The Kentmere Hydro Trust is harnessing the power of the River Kent
in South East Lakeland part of the Lake District National Park, in order
to make its own hydro electric power. Since the place looks like a mini
Switzerland, but is very desolate and in parts isolated, that seems
like a good idea.
When I was a child, myself and family would
occasionally stay at my aunt's house at Hallow Bank, Kentmere, near
Kendal, or at neighbouring Fold Howe, a house just across the way from
Hallow Bank. Actually, her house was in a small hamlet up a private road
which was really more like a dirt track. The road up there from
Staveley runs for about four miles and is very narrow in parts.
Kentmere
village is about one and a half miles from Hallow Bank and it has a
church there I am sure it used to have some kind of post office but this
will have long gone I think. The Eagle and Child pub in Staveley was
near a playground and the River Kent rushed along neaby. There was
apparently one part of the River Kent in which it was possible for
adults to swin but you had to know exactly where it was as some areas of
the river were dangerous. Another feature was the nearby pinewood and a
stream called The Dolly Tub which was an area forming a small pool
where it was possible to actually sit on rocks in the water if it was
warm weather.
Originally my aunt's house had a generator for
electricity and there was only enough power to use during the day. At
night the house was lit by oil lamps and I was always dubious when the
lamps were brought out of the lamp cupboard in the evening as I hated
the smell of them when lit. My aunt and uncle had no TV in their house
but there were lots of interesting things to do, it was such a beautiful
place.
The postman would bring the mail in a 'Postman Pat' type
van and we used to walk up to Dickinson's farm nearby, carrying a small
milk churn and bring home milk straight from the cows. Sometimes the
milk was warm and had a few black specks in it and yes it was probably
not a good idea to drink untreated milk, but we used to put it on the
cornflakes back then and my aunt would cyphon it into milk bottles and
put her own coloured stoppers on them. She also made her own cider from
apples growing in her orchard.
From one of the kitchen windows it
was possible to see a snow capped mountain with a small stream running
down it (you could see the stream if you used binoculars). The kitchen
was very homely with red and white striped curtains, a Raeburn cooker
and a sort of calendar written in German with an owl on it, next to a
barometer. In large walnut style glass fronted cupboards my aunt kept
pewter goblets and ancient crockery from times long past. Dinah, my
aunt's faithful golden labrador, would lay contentedly on her blanket in
the kitchen.
