A century ago, Britain's rail network was the envy of the world.
You could get a train from almost anywhere...
..to almost anywhere else.
But many of these lines were considered unprofitable,
and in the 1960s,
Dr Beeching was recruited by the government to come up with a
plan that would stop the railways from haemorrhaging money.
He famously brought the axe down on over 4,000 miles of track,
and 2,000 stations.
Almost overnight, 30% of the network was closed down.
50 years on,
I'm going on a journey to discover just a few of those lost lines.
I'll be walking the Penrith to Cockermouth line in Cumbria.
I'll get an insight into the mining industry that thrived here...
That's got to be lead, isn't it?
I'll follow in the footsteps of the region's first tourists...
This is magic! Woo-hoo-hoo!
And I'll seek out some of the relics of the past...
This is brilliant. This is just what I wanted to see!
And finally, experience what the Lakes'
most famous guide-book writer described as "the ultimate view".
I'm here at Penrith Station.
It's on the main line between London and Glasgow, and once upon a time,
you would have changed here for what was one of Britain's
most popular branch lines.
Only now, 50 years on, it's become one of Britain's
great lost railways,
and I've come to rediscover it.
Like so many lines,
it was built to transport freight from Britain's industrial heartland
to the Cumbrian coast, some 40 miles or so in that direction,
but it's what lies in-between those points that interests me.
They used to call it Lakeland.
Nowadays, we know it as the Lake District.
I'm walking the Penrith to Cockermouth line in Cumbria,
closely following its 31.5 mile stretch,
that passes through some of the most stunning countryside in Britain.
This old branch line is called the CKP, and was opened only for goods
traffic in 1864, carrying minerals like iron ore, lead, and coal,
from the ten major mines operating in
West Cumberland and South Durham.
The line cost much more than anticipated,
and while the mineral traffic wasn't as lucrative as predicted,
the passenger and goods traffic made the CKP profitable.
Penrith Station today sees passenger and freight trains,
but what I want to know is where to pick up the branch line that's been lost.
To help me get along my way, I've come to meet Ken Harper,
who started working here as a youngster in 1965,
and back then, his official job title was Signal Box Lad.
Hello.
How do you do? Thanks for meeting me here.
So, this is where you used to work here?
I worked in the signal box at that end.
So, yes, it was rather exciting at the time.
Was it? Do you remember what it was like? Oh, yeah.
I was learning to be a signalman,
but assisting the signalman at the same time.
You were the learning on the job? Learning on the job.
What've you got here, Ken? This was part of the signalling system.
To ensure that trains didn't meet on a single line, and crash
into each other, the driver had to be in possession of a key token.
So, what would this do then? You handed this to the driver?
The signalman gets that out of the machine in the signal box, with the
agreement of the signalman at the other end, puts it into the pouch,
gives it to the driver of the train, to go onto the single line, and then
as the train goes past, he would hand it to the driver like that.
So then that way, no-one else was allowed onto that section of line. Exactly.
And it was a sackable offence for him to go on the single line without the key.
Well, understandably. I mean, that's a huge safety risk.
Yes, exactly.
Well, if I wanted to start walking the old line,
where do I need to get started?
Right. If you walk across here, then the actual junction from the main
line to the Keswick line is about half a mile that ways.
OK, so I will need to be heading up there,
and then I'm going to be looking to branch out west.
Branches out off to the right, yes. Oh, yeah.
It's a bit overgrown now, but I'm sure you'll spot it there.
I feel like I'm living civilisation behind, then, and heading off into the wilderness.
It's a great unknown, but I'm sure you'll be OK!
And because this is still operated main line,
I've had to take a little detour, out from around the station,
to get back here, but the station is just there.
When the branch line first opened in 1864,
obviously, none of this was here.
All of this was dug out, for the motorway to be built.
Back then, it was just a slow incline out from the station,
and away up into the hills.
This is where I leave the main line out of Penrith.
We'll just start through here.
This has gotta got to be it.
Yes.
That is where the branch line originally split off,
and it is quite a climb out of Penrith.
I'm heading west through Blencow towards Troutbeck.
There's very little left of the old branch line around here.
Sadly, much has been taken back by nature,
used as a public footpath,
or redeveloped for other purposes, like a golf course.
So, trying to follow the path that the railway took is not going
to be an easy task.
A little track here.
I reckon that track's been there a while, because I can see remnants
of some stone there, and all this stuff's just been left here.
This very possibly could be...
I think it is, though. There's little clues here.
Yeah. Look at the shape of this.
To me, that's saying that is the keystone in the top of an
arch bridge.
I reckon this is what's left of a
demolished stone arch railway bridge,
on our line,
which went across this gap here.
There's another clue up there, I think.
You've got what looks like a fairly modern house behind,
from the brickwork.
See this little hut, here?
That is much older brickwork there.
That would have been right alongside the railway itself,
that's some kind of railway maintenance hut, there.
I'm a few miles beyond the old Troutbeck Station,
which has completely vanished.
But what does exist somewhere around here is a lost relic of
Victorian architecture.
Now, what better way to be brought west into true Lake District
landscape than this -
the Mosedale Viaduct.
It's absolutely beautiful.
You're building a railway, you want to keep a straight, flat route,
so unsurprising here in the Lake District,
there are viaducts like this to help keep it as flat as they can.
This is an abandoned piece of Victorian engineering,
that's isolated in the middle of a farmer's field here.
Nobody gets to see it.
It's too beautiful to be lost!
Oh, it's gorgeous.
Look at these brick arches!
I've never seen a bad example of a
Victorian brick, arched railway viaduct.
In the 1990s, the fate of the Mosedale Viaduct hung in the
balance when British Rail decided to demolish it as a defunct
piece of infrastructure, but in 1997,
those plans were abandoned due to considerable pressure from a campaign to reinstate the
Penrith to Keswick line, and personally,
I'm very thankful for that.
Coming to this side of the viaduct,
train passengers would've been faced with the first big peak
of the Lake District along this line - Blencathra.
As I follow the line through this dramatic landscape, I'll find
out just how challenging it was to build a railway through it.
Railways and the Lake District don't combine at all.
I'm 13 miles into my journey on the Penrith to Cockermouth line.
This was one of Britain's most popular branch lines for tourism,
and you can see why.
I've deviated from the track slightly so I can capture my
route from a different perspective.
There it is - Mosedale Viaduct.
And actually, if you use a little bit of imagination,
you can see where the line came through from Penrith,
heading up the valley towards Keswick.
Imagine puffs of steam snaking their way through the valley here.
But I'm not just here for the views.
I'm meeting Steve Birkinshaw,
a man who has an affinity with these surrounding peaks.
Steve holds the world record for running up all 214 of these fells,
in just six days and 13 hours!
Steve! Hello.
Hello! Good to meet you!
Good to see you.
Take a pew, have a rest! Thank you.
How's that? Yeah, great.
What more could you ask for, running on the fells on a day like today?
In my mind, a fell is a hill.
Is it as simple as that? Just another word for it? I think so.
It's a hill in the Lake District.
OK. And fell running is basically running anywhere you like
on these areas.
And how popular is fell running up in these parts?
These parts, it's really popular, yeah.
I guess it's been a part of the culture since Victorian years.
Is that because more and more people were coming in?
Yeah, so people were coming in because of the railways.
They wanted to go walking on the fells, and they needed guides.
And the guides then had races between them to see their
pecking order - see who was the best.
So, it became part of the local shows.
To me, it's just freedom.
I can just run where I want to.
I think you're up amongst the guys who have done the most fells
the fastest, aren't you?
Yes, and I hold the record for going round all 214 Lake District
fells as fast as possible.
Which is how long? Six and a half days.
That's really quick!
Yeah! You must have been exhausted after that.
Well, it took a lot out of me, actually, yeah.
Took two years to recover from that! Goodness me!
Back to full fitness now. And you're back out here? Yeah.
So, where's your route now?
I'm pretty much going straight back down. Are you? Steve, really nice to meet you.
Good to see you, yeah. Thank you very much indeed.
Nice to talk to you. Yeah. Enjoy the rest of your run.
I'm back on the track now, and this section has been re-purposed
as a Lake District Park walkway,
and dotted along it are still some wonderful reminders of the old line.
Old railwayman's hut.
Bit of storage and shelter for the men working out on the line.
At one point, there were 135 under and overbridges between
Penrith and Cockermouth, which tells you just how difficult it
must have been to create a route through this mountainous landscape.
Right.
This looks like it's going to be difficult to get through.
In fact, it says "No Access".
So, it was a matter of time, really, before I was going to come up against something likethis.
This area has suffered some severe floods over the last decade or so,
and as far as I'm aware, a lot of the trail up here was
really quite badly damaged, almost washed away.
So, that's as far as I can go up here.
So, back round and a bit of a detour, I guess.
There's a lot of local campaigning to get this track reinstated
as a railway, so I've arranged to meet park ranger Cath Johnson,
of the Lake District Park Authority,
to find out what this trail means to the local community.
Nice to see you. Yeah. Nice to meet you.
So, this is why I couldn't come across along there. Yes.
So, you can see, there's a very big bridge missing here.
So, December 2015, Storm Desmond hit Cumbria, and this bridge here
was knocked clean off its abutments, and just left as wreckage.
That just happened in a 24-hour period.
So, they were there on Saturday morning, and by Sunday morning, they'd gone.
Goodness me. Yeah.
This was one of the biggest record storms.
Unprecedented levels, historically.
It was just devastation, really.
It must be such a tough time for the community.
Well, the significance of this path was it was just such a jewel
in the crown.
It's a level route, people's children have learned to
cycle on this route, but people with limited mobility as well,
you know, so trampers, all-terrain scooters, wheelchair access.
Cyclists, runners - you name it.
So, the loss was really felt by the community.
Do you think the line here would ever be reinstated as a
railway line, back through here?
Well, it's not within the realms of impossibility that we would
see some sort of transport system using this route in the future,
and that could be anything - you know, something like
driverless pods, in fact, could be seen using the route, probably.
There's a thought! There's a thought!
This possibly could become some kind of futuristic transportation
along this route. Well, it's a possibility.
Tell you what,
I'm going to ponder on that as I continue on my journey, Cath.
Well, thanks very much. OK. Yeah. Nice to meet you.
Driverless pods.
Sounds very Jurassic Park.
While the future is uncertain, we can be sure about the past,
and I'm meeting bridge expert John Mather to find out more
about the man who designed this line,
pioneering engineer, Thomas Bouch.
Mind if I join you here?
This a nice little spot, isn't it? It's absolutely gorgeous.
This is one of Thomas Bouch's original bridges
on the Cockermouth-Keswick-Penrith line.
He designed three railways within Cumbria.
All of them were well-built,
and altogether, he designed over 300 miles of railways,
and some large bridges,
within Northern England and Southern Scotland.
So, let's talk about this particular bridge,
cos this is quite an iconic bridge, really, isn't it? It's a classic.
The inverse bowstring truss bridge.
I mean, it looks a little bit like an arch underneath the bridge.
What's the advantage of having it under rather than over the top?
It makes the bridge more stable, cos the train and carriages
are above the bridge, so the dead load is within the structure.
So, the centre of gravity is lower.
That's right, yeah.
And the actual structure is so light.
It's so slender.
Railways and Lake District don't combine at all.
However, Thomas Bouch was such an ambitious and innovative engineer,
he decided he could do it.
Through force of character and some incredible innovative engineering,
he managed to weave the railway line through some
dreadful mountainous scenery.
Thomas Bouch was, without doubt, an expert engineer.
He was even knighted for his achievements,
but this tale has a sour end.
15 years after he completed the CKP line,
he built the Tay Bridge in Dundee.
The poor materials,
unskilled labour and bad maintenance all led to tragic disaster in 1879.
During a fierce storm, the bridge collapsed while a train was
travelling over it, and 75 people died.
Thomas Bouch was ultimately held responsible.
He died ten months later, with his reputation in tatters.
It's a pity, really,
that he hadn't stopped once he built some of his good bridges.
He's remembered now for all the wrong reasons.
For the Tay Bridge disaster?
Exactly, yeah.
He could've been celebrated and feted for the schemes he did
in Cumbria, I do believe.
Building these lines was bold and ambitious, and I'm keen to
continue on this journey to see more of this old line.
Keswick is a busy market town,
surrounded by mountains like Skiddaw.
The well-preserved station platform reveals more about how the
railways and hotels worked hand-in-hand.
The closer you get... Yeah.
Loads of it still intact.
That whole canopy is exactly the same.
The railway track curves off round to the right.
That's great.
The Keswick Hotel is right behind the station here, purposefully so.
I'm here to meet Bob, who's going to give me a bit more history
about the hotel and the station here in Keswick,
and how much of a hub Keswick was for tourists in the Lake District.
Bob, very, very nice to meet you.
Well, this is lovely, isn't it?
It's a famous spot, this, and the second of January, 1875,
was a red letter day, cos that's the day the first train came...
From Penrith... ..from Penrith...
..here into Keswick.
On to Cockermouth. On to Cockermouth.
And I suppose every schoolchild in Keswick was here - half the town.
An enormous cheer when the train stopped, you know?
Absolutely!
It was a big moment, wasn't it?
It's putting Keswick firmly on the map.
Absolutely.
Was there an element, then,
that the railway was helping to sell the dream of the Lake District?
I'm sure it was, although the initial reason was some
businessmen who wanted to make money, that was the railway
they were thinking of, but the tourism element increased.
That just made it easier for people to get here. It did.
And there were lots of hidden freedoms as well,
which people don't often talk about.
I mean, for example,
you've got a bigger choice of a boyfriend or a girlfriend.
I mean, I'm quite certain that quite a few people used the
railways to have one girlfriend in Keswick, and one in Penrith,
and that made sure they never met, you see?
Yes, it was a real freedom.
So, first of all, then, was upper-class tourists. Yes.
If you take, for example, the design of this platform,
at this far end here there's a big door,
and that goes into this new hotel, and the first-class
passengers could go straight from that without getting wet.
With the canopy over them. Yeah, indeed.
One person who came across was the Kaiser himself, Wilhelm,
and he brought his cars with him -
the Yellow Earl. They were all painted yellow.
And he must have used the railways to get the cars here.
Were there other famous people who stayed here at Keswick?
Well, we know Winston Churchill was here.
The Royals, of course - 1956, the present queen, she was here,
and was photographed in front of, of course, the hotel.
Well, as the railways allows all those early tourists to head
off into the Lake District, I'm going to continue my journey
through as well, Bob.
Thanks very much. Bye-bye now.
This illustrious building, and its adjoining platform,
gives me a snapshot of the exceptional standard of this Victorian route.
And it's no surprise to learn that, as a consequence,
Keswick has retained its reputation as a go-to destination.
But it wasn't just tourists that the railways brought in -
it was industry that put the Lakes on the map.
The railway suddenly arrived, and altered the whole scheme of things.
I'm in the tourist town of Keswick,
walking the old Penrith to Cockermouth line.
I want to take a look at a curious instrument that,
because it was so heavy, relied entirely on the railways for
its transportation and its success.
This is it, is it? This is it.
This is the work of Joseph Richardson,
a local stonemason in this area.
He became very interested in the musical properties of the
Skiddaw stone.
That mountain range, or mountain group...
Skiddaw is the mountain range, and on Skiddaw,
you find hornfel stones, which are what these are.
Ooh, there's a sound!
The hornfel is a metamorphic rock,
and to get the musical stones to actually play,
you need a rock that the grains are really close to one another,
to carry the vibration through the stone.
And so, 1827, Richardson starts playing a little bit with the
stone and becomes completely obsessed.
13 years later, this is the product.
13 years?! 13 years.
Can I have a little... Certainly!
But you have to give it quite a bang.
That sounds beautifully in-tune, I have to say!
Is that what took Richardson so long?
Making sure that the tone was absolutely perfect on all of these stones?
That is the real skill behind what he was doing. Wow.
So, was this quite successful, then, once it was finished?
It was hugely successful.
Joseph Richardson and his son set off on a three-week tour,
and they didn't come back for three years,
travelling all the way through Europe by train.
They'd take this around with them?
Yep. You can imagine the weight of these stones.
Yeah, I know.
I doubt if they had roadies back then, either, helping them out!
Do you think this would've had a bit of a reputation, then, and
people would've been quite excited, "Oh, I've heard about this! We need to go see it!"
Everybody was very excited.
The boys actually went to do a performance at
Buckingham Palace and had to give an encore for it.
Wow.
And I've never heard rocks sound like this before.
Just lovely harmonies there.
Absolutely beautiful.
Thank you so much for showing this to me, Becks. Not a problem.
This is lovely.
I'm leaving Keswick now, and trying to get back onto the old line,
but some parts of it have either completely vanished,
or are totally hidden from view.
I want to make sure I really can find where it went.
Here we go. Keswick.
There's the station, which is behind me, there.
So, from the station it does bend round to the right,
which means, I think, it probably hugged this line through here.
So, I think I need to be back just along these trees.
Here we go.
Whenever you've got a bit that's built up suddenly, like this here,
that says to me "railway embankment".
I'm back on track.
I'm 20 miles along the old line from Penrith to Cockermouth,
tracing the route to the old mining village of Braithwaite
to check out the now defunct Force Crag Mine.
This area was once an industrial landscape,
and the railway at the bottom of the valley in Braithwaite played
a big part in moving all the lead and zinc mined here.
Waiting for me is Ian Tyler,
a man who had the explosive task of blasting the rocks with dynamite.
It's quite a walk, that, Ian!
Aye, it is, isn't it?
LAUGHTER
Good to meet you. Yeah. I made it!
So, this is Force Crag mine?
Well, basically you're looking at Lob's Mill,
which was the first real, properly-constructed workplace.
What minerals were coming out of the hillside here?
Lead, zinc, and barite.
Well, part of the challenge here must have always been getting the
mineral from the mine here,
to export it out to where it could be sold and be useful.
Yeah. We got the mineral, but we couldn't get it away!
It was difficult.
Well, it is quite isolated up here, isn't it? Yep.
We've got a two-mile road, which you've enjoyed walking this morning.
I have. I have.
The railway suddenly arrived and altered the whole scheme of things.
Now, we've got access to heavy carriage and moving things away.
Before, it was a horse and cart.
Well, where are you going to go with a horse and cart?
You know, one cart only carries a tonne, tonne and a quarter.
So, when the railways did arrive here, Braithwaite was the
station where all this mineral would be loaded, would it?
Yeah. But along with mines all around, as well. Yeah.
Just in this valley, there were ten major mines and quarries, you know?
So, this was a real industrial landscape.
There's some lovely machinery behind us here, now.
I imagine there's quite a bit more to see down below, is there?
Absolutely, yeah. The mill is completely full.
I'd love to go and see it if we can, yeah. Off we go.
Careful down here. Yep, thank you.
This is all... Just give me your arm. I've got you.
I've got you. Aye, you're a good man.
I can feel the strength in that.
Whoa!
It's beautifully tranquil and peaceful here at the moment.
But back when those mines were operating,
I imagine it was really quite different.
Absolutely.
Oh, that's great, all of this, Ian.
Here we go!
I just need a second to take all of this in, Ian.
There's a lot of it in one place.
It's quite cramped in here, isn't it?
Yeah, and noisy.
Oh! The mill, then, was all about, what?
Crushing and processing what was coming out of the mine?
And separating the minerals from the rock.
OK. That's... All we're doing is making it into proper,
workable mineral to leave to go to the railway.
So, you would have lead, you'd have barite, and zinc. That's it.
I was happy to be given the full tour through this wonderfully
preserved mill, and I can tell Ian misses the days of blowing up
rocks in the mines here.
Enjoy your walk back down the road.
I will. Don't get lost.
You've given me so much enjoyment, seeing all this, Ian.
Thank you very much indeed.
And now, I'm getting back on track, and heading over to
Braithwaite so I can see where all those minerals were loaded up.
As a tourist coming to Lake District today,
to enjoy picturesque walks, and this famous scenery,
it's easy to ignore the fact that, for centuries,
tourists coming here would have experienced heavy industry as
part of this landscape from the likes of the Force Crag Mine.
Just look and listen at how quiet it is here now.
But just here...
..is the old Braithwaite Station -
what has now been converted into this picture-perfect cottage.
It's private property, so I've been given special access.
But look, you can see the edge of the platform, right here,
and this is where all the minerals from the mines in the
surrounding valleys here would have been delivered and consolidated,
to be loaded onto heavy freight trains,
to be taken off around the country for further processing.
It is a world away from what we've got here now.
But it's a really important part of this area's history.
I'm three-quarters of the way into my journey now,
and heading to my first taste of what this region is renowned for -
stunning lakeside views.
There are 16 bodies of water in this region,
but only one of them is traditionally called a lake.
Lake Bassenthwaite is the fourth largest in the country.
In 1965, construction started on one of the main east to west coast roads
in the north of England - the A66.
It's this road just beside me here.
Now, the railways often took the most efficient route through
the landscape, and so when the old CKP line closed down in 1966,
it was the obvious choice to build a road following the same route.
In fact, for much of its length through the Lake District,
the A66 is built right on top of the old CKP line,
including this stretch here,
alongside the stunning Bassenthwaite Lake.
The rapid growth in car ownership in the 1960s meant road networks
were being extended all over Britain.
People were swapping train journeys for car journeys at an
alarming rate.
The railways were suffering a dramatic drop in passenger use,
and the way to stem the huge losses was for the axe to fall on
over 50% of the stations across the network.
It simply wasn't profitable to run routes like this any more.
Following this old track bed, I'm hoping to find a lost relic
of the old railway, but 52 years on since this line was closed,
you never know if any of it will still exist.
That's the thing with these old railway lines - sometimes it is a nice, smooth path,
other times, you have to work a little bit harder to find the route.
You can't get away from the fact that I'm right alongside the
busy A66 here.
Cars, vans, lorries continuously streaming past.
Now somewhere up here, I'm expecting to find Bassenthwaite Station.
I've seen some photos of it, but I've no idea what state it's
going to be in now, or if it's there at all.
It could've been completely ripped down and demolished,
but that's all part of the fun.
It's part of the adventure.
This is man-made.
That's not natural.
That is...big old stone bricks.
That's platform, maybe?
Embankment?
Let's have a look, confirm that... Ooh, yeah. Ugh.
Confirm that in a sec. This is great.
This is old railway archaeology through here!
So, this is the station,
and that little brick wall that's now sunk into the ground there,
I reckon would've been the edge of the platform, so the railway would
have been down there, dug out.
I'm so pleased there's something left.
Let's see if I can compare this against how it was when there
was a railway here.
Do you know what? It is actually from roughly here.
You've got the two windows just down the end there.
You've got this row of maybe five or six windows just in here,
and this gable sticks out.
This is excellent!
This is exactly it.
These are the little surprises that I absolutely love finding
along the route here, cos they are genuine surprises.
When you do find any kind of remnants, it's nice,
it's special, and it kind of brings the line back to life for you.
You've got to do your work, you know,
you've got to put your homework in and a bit of physical work
to get here as well, but it's so worth it.
Swapping the railway bed for the roads, I'll finish the final
leg of my journey in the same style as the wealthy Victorian tourists.
This is magic! Woo-hoo-hoo!
I'm nearing the end of my walk along
the Penrith to Cockermouth line in Cumbria,
which cuts through 31 miles of the most stunning Lake District scenery.
I've arrived in Cockermouth,
on the western edge of the Lake District National Park.
Now, freight trains would've continued another eight miles
or so out to the coast, but for most tourists,
this was the end of the line, which is rather apt, really,
because the man who encouraged many of those early tourists to
come to the Lakes in the first place actually came from here.
Cockermouth is an ancient market town
where romantic poet William Wordsworth was born,
and spent his young adult life.
He brought the wonders of the Lake District into the hearts and
minds of people everywhere.
He even published a guide-book for the Lakes in 1820.
Now, this little book was undoubtedly responsible for
the early influx of tourists to the area.
All right. With the line running through here,
this is where Cockermouth Station once was.
I mean, there's very little, if any sign at all of it here now,
but the trains would have come in here from Penrith,
and then headed off towards Workington in that direction.
And the main reason so many tourists ventured as far as this is
because by the 20th century, the station here had been
cleverly renamed "Cockermouth for Buttermere."
Buttermere has always been one of the most revered lakes in the
whole of the Lake District, so to follow in the footsteps of
those Victorian tourists, that's where I'm headed now.
Buttermere is the unspoilt jewel in the crown of the Lake District,
but it's ten miles away from where I am here in Cockermouth.
Now, there was no railway to Buttermere, so,
much like the tourists back in the 1920s and '30s might've done,
I'm going to indulge in some new-fangled motor transport.
This is beautiful, isn't it?
Yeah. 1925 Humber 12/25.
But this is exactly the type of vehicle that tourists coming
up to the Lakes might have gone in to take their day trips? Yeah.
It's not always as nice as today, but we have got...
Oh, is this for me? Yep.
Oh, yes, please!
Have a jacket to keep you warm.
That's made-to-measure, that, Chris! Lovely. Look at that!
Take us away, Ken!
So, hand-signals to indicate?
Yeah. Everyone was used to that.
We'd better just help everyone else on the roads are really used to it now!
Well, yes, but I think they're looking at us,
cos, you know, we've got some style to us. We do!
I guess this is what it would've been seen as back then as well -
travelling in style, this!
Yeah, and this is for your richer traveller.
Was it quite an established day trip, then, for tourists
coming in on the train to get a car from Cockermouth to Buttermere?
Yeah, they would've advertised.
And you'd write a letter ahead, booking your place...
OK, so well ahead! Yeah.
When you arrive on the train, the man's there waiting for you
to take you on your day trip.
So, was this kind of day trip, and I guess access
out into these more remote areas of the Lakes,
the reserve of the rich and the affluent few?
No, they had charabancs - ten or 12 people, squeeze them in.
Those charabancs would have been, kind of middle classes,
probably, being able to afford that.
Unfortunately, the poor working classes just don't have that money
to get out and about as much, unless you wanted to walk.
If you can get the train to all those different train
stations you've been stopping at, you could walk from one to the next.
Hi. It makes people smile when it goes by, doesn't it?
Everyone loves this!
Look at this!
This is why people wanted to get out of Cockermouth
and come and see this, you know?
I guess the motor car allowed you to do that.
Yeah, and quicker than a horse would have done. Of course.
This is magic!
Woo-hoo-hoo!
Amazing. Amazing.
The tranquil surroundings of Buttermere are simply breathtaking.
You can see why poets and writers have been attracted to this
place for over 100 years.
It's off the beaten track from the railways, but without them,
many people would have never got to discover this unspoilt,
natural beauty.
One of the Lakes' most famous writers is Alfred Wainwright.
He produced seven pictorial guide books on the Lakes that are
still a go-to guide for tourists today.
To tell me more about the man is Chris Jesty,
who's been on a mission to retrace every path and fell
that Wainwright ever documented.
How much time did it take you to do the lot?
Ten years and three weeks. Wow.
It was from 2003 to 2013.
Wainwright picked out 214 fells.
You have re-walked every possible route?
Yes, every route,
and every path that was shown on the original - I've walked them.
It sounds like an incredible amount of work that you undertook.
Oh, well, you must remember I did nothing else for ten years. Mm.
Was it an enjoyable experience?
Oh, very. Yes.
You know, a lot of people say, oh,
they'd like to live on a farm or something.
But at a farm, you see the same scenery every day,
but I see different scenery every day.
How did you come to be so involved in Wainwright's world?
I first suggested to revise the books, I think,
in about 1980,
and he said he didn't want it done until after his death,
and that was in 1991.
And Haystacks was the place that he chose to have his ashes
scattered when he died, because he thought that was the most
interesting of all the Lakelands' summit areas.
That was his favourite, then, was it? It was, yes.
It's more interesting than some others.
And lot of the mounts there's just nothing there at all.
This makes me feel like I need to go and experience it somewhat myself.
Yes. Chris, thank you very much for meeting me down here.
The surroundings are just wonderful, aren't they?
Oh, it's been a pleasure.
And that's where I'm heading.
The Lakes simply do not cease to impress...and inspire.
There it is, look.
Wainwright's favourite fell here in the Lake District - Haystacks.
It is a fair way up, but it's got to be done.
The Lake District is undoubtedly one of Britain's most distinct
and popular places to visit.
It has been for centuries.
Before the railway, the upper class came by horse-drawn transportation,
and so the arrival of the CKP line revolutionised the
tourism industry here, bringing more people, and not just the elite.
Now that the railway has gone,
it's the motor car giving access to all this, to all people.
So, whilst how tourists have arrived has shifted over time,
why they come here has never changed,
and I don't think there's any more I need say to explain that.
Next time, I'll see why the lost Somerset and Dorset line
brought financiers to their knees...
It was this thick, boggy marshland.
I'll make an unexpected discovery in a lost world...
Oh, my goodness me!
The labour intensity, along with the cash, would have been phenomenal.
..and I'll learn that cutting costs can cost lives.
It killed people?
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