Cool Caravanning, Updated Second Edition. Caroline Mills

      Caravans settled at Castlerigg Farm

      When the world was formed, someone must have sat on top of Castlerigg Fell and decided that this was the place from which to create a landscape. And when Doris Harrison selected a few fields of her farm for a campsite on the very same spot, it was a wise decision. Like some natural IMAX cinema, the views are 360 degrees – and you don’t need 3D specs to appreciate them.

      Doris’s daughter Emma and her husband now run Castlerigg Farm Camping and Caravan Site. Tucked away along a no-through road, the only traffic past the site is to the farm next door, so there’s no trouble with road noise at night. Nevertheless, civilization is close at hand for the seclusion-phobic, as Castlerigg Farm is just half a mile from the main road that cuts its way through the Cumbrian mountains and a couple of miles from the town of Keswick, which must boast more outdoor gear stores, as well as plenty of other shops, than any other English town.

      Keswick can also boast of Bryson’s, a traditional bakery where you can purchase tasty treats, such as Westmorland Fruit Cake and Lakeland Plum Bread. A few doors up the pedestrianized Main Street is Ye Olde Friars, a sweet shop that looks harmless enough with its timber-framed facade yet with contents that will make a dentist shudder. Amusements in the town vary from the unique Cumberland Pencil Museum, providing historical facts on the world’s very first pencil, which was introduced in Cumbria, and modern pencil-making techniques, with a very good shop if you’re into coloured pencils; and Theatre by the Lake – a regular regional winner in the UK Theatre Awards for the ‘most welcoming theatre’.

      Three miles east of the campsite is the Castlerigg St one Circle, Cumberland’s answer to Stonehenge; what it lacks in size, it makes up for with vistas.

      From the campsite, when the road peters out, the public footpath begins, straight up the Walla Crag, the peculiarly named hill that climbs even higher than the one you’ve parked your ‘van on and which has views that swallow up the whole of Derwentwater and Borrowdale beneath your feet. When darkness falls, the only light pollution is from the torches of campers in the tent field, which is separated by a stone wall, and a few twinklers from the village across the lake. It doesn’t matter how cold it may be, it’s well worth turning out the lights in your ‘van, parking your bottom on something comfortable outside and craning your neck skywards. Without the orange glow from cities lit with sodium, the stars are sure to draw your eyes upwards; and if they don’t, the silhouettes of the fells west of Derwentwater as the sun sets behind, the final moment of the day lining each peak with a pink ribbon, certainly will. At daybreak the sun rises from Low Rigg on the other side of the campsite and you get a second chance to watch the natural magic show, the rising light turning the surrounding fields and fells into an iridescent jewel.

      As you’ll be unlikely to find a view of Derwentwater from your pitch, and if you can’t face climbing Walla Crag for the jaw-dropping vistas, you should linger over your recycling and catch glimpses of the lake while doing your bit for the environment at the bin point.

      There are plenty of hot-water showers, if you want to leave the Cumbrian mud in the country rather than treading it into your ‘van, and a laundry for your hiking gear. Don’t rely on the small site shop for creating a meal as it’s basic (Booths supermarket is in Keswick), but the converted Hayloft Cafe (literally – it was once full of hay), within yards of the pitches, is a comfortable place for a bite to eat. Toasty in autumn, the log-burning stove is a welcoming focal point over which to enjoy breakfast or Cumberland sausage and sticky toffee pudding, and, as it’s fully licensed, you can enjoy a drink knowing that you don’t have to drive: perfect!

      Designated a family/couples’ site, there are no single-sex groups allowed, with rowdy behaviour discouraged; it is, after all, the echoes of the silent surrounding fells that are calling you to this campsite.