I received another mystery package from an online bookseller yesterday. I really had no idea what it was – I though that perhaps it was an out of print cookbook that I had ordered some time ago, but I didn’t recognize the name of the company. It turns out that the book inside the package was A Year in the Life of the Langdale Valleys. I had actually seen the book before – it was available for sale in the Three Shires Inn, the hotel Dad and I stayed in when we were in the Lake District earlier this month. I hadn’t actually looked at it, but Dad had, and he ended up buying a copy, which he gave to his mother (my grandmother) when he got back to Australia. My best guess (because there was no note accompanying the book) is that Dad ordered the book for me when he got back to Australia. The book is lovely. It’s really a coffee table book filled with photos that document the four seasons in the two Langdale Valleys: Little Langdale and Greater Langdale. The photographer, Bill Birkett, was grew up in Little Langdale, and continues to live there, and his text that accompanies the photographs gives them a very real, local context. The book is a lovely souvenir and reminder of Dad and my time in the Lake District.

Cross-posted on Grevillea