So far on this quest we've covered Newcastle, Durham and Liverpool and if you want to help or just find out more about the project you can view my crowd funding page HERE

On Wednesday my daughter Abigail and I climbed aboard a Northern Rail train for an amble through the pretty cumbrian countryside to one of my favourite smaller cities Carlisle

Carlisle has been a city since the middle ages and currently it's population is around 110, 000, it's the only city in Cumbria and being on the border of England and Scotland it's steeped in the history of the Border Reivers, something we Charltons are interested in as we were one of the main clans (even though my parentage is Scottish and I actually see myself as far more Scots than I do Border Reiver being that I came to be a Charlton by marriage.

Anyway, I digress, there are lots of things to do in Carlisle if you like history and between the Castle, the Cathedral and the Tullie House museum and art gallery there's bound to be something to keep the little people interested.

So of course my main quest was the all important cityscapes and here they are -

This is Bitts Park in Carlisle, I love that it's so green and full of trees and I'm sure many a happy afternoon could be spent with the kids, it even has it's own ice-rink.

This is probably the Cityscape which identifies Carlisle as Carlisle, because it's not a massively densely populated city, it's not quite so layered as other cities but the Cathedral is certainly a beautiful building.  

and so that was Carlisle, the beautiful Cumbrian town which takes around 45-60 minutes to reach by car or around an hour and a half on the train, a train leaves for Carlisle from Newcastle approximately once every hour and the trains are mostly run by Northern Rail, with a  family and friends rail card for myself and my daughter it cost just under £15.

All of the images on this blog were taken with the Fuji X-pro1 and the 35mm f1.4 lens, a truly fabulous combination

So onwards to city number 5, I spent all day in my office trying to fund raise and sending out corporate sponsorship requests and press releases and if you would like to help me in any way, you could even sponsor your own city!  You can either visit my crowd funding page or you can simply drop me an email, I would love to hear from you.

Carlisle, a bank holiday getaway

So if you saw yesterdays post you'll have realised that our roving reporters Looby and Abigail recorded video at Carlisle Castle yesterday, we really did have a good day out although I kind of liked the Cathedral best of all if I'm honest, I really recommend that you see it if you have a couple of hours to kill in Carlisle.

I actually had my camera with me yesterday, I took it purposely, shocker!

here's a few highlights of the day -

we were fully eco and carbon friendly and got the train, because of our family railcard it was £26 for the 4 of us, I'm pretty sure that cost less than it would have for petrol and parking.

Looby snapped a photo of moi, she's getting good, I just wish I'd have worn makeup!

The edges of the walls of the city just next to the station

we're off to explore the Cathedral

They both lit candles, Looby prayed for people to stop fighting, Abigail said she prayed that she could stop back chatting and be a nicer person.

A very impressive ceiling

In the underpass as we went across to the Castle we found our surname, photo opp!

we're off to see more history at the Castle, we got in free with our English Heritage membership, if you don't have one expect to pay around £20 for a family of 4

Looking out of the castle keep

Looby and Abigail playing war games

a view of Carlisle from the top of the castle

A view of the military barracks

My lovely girls.

We did enjoy a thoroughly good day out in Carlisle and I'd go again, probably at Christmas for the shopping!!

Looby and Abigails video diaries from Carlisle Castle

So today we went on the train to Carlisle for the day visiting the Cathedral and Castle, I took a few photos and I'll share our day tomorrow, while we were there Looby asked if we could take some video clips because she likes to remember herself in videos so with my handy iPhone we did 3 videos...

This one was in the castle keep so it's fully dark and atmospheric

Looby asked Abigail to give a quick video report for the Laura news

and finally Looby finished off with part 2 of her guide to Carlisle castle.  I'm loving how they want to get involved with my blog and it's great to have new moving memories of them that we can all look back on in future years.

Whatever you got up to this bank holiday weekend I hope you got to create some fabulous memories