The Bowder Stone

The Lake District cannot compete with the scale of some of the world famous natural wonders.  It's a relatively small area of North West England that takes about an hour to drive across.  What is unique about the Lake District is the Victorian Follies: the little plaques, memorials, buildings and other odd objects that wealthy people created, seemingly to mark the beauty of, or a special attachment to, a particular area.  If you could apply the phrase, "They'd never get away with that now, the whole area is protected." you are probably looking at such a folly.

The Bowder Stone is a big stone in Borrowdale with a ladder up it.

The whole area is popular with climbers.  If you park at the Bowder Stone car park, you can often see climbers on the crags around King's How.

The Bowder Stone itself is also a popular bouldering spot.  You can see in the pictures the white marks where climbers have put talc on their fingers to allow them to grip better.

The stone is estimated to be 30ft high and weigh 2000 tons.  There is a very small gap at the bottom where it is possible to reach your hand through and shake hands with somebody on the other side of the stone.  It was a bit muddy on the day we visited so we didn't try this.  The gap is just to the left of me in the picture on the left.

Hannah thought the whole thing was great.  I was unsure how she would react to the height thing.  She climbed the ladder, got to the top and then needed a piggy back down.  Her mother asked her if it was too high and she said that it was, then she shot back up the ladder again (and needed a piggy back down again).

 

up on top

The Bowder Stone is located at NY 255164