Mountain With Griff Rhys Jones

The Lakes (1x2)

: 05, 2007

Rhys Jones goes to Dove Cottage on the edge of Grasmere, home to William Wordsworth, whose poetry was inspired by the area. Hardknott Pass, 17 miles (27 km) south-west of Ullswater, is the steepest road in England. It includes a succession of hairpin bends and a 1 in 3 gradient, rising to 1,200 feet (370 m) in little over a mile, and Rhys Jones travels it riding pillion on a motorcycle. He then visits Honister Slate Mine, near Keswick. The stone circle at Swinside serves to illustrate the mysticism of the Lakes, and Rhys Jones attends a meeting of Quakers, whose founder, George Fox, preached from an outcrop on Firbank Fell. The presenter then follows Samuel Taylor Coleridge's perilous descent of Broad Stand, a series of sloping steps on Sca Fell. After discovering how the climber's fuel of choice, Kendal mint cake, is made, Rhys Jones then heads for a bookshop to examine the works of Alfred Wainwright, whose guide books about the region became best-sellers. The books are now being updated and Rhys Jones accompanies Chris Jesty, who is carrying out the revisions, on a journey to the top of Catbells. Finally, landscape photographer Gordon Stainforth sets out to recreate a shot taken in 1901 by mountain photography pioneers, the Abraham brothers. It involves Rhys Jones scaling Napes Needle, a pinnacle that abuts Great Gable.