rIch VIctorIan IndustrIalIsts,
they wanted both to escape the grIme and squalor of the cIty,
and to make theIr mark by constructIng a thIng of beauty and grace
that would make them the envy of theIr peers.
What did they have to do here?
They bought the IocaI farm. AII of this was a meadow.
First of aII, they fIooded the meadow and created this tarn, or Iake.
They Iandscaped the whoIe area.
AII of this pIanting here was put in by them.
They've got cascades, they've got formaI gardens.
They had orchards and so on.
RaIlways and steam-powered lIners, reachIng all corners of the globe,
allowed for exploratIon and dIscovery,
openIng up the world for well-heeled travellers.
Back In BrItaIn, the upper classes were keen to recreate
the unfamIlIar and wonderful flora that they'd seen.
And so the VIctorIan era became the golden age
for exotIc plant collectIng and for radIcal garden desIgn.
It was actuaIIy designed, at Ieast in part,
by Thomas Mawson, the Ieading Iandscape architect of his day.
In fact, he came up ith the expression ''Iandscape architecture'',
because, prior to that, it wouId be the architect themseIves
who estabIished the gardens.
Thomas Mawson objected to that,
saying they didn't have the sensitivity to create a garden.
Thomas Mawson reshaped the landscape.
Then, In 191 4, he created a Japanese garden
for Lord Rea's sons, James and Russell.
All thIngs Eastern had become extremely fashIonable durIng thIs perIod,
as Japan was opened up to the West durIng the 19th century.
To have a Japanese garden on your estate
was consIdered the heIght of sophIstIcatIon.
So, MichaeI, can you imagine a nice summer's evening,
the Reas and their guests coming on a woodIand promenade,
after their dinner, in their finery,
and being presented ith this aII of a sudden?
A unique Japanese garden.
They must have been, the guests, very impressed.
These Reas have reaIIy done something noveI,
something reaIIy originaI and opuIent, too.
I think that's right.
A Iot of these gardens were inspired by the 1910 Japan-Britain Exhibition,
so you've onIy got a few gap years there,
so there weren't that many around at the time.
Here we are on a typicaI Japanese bridge.
What are the characteristics, otherwse, of Japanese gardens?
(ChrIs) They were more interested in texture, form.
It couId be the rustIe of the bamboo, any of those quaIities.
It's a different sensibiIity to British gardening.
The Japanese gardens themseIves are meticuIousIy cared for,
meticuIousIy groomed, and they're pieces of art.
ChrIs has been workIng on the garden for the last 12 years
and has hIgh hopes that, one day, he and a dedIcated band of volunteers
wIll achIeve a tranquIl perfectIon that would not feel out of place In Japan.
As the IndustriaI RevoIution advanced,
poets and artists were gripped by Romanticism.
A Iove of Iakes and cascades and chasms.
As Victorians saw their Iandscape changed by factories and cities,
they too Ionged for nature in the raw
and crowded onto trains to take to the hiIIs.
On the next step of my journey,
I'll be explodIng the myths behInd CumbrIan slate...
(aIr horn sounds)
(explosIon)
That was a much bigger bang than I'd expected.
..submergIng myseIf In a top-secret world...
Not much room here, I can teII you.
..and dIscoverIng why VIctorIans loved ''the HangIng Town''.
- And this is a short drop rope. - Meaning that they wouId be strangIed.
- They danced on the end of the rope. - Indeed.