One of the good things about being back in the UK is the number of gigs that we can get to. This one was at the Theatre on the Lake in Keswick and a two-night trip worked very well for fitting in a couple of walks and, with the lighter nights, an evening fixture in the fourth division of the Westmoreland League. That’s the eighteenth tier of the English pyramid.
The gig was Our Man in the Field. We’ve seen him a couple of times before and he was better on both previous occasions. The sound was poor early on and I thought his new songs a bit dull. With the venue being a theatre, there was an interval for consuming those little tubs of ice cream and about a third of the thirty or so people in the crowd didn’t return to their seats afterwards.
The walks went well. On the first day we took the circular route around Derwentwater, a route where you’d think that it would be difficult to get lost. We missed a turn towards the end though and extended our day from a planned ten to an eventual eleven miles.
The highlight was feeding a duck from my hand. I like it when a bird is trusting enough to do that. It had a more solid peck than the crow that I’d fed in a similar way the previous week.
On the second day we took a path towards Cockshot Wood, intending to just do an out and back walk of a similar distance. However, the path looped around towards the lake, and we ended up retracing some of the previous day’s route, albeit in the opposite direction. It was good to have walked on consecutive days and a total of seventeen miles will have boosted the step count average.
The game was just outside of Langwathby, on the outskirts of Penrith and an easy enough half-hour drive from Keswick. The Tollbar ground had a couple of pitches and a cricket field. I arrived to find the car park full and joined those parked along the hedgerow of the road outside.
From what I understand, Langwathby United broke away from Eden Valley Reserves in the summer. They’ve done well for a new club, sitting towards the top end of the division. Maybe they took all the decent players with them as Eden Valley Reserves were bottom of the table with just a single point from their sixteen matches to date.
I got chatting with a fella who pointed out a not-so-secret World War 2 bunker amongst some nearby farm buildings. Apparently, a tank was hidden there in case of an invasion and was intended to either defend or blow-up a nearby bridge depending on how the fighting was going. He knew a few of the players and he picked up on his conversations with them on village events whenever play brought them back to our section of the touchline.
There were a couple of early goals. Eden Valley went one up through a defensive error and then promptly equalised with a finish that I managed to snap as it went in. The visitors regained the lead after some further slack defending and went in at the break with a two-one lead.
There were some harsh words in the Langwathby half-time huddle, and they were better in the second-half, managing to equalise. Eden Valley held on for the draw though and doubled their points total for the season.
Tags: Derwentwater, Langwathby United, Our Man in the Field, Secret tank bunker
Trail of the Lion King 
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