Gisburn Forest and Morecombe Bay

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We decided to head into the Forest of Bowland a bit more today, since we'd only really driven through it on the rest of this holiday! Our destination was the Gisburn Forest & Stocks Reservoir. The Dale Head Ramble was a 3.2mile walk along the edge of the reservoir then up through Birch Hills, down to Bottoms Beck and back along Egg Berry Road (a stoney track rather than surfaced road). Despite being a forestry commision plantation it was a beautiful wood to walk through, sunlight through through the green leaves and glinting off the water, blue skies above. From the bird hides by the reservoir we saw several ducks and geese, a flock of lapwings, and a barn owl hunting on the opposite shore!

After lunch we drove over towards the coast driving through the Trough of Bowland, pausing at an impressive tower viewpoint between Abbeystead Fell and Hare Appletree Fell, skirting past Lancaster and into Morecambe. Here we strolled along the seafront, out onto the Stone Jetty then back along to the lovely Eric Morecambe memorial. We had hoped to find a cafe but they were all shut so we returned to the Station House to eat up the remaining food and start packing up ready to leave in the morning.

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