NHS Hip Replacement - The Acid Test

It's almost exactly three months since I was discharged from hospital with my shiny new hip and every week my leg has felt a little bit stronger and my limp has become a little less pronounced. So, as we are in the Lake District - the walkers' paradise, we felt that it was time to put it to a real test and go for a walk in the country.

So here we were at Derwent Water, before the early morning mist had fully cleared, ready to take the launch to the other end of the lake and walk back. The weather smiled kindly on us and by eleven o'clock we had disembarked at Lodor and were heading into the the lakeland wilderness - well, not quite, as, at five past eleven we came upon the Lodor Falls Hotel which proclaimed that ramblers were welcome (providing that boots were left at the door) and five minutes later we were sitting by a roaring fire in our stockinged feet sipping coffee and sampling their home made biscuits - this rambling is thirsty work I'll have you know.

The sun shone, the sky was blue and it was a perfect day to take the hip for a test run. The walk is not exactly strenuous. It carves a scar wide enough for four people across the landscape and even today in early March there was a fair amount of mostly retiree traffic ambling along it's length.We imagine that at weekends and in the summer it will be jam packed with walkers but today there were few enough for us to sometimes wander lonely as the metaphorical cloud.

I took a few shots along the way using the iPhone and I have to say that I am very impressed with the quality for a phone.

The lake was millpond calm throughout the day and we arrived back in Keswick by 3.15 after another brief stop in a cafe for a pot of tea. Although I was fairly tired after the walk, which was, I believe, about six miles, the hip stood up to the test and I got back to the car without any pain. 

The sky was darkening a little by then but the rain held off making it a pretty perfect day. I even found time for a bit of metal detecting when we got back to the cottage and I found this. No idea what it is. I doubt that it is particularly old but answers on a postcard please (or just email me if you like).