The Kirkby Stephen Poetry Path

The poetry path in Kirkby Stephen is an innovative and beautiful idea. A circular walk (takes about an hour and a half) with twelve carved poems along the way to commerate the year of a hill famer. 

The poems were written by Meg Peacocke and engraved by lettering artist Pip Hall into blocks of stone which were incorporated into walls and stiles or positioned as milestones at intervals along the route. 

Each one has carved decorative motifs which depict some of the activities associated with each month of the hill farmer's year. Kids can make rubbings of the illustrations so take paper and crayons with you.

A PDF map of the route is available from the the East Cumbria Countryside Project http://www.eccp.org.uk/images/recent-projects/PoetryPath2.pdf

pictures taken gratefully from visitbritain.com and english-lakes.com