Urban Adventures

Living, as we do, in the Lake District, people tend to assume that we’re rural fanatics. And it’s true that we’ve made a conscious choice to move to the country and embrace a simpler way of life.

But we value our urban adventures too. In fact, we love them. And the greater the contrast with our base here in Keswick, the better. In Cumbria, each village or town may have its own flavour. However, the general look and feel of the place – stonework, scale, foliage – remains the same.

That’s why we love visiting London. We’re always struck by the sheer variety of areas packed tightly together. In London, you can hop on a tube and it pops you out into a different village each time. Perhaps one becomes dulled to this day after day when braving rush-hour crowds. However, we always marvel at the contrast of vintage shops and retro cafes in Angel, the anarchic sprawl of Camden, and the sophisticated delis of Marylebone High Street.


Camden High Street
Photo courtesy of bortescristian

We designed our bags for city use as much as rural adventures. Spilling out of the Intercity train onto the platform from Euston, we always have a mass of papers, i-Pods, clothes and refreshments with us. There’s nothing like a generous shoulder bag or Gladstone bag to carry these things.

We’re also always hit by the information overload coming at us from all angles at Euston Station. Messages on billboards, buses, taxis, shop windows, in free newspapers. No wonder when one looks around that most Londoners march head-down, determined to resist distraction.

It’s probably always been this way for a person going from the countryside to the heart of a city. It must have felt like that for anyone travelling from rural outskirts into the centre of one of our favourite cities – Marrakech.


Photo courtesy of roblisameehan

Pride of place by night is the great central square – Djemma el Fna. Under cover of dark, it transforms into one of the great contemporary wonders of the world – a steaming, aromatic medieval bazaar filled with food stalls, henna painters, acrobats, quack doctors, and performers.


Djemaa el Fna - story tellers

Photo courtesy of Ahron de Leeuw

Worthy of a painting by Hieronymus Bosch, the bazaar feels like something out of the Dark Ages. We have also sometimes felt like we’re wandering through a movie set. Only the sores on that beggar over there are real. This quack doctor has a real monkey’s head in his jar. That contortionist truly is wrapping his feet around the back of his neck.

So love our rural retreat as we do, we can’t do without our urban adventures in London, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow and Edinburgh, and further afield. The souk in Marrakech, the great cafés in Amsterdam, Barcelona’s curvaceous, Gaudi-inspired architecture, Rome’s dense layers of history, the islands around Stockholm, and the avenues and underground of Moscow – these will remain perennial favourites with us.

The landscape, history and people of Keswick remain our home. But we need our city fix from time to time.