Childhood memories

Family activity in the Lake District.
Coniston, January 2012.

How early do childhood memories form? I have two memories which I have always thought of as my earliest. First, crawling around on a blue and orange patterned seventies carpet in an open plan living room; second, sitting on the kitchen counter every day asking my mum to make cucumber sandwiches for lunch.  Unfortunately both memories are almost certainly false.  Where did these memories come from? I have no idea.  I also recall being sick in my pushchair on an early holiday in the UK (spaghetti bolognese).  Do I really remember this, or have I been told about it? How many of our childhood memories actually come from photographs? I like to think I have a memory of sitting on my potty in the middle of a field whilst camping in the lake district aged one and a bit.  I couldn’t possibly have remembered this, and I suspect I’ve seen a photograph of the scene.  

I definitely do remember childhood trips to the Coniston in the Lake District from about the age of four.  Sleeping in an orange Vango Force Ten tent, playing in the stream at Hoathwaite Farm, clambering over piles of felled logs with Jonathan Quayle wearing canoeing helmets, sun-baked walks up the Old Man of Coniston.  Later on, orienteering in Torver Woods, capsizing Topper sailing boats on the lake, looking longingly at brightly coloured GoreTex jackets in Summitreks outdoor clothing shop. 

I have been revisiting some childhood memories this past week, with a trip to Coniston in the south Lakes.  Anita, Lara and I holed up in a teeny tiny cottage perched on a terrace high up with views of the village and lake.  It was a stunning location and the cottage was perfect - cosy rooms, an open fire and beautiful views from the windows.  At least the views were beautiful when we got them - the weather was almost continually terrible. Gales, rain, black skies and hail just some of the delights on offer.  We didn’t really manage the long country walks I imagined us taking together, although we did manage the long evenings lazing in front of the fire, which provided ample compensation.  We visited Coniston and Ambleside (complete with obligatory wander around Gaynor sports) and spent an afternoon at the UK’s biggest climbing wall in Kendal. We walked up to the old Coniston coppermines, around Torver Woods, and along the old Walna Scar road.  Lara has really taken to her new mode of transportation - her MacPac papoose (complete with rain cover); and will happily perch on my back for hours with a smile on her face, even as her little cheeks turn pink from the wind.  I’m sorry to say that she hasn’t yet managed her first trip up the Old man of Coniston - we turned back half way due to the weather being just too terrible even for her daddy’s levels of enthusiasm (as the saying goes: if you can’t see the Old Man its raining; if you can see the Old Man its going to rain. We saw it once, when the clouds parted briefly to reveal it covered in snow). There’s always next year. 

I love being in the Lake District.  I love everything about it: the mountains, the scenery, the walking, the smell of open fires in the evening, the atmosphere in the pubs, even the terrible weather.  I think partly I love it because it reminds me of my childhood. Whilst I spent only one or two weeks a year in the lakes as a child, my most vivid, colourful and adventurous memories are of this place.  At ten months I know Lara is too young to form her own memories of this trip, but I secretly hope that deep down a subliminal affinity with the Lake District - or at least the feeling of being outside in the mountains, whether in sun, wind or rain - is forming somewhere inside.  I can’t wait to bring her back here again, and it is exciting to think that soon enough she will start to remember.  What is most exciting of all is having a new friend to share it with.