A List of Adventures!

Looking for somewhere a bit more unusual to take your four legged friends? It can be difficult scrawling through web pages trying to look for dog policies in places that someone somewhere has obscurely mentioned may be dog friendly, so to save everyone time, I've put together all of Missy's adventures into a list (broken by region) to hopefully save everyone else a little stress.

Missy out ghost hunting at the abandoned asylum!

Please share any suggestions of places we've yet to discover ourselves across the UK - Missy is always on the lookout for new adventures!

Scotland:

Edinburgh and the Lothians:

Walks:
Beecraigs Country Park
Antonine Wall/Falkirk Wheel
Bangour Village Hospital (abandoned asylum)
Union Canal (Ratho - Edinburgh)
Hermand Beechwood
Cramond Island
Cairns Castle
Pentlands
Cammo Estate
Korean War Memorial and Witchcraig Woods

Attractions:
Camera Obscura and World of Illusion
Summerhall Gallery
Almond Valley Heritage Centre
National Museum of Flight
Muiravonside Country Park
Bo'Ness and Kinneil Railway
Scottish Seabird Centre

Historic Scotland Sites:
Cairnpapple
Blackness Castle
Craigmillar Castle
Linlithgow Palace
Crichton Castle
Tantallon Castle (revisit)
Dirleton Castle and Gardens (revisit)
Dunfermline Abbey and Palace
Craignethan Castle
Thistle Knights Tours (Edinburgh Ghost Walk)


Events:
Bathgate Highland Games
Linlithgow Jousting
Siege on the Forth
Edinburgh Kiltwalk
Arthurs Ambles
Prepare to give Fire!
Dalkeith Show
40s/50s day @ Bo'Ness Railway

Kingdom of Fife:

Walks:

St Andrews Beach

Attractions:

Historic Scotland Sites:

Arbroath Abbey

St Marys
Ravenscraig Castle

Glasgow, Clyde and Ayrshire:

Walks:

Attractions:

New Lanark 

Glasgow Botanical Gardens

Historic Scotland Sites:

Bothwell Castle
Craignethan Castle

Perth, Kinross and Angus:

Walks:
Killiecrankie

Attractions:

Historic Scotland Sites:

Huntingtower Castle (dogs not permitted in buildings)

Bothwell Castle (revisit)

Events:
Perthshire Highland Games

Central and West:

Walks:

Attractions:

Loch Katrine Lake Cruise

Inverary Jail

Historic Scotland Sites:

Inchmahome Priory (revisited)

Castle Campbell and Gardens

Dumfries and Galloway:

Walks:

Attractions:
Crawick Multiverse

Historic Scotland Sites:

Caerlaverock Castle
Jedburgh Abbey
Dryburgh Abbey
Sweetheart Abbey
Lochmaben

North and Grampian:

Walks:
Culloden (dogs must be kept on leads)

Attractions:
Landmark Adventure Park
Jacobite Cruise Loch Ness
Dunnator Castle

Historic Scotland Sites:

Kildrummy Castle

Glenbuchat Castle

Corgarff Castles (dogs not permitted in buildings)
Fort George (dogs not permitted in buildings)
Clava Cairns

National Trust Sites:
Crathes Castle (dogs not permitted inside)

England:

Greater Manchester:

Walks:

Attractions:

Stockley Farm

White Peak Alpacas

East Lancashire Railway

Events:

Heald Green Festival

The Lakes:

Walks:
Grizedale Forest
Whinlatter Forest

Attractions:

Pencil Museum

Puzzling Place

Windermere Lake Cruises

Laurel and Hardy Museum

Stott Bobbin Mill

Lakeside Motor Museum

Haverwaithe Railway

Old Hall Farm

If you've found somewhere fun to go through this blog, Missy and I would love to hear about it - please let us know and share your travels with us!

Lake District

So that's us not long back from our week away in the  - I've posted before about how wonderfully dog friendly the area is and we were not disappointed a second time!

I wont witter away for too long, so here are the highlights!

Our first port of call was in Ulverston (about 40 minutes from where we were staying) to the Laurel and Hardy Museum. Its completely dog friendly and goes over the life of Stan Laurel who was born in the village. There is a little bit about Hardy too and there is a cinema screen constantly playing the movies. The chap who runs the place (his grandfather founded it) was very chatty and full of interesting facts. A definite recommend! 

We then went to the nearby Buddhist temple and took Missy on a nice walk along the 'beach'. We had planned on stopping at the Stott Bobbin Mill, but fortunately I noticed when putting in the postcode that as it was off-season, it happened to be shut the Tuesday.

Wednesday we did a cruise with Windermere Lake Cruises and did the green walkers route, which picked us up at Brockhole, took us to Ambleside (we found an amazing pet shop there and got Missy a new collar and a lovely tea shop) and then to Wray Castle. We had planned on walking out to the newly built view point but hadn't realised it would be a 6 mile round walk (next time we'll do it!). We had a theatre show booked for the evening, so instead did a 3 mile walk to a lovely old barn house that was another viewpoint. 

The show that we saw was "Meeting Mrs Bea" at the recently built Old Laundry House theatre. It was about Beatrix Potters later years as Mrs Helis when she had become an accomplished sheep farmer and had given up on writing stories - I wont say more than that, but if it tours by, or you can find the original radio play its based on, its well worth a watch.

Thursday was a busy day! We started out by hunting down the locally infamous orange sheep and enjoying a walk around Troutbeck which is were we were based for the holiday. The sheep did not disappoint and are much more orange in real life than either photo or video shows!

We then took Missy out on a row boat and, whilst unsure at first, she quickly settled into it all, even risking a damp nose and peeking into the water a few times! Whilst Missy is an incredibly strong swimmer, she stoically makes a beeline to shore and does not enjoy the experience in the slightest , so we had no worry or concern that she would jump into the lake (living by a river that flows very strongly after rain, we did test that she could in fact swim not long after getting her, whilst she would allow me to carry her into the water, she did not venture in on her own free will!).

Our last day was going home through Keswick. The Pencil Museum was sadly closed for refurbishment, but we found some nice shops and a lovely little cafe to enjoy our last day in.

Its now Sunday and Missy is still quite tired from her adventures, and we're already planning the next one! Till next time!

Windermere Lake Cruises

Windermere Lake Cruises

Place Name: Windermere Lake Cruises

Location: Various around Lake Windermere

Cost: Varies depending on cruise type

Parking: various pay and display car parks - information is well provided on website

Time Required: 45 minutes to all day

Restrictions: Dogs to be kept on leads and not allowed on the furniture.

Refreshments: There is a small bar on most boats that does tea/coffee and alcoholic drinks

Website:  https://www.windermere-lakecruises.co.uk/

As you can expect with a name like Windermere Cruises, the attraction here was going out on either a launch boat or a steam boat on the lake. The company offers a variety of packages depending on where you sail from, how long you want to stay on the boat and whether you want to do a walk around Wray Castle as part of their seasonal walking cruise. The larger trips use the steamer, the smaller ones use the wooden launch boats.

The plan from day one had been to do one of the cruises on the lake, but like all great plans, other things came up and instead of a full day on the lake we only had time to fit in the 45minute Island Tour. With Missy being prone to the odd bout of travel sickness, it also made sense to just do a small ride just in case. The Island tour sails in and out of the Bowness harbour every half hour. The location allows for plenty of ice cream, duck feeding and strolls along the shore line before going onto the tour, and if you're up for it, more of the same once your back off the boat.

Once we'd bought our ticket (dogs go on free) we simply strolled onto the boat. The staff made no complaint to us sitting downstairs in the shelter on the nice soft chairs (Missy on the carpet) and had no problem with us all going onto the more exposed top level during the tour. The weather was fortunate enough that we stayed up top most of the time, but it's good to know that had the elements turned against us, we could all huddle downstairs together.

The boat set off and we had a guided tour of the different islands - it was interesting to see that one had simply eroded down to a single tree whilst others had been the film set to Swallows and Amazons whilst the largest was privately owned with its own house and everything! The only real complaint to be had was that the information was quite brief and the guidebook we had purchased covered all the tours so the information on just the islands was a touch sparse.

Missy stole the show as usual and we got a lot of compliments on how well behaved she was - truth be told not a lot phases her and she really does take new and odd surroundings in her stride. She thankfully didn't suffer any travel sickness and strolled quite calmly off the boat with us.

And yes, we did go back and have a second ice cream on our stroll along the shore line!

Overall rating : 4.5/5 - Timetables and maps were a touch confusing to figure out, but the staff were great with us. Great fun and a novel way to get about if you have a whole day to do it.

That's the last of the Lake District reviews for now, we hope to get back down again soon, but in the meantime please feel free to let me know any recommendations in the Scotland area!

attraction, Cumbria, dog, dog friendly, Dog walking, England, Windermere lake cruises, Lake District, missy, pet

Keswick - Pencil Museum and Puzzling Place

Place Name: Pencil Museum

Location: Keswick, England, CA12 5NG

Cost: Adults £4.50, Kids £3.50

Parking: Pay and display carpark to rear of building; £4 for all day

Time needed: hour to hour and a half

Restrictions: Must be on lead. If there is a demonstration on, dogs are not permitted in the cafe area but there is spaces to eat outside.

Refreshments: Cafe inside the gift shop area

Website:  http://www.pencilmuseum.co.uk/

The Pencil Museum was originally on the to-do list as a bit of a joke. One of the first places we found that allowed dogs inside, we simply had to take Missy and find out just how ridiculously twee the place would be...

The Pencil museum is well sign posted and easy to find. The car park gives you all day parking for £4, and that comes with a £1.50 off entry voucher, so we didn't begrudge that, especially as we'd already made plans to be spending the day in Keswick so the parking suited.  We had decided that we were going to stop for lunch first, so were a little caught out that due to the demonstration, Missy wasn't allowed into the cafe area (there's a small additional room that they are normally allowed in). There was plenty of outside sitting, so we braved the chill and ate out, though in hindsight there was a million dog friendly cafes and pubs barely five minutes away, so we should have just looked elsewhere.

We were pleasantly surprised within the museum - if anything, if wasn't big enough! There was a history on pencils and graphite in general, a section about the spy pencils from WW2, machinery and videos explaining how pencils are made and even tiny pencil lead sculptures! The floors were all carpeted so Missy was quite happy to lie down whilst we watched the videos.

The strangest thing for us was that no one batted an eyelid with having Missy in with us! She had a tremendous fuss made over her by the staff in the gift shop, bu other than that we were left to our own devices.

Overall rating : 5/5 - Surprisingly interesting and informative, staff were absolutely brilliant and really pleased to see us.

I now have a sausage dog!

Puzzling Place

Place Name: Puzzling Place

Location: Keswick, England, CA12 5DZ

Cost: Adults £3.75, Kids £2.90

Parking: A short walk from the Pencil Museum car park (£4 all day pay and display)

Time Required: 1 hour

Restrictions: None.

Refreshments: None.

Website:  http://www.puzzlingplace.co.uk/

This was a quick stop for after the Pencil Museum and the hubby particularly likes his puzzles and optical illusions. It was a short walk from where we'd parked which was ideal for us and was relatively well sign posted.

Up a flight of stairs and we entered a small shop before paying to go into the main attraction. For less than £4 it had a good mix of optical illusion posters, holograms and some very clever camera mounted sets that made it look like you were walking on the wall and things. Some of the holograms were a little worse for wear, but other than that it was well laid out, clean and very enjoyable.

Getting Missy to pose with the illusions was a little tricky, but other than that, we all had a good time!

Overall rating : 3/5 - A nice cheap way to kill an hour, but the low price does reflect on the exhibits.

Whinlatter Forest

Place Name:  Whinlatter Forest

Location: Lake District, England, CA12 5TW

Cost: Free

Parking: Plenty, pay and display

Walking distance: Variable, 1 hour to all day

Restrictions: Dogs are not allowed into the visitors centre, shop or cafe

Refreshments: Cafe by visitors centre (dogs allowed in outside seating area)

Website:  http://www.forestry.gov.uk/whinlatter

Whinlatter is the big brother of Grizedale which I reviewed previously. On that note, I will quickly start on their similarities and differences which are worth bearing in mind.

The parking is again pay and display, though more sensibly broken into hour blocks. I was more prepared this time and had plenty of change! A Go Ape is located within the forest, though this one felt more discretely placed to one side and tons of mountain bike trails. Missy, as I said previously, is on fairly strict lead walks because of her claw, so the odd bike whizzing by wasn't a problem, but should be noted for those who let their dogs free range, especially as the year warms up.

More carvings to find!

The one major difference that did surprise me is that the cafe in this one is not dog friendly (well, they can sit out under a shelter on a porch) and the prices are a touch more expensive - but you expect that when one place uses teabags and the other serves you loose tea leaves, a strainer and a menagerie of pots for it all!

Without sounding snobbish about trees, this forest is part of the forestry commission for felling and is a wave of evergreens. It is predominantly firs and pines with the odd lone birch tree making a spindly break for it. However, the forest still retains a natural feel, unlike the eerie endless rows of some forests and is well populated with birds and such. It is also huge. With the parking meter ever ticking in the back of my mind, we didn't stray off the marked routes (we did two walks, the yellow short walk and the blue medium walk) but there was plenty of 'off road' stuff to explore should you be a frequent visitor or decide to do a whole day.

Its difficult to really get the full scale of the place

We did have time for a little look at the playgrounds. Yes, plural. Whoever came up with splitting a play park into little bite sized pieces and spreading it across a walk was probably a genius. The areas we looked at were well made and designed, and we may have indulged in a go at what was effectively a giant sand pit toy but with pea gravel. The website also promises the Gruffalo (a statue of a children's book character) who we failed to find, but I suspect that he was tucked away on a separate little path rather than on a main one.

Overall rating : 4/5 - The parking (again) and the fact that the cafe didn't allow dogs whilst the sister site did pulled the score down. However, the paths are well kept, facilities were great and overall a great place to visit that could either be a tremendous morning walk or an all day thing.

Is that rabbit I smell on the wind?

Grizedale Forest

Its a boar if you look long enough!

Place Name: Grizedale Forest

Location: Lake District, England LA22 0QJ

Cost: Free

Parking: Plenty, pay and display

Walking distance: Variable, 45 minutes to 2 hours

Restrictions: Dogs are not allowed into the visitors centre or shop.

Refreshments: Cafe by visitors centre is dog friendly

Website:  http://www.forestry.gov.uk/grizedale

For Missy's first proper holiday, we decided to start with one of the most dog friendly parts of the UK. Matt and I have previously visited the Lake District and felt Missy would enjoy the greener than green scenery.

The Grizedale forest struck us as a good one to do - it was nearby and it was sold in a similar way to Beecraigs (one of her favourite haunts). Signposting into Grizedale could have been a little better, but that is more likely the fault of my sat nav, which chooses the most convoluted and windiest routes possible.

Views were truly stunning, even Missy took a moment to appreciate them

Once we arrived and parked up, I was caught out by the pay and display. Furious re-reading of the pamphlet did show that this is advertised, so I can't say there was no warning, but it could have been a bit more obvious. With the largest route taking an estimated 5 hours, the 1 hour for £1.80 plus 45p for every twenty minutes thereafter (£7 for the day) seemed a bit ridiculous, although I suspect this is a ploy to 'encourage' everyone to buy their Discovery Pass which allows year round free parking.

Thankfully, that was the only gripe to be had. A quick tea and cake was purchased at the cafe which was a novel and new experience for Missy who hasn't done dog friendly cafes before and the prices were very reasonable and the cakes excellent.

Having paid for just an hour, we did one of the shorter 3.5 mile trails (we all walk much faster than the estimated average). They currently have a Superworm trail on at the moment, so much like Beecraigs, they keep renewing activities and information. It was nice to see a school group making their way about as well, so the area is certainly well used by people although, with the exception of song birds, there wasn't much wildlife - not a bad thing as Missy is recovering from a torn claw so we didn't want her chasing things, but it does make the place a little eerily quiet.

One of the things that they make a fuss about in this site is the 40+ sculptures to be found dotted around the place. We saw a handful (4 or 5) so I can see a real return element to try and find them all.

This huge wood cutter greets you on the way in

That was really all we had time for, minus a wee peek round the shop and a quick privvy break (good, clean facilities) but there is plenty more to do. The area co-hosts a large Go Ape tree climbing trail (there is a proper kennels at the car park, so the dog in theory can be dropped off if a member of the party doesn't want to miss out). There is also a large outdoor play area that is very new looking and nicely contained to the visitor centre side of the forest and, as I've previously said, the events change frequently, so it certainly seems  worth keeping an eye on the 'what's on' section of the website.

Overall rating : 4/5 - had the parking been free, or more reasonable (£2 or £3 for the day for upkeep would have been perfectly fine) then I would happily have given it a 5. As it was, with no option to park anywhere else, it seemed a tad unfair. Other than that, something for everyone to enjoy with or without the dog.