Wednesday 19 January 2011

Sharp Edge

Sharp Edge, Saddleback

The classic Lake District ridge walk is up Sharp Edge on to the mountain of Saddleback. It is indeed a sharp edge which people fall off on a regular basis, but the majority live to enjoy the challenge.  This is one of Mayson's Keswick Series of Real Photo cards, unused. Even if I did not know it was an old card the name Saddleback would have given me a clue for this is the descriptive English name.  Its local, and original name, and the one that it has now reverted to, is Blencathra.  Probably from blaen (a bare hill top) and cathrach (a chair) which put together is a bare hill shaped like a chair. 

The lone walker stands looking at Scales Tarn in the hollow. On a clear day it stands out an intense blue surrounded by grey rocks.  I thought I had posted a picture of this on my other blog but I had been on the theme of 'edge' so no tarn here only blue skies.
As you see modern maps use both the mountains name, I wonder if like a cat it has a third name, no human will discover. (TS Eliots The Naming of Cats here)

2 comments:

dakotaboo said...

Great postcard from a beautiful part of the world.

Unknown said...

You have a very interesting blog here showing off post cards, postcards are pretty neat the older they are the better I like them.

Thanks for visiting my blog and I am glad to of joined back up with the ABC Challenge.