shewhomust | The hills in their summer plumage

We should get out more. And we have various ideas about that, none of which seemed ideally suiteble for a Bank Holiday weekend. But we were fed up with not getting out at all. Then

durham_rambler pointed out that it is a long time since we have seen the heather moorland in bloom. So that's what we did.

There's a point on the Waskerley Way where there was once a tearoom, catering for passing cyclists (the C2C cycle route also goes this way). The photo shows the tearoom - the old Parkhead Station - in the distance. We had never visited it,and it might or might not still be in business, but it gave us a point of access to the line, with car parking, and a scenic drive up the dale and over the moors to get there. The tearoom was closed - and indeed for sale - but here's the entry point to the railway walk:

It stands for 'Stockton & Darlington Railway' of course - but you knew that.

We didn't walk far: but far enough to take a side path for a better view of the Waskerley reservoir, looking very thirsty:

But it's all about the heather:

On the way home we called at the charity shop in Wolsingham, and bought a heap of books. We thought of going to the Bradley Burn farm shop for lunch, but there was some sort of holiday event going on there - a sale of some sort, which at another time might have appealed, it was very busy and we were looking for lunch, so instead we went to the café on the A68. This would have been well placed to drop in on J., but she wasn't in, so we came home.