Hi
Can anyone help?
Burnmoor Lodge is situated at the side of Burnmoor tarn which is just to the east of Wastwater in the Lake District, grid reference NY 183 040 (GB Grid.)
It a very remote house with a religeous inscription on the side, and is to say the least has a dark character.
It's not a bothie but looks a great place to stay over.
Anyone any idea who owns it, or if it's for rent?
Some info on the web suggests people have stayed there?
Any info welcome.
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| Edited: 10/11/08 13:29 |
 It's privately owned, but available for hire, providing very basic accommodation. You get your water from the tarn, use a chemical toilet, paraffin for heating... and you have to lug all your supplies in with you. I don't know who you contact for details... sorry.
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I heard it was a religious group Manchester way. One of our walking group found a name and number. Unfortunately he moved away and is no longer in contact. He did find out the details on the internet so keep googling. It is a good but dark spot. We planned to use it after someone in an Eskdale pub said you could use it. Ended up having lunch there with a fire for warmth in the backyard (ruined walls at the back) where there had been previous fires so no extra damage. It is quite a bleak and dark spot. No other way to decribe it but dark. Didn't like it much myself. Some places are like that though beautiful.
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 I believe it is owned by a Christian group as a Climbing\Walking Club Hut. A ski instructor from Oak Hall I talked to had, I think, stayed there. Can't remember his name, but they are the kind of people who might know. You could google them and see if they could point you in the right direction.
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 Something here about the ownership of it too. About a third of the way down the page. No idea how up to date it is though.
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These guys should have the answer for Burnmoor
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| Edited: 10/11/08 17:41 |
I was told an horrendous story about Burnmoor Lodge by an hotelier in Keswick who was brought up in Boot. Please note that I have been unable to verify this story from any other source. <>I was told that the house was built at enormous cost, because it is so inaccessible, in the late victorian period. The owner loved the remoteness of the location but his wife hated it and was driven to the edge of madness. Her husband snored very loudly, which added to her woes, and one night she was so desperate that she heated a saucepan of goose fat to boiling point and poured it down his throat as he lay sleeping. <>That's how the story ws told to me and I should love to know whether there is even a grain of truth in it. All my researches on the internet have been in vain. One day I shall contact Cumbria's Local History Library to see if any light can be shed on the true story of Burnmoor Lodge.
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I was told an horrendous story about Burnmoor Lodge by an hotelier in Keswick who was brought up in Boot. Please note that I have been unable to verify this story from any other source. I was told that the house was built at enormous cost, because it is so inaccessible, in the late victorian period. The owner loved the remoteness of the location but his wife hated it and was driven to the edge of madness. Her husband snored very loudly, which added to her woes, and one night she was so desperate that she heated a saucepan of goose fat to boiling point and poured it down his throat as he lay sleeping. That's how the story ws told to me and I should love to know whether there is even a grain of truth in it. All my researches on the internet have been in vain. One day I shall contact Cumbria's Local History Library to see if any light can be shed on the true story of Burnmoor Lodge.
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Sorry for submitting this message twice!
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I am the owner. The first link contains fairly accurate information. Though my father never worked for Boots, he did live in Nottingham for many years. He used Burnmoor Lodge for the youth group he ran (climbing and walking were major activities) and it was also used by the national organisation the youth group was affiliated to, the Covenanter Union.
Sorry Hugh, the story about the greasy murder belongs a couple of miles away in Miterdale. I don't know how much truth there is in the story, but we used to enjoy telling it, with the suggestion that a choking ghost haunts the area - I've never come across it!
Interesting how some people feel that Burnmoor is a "dark" place. I think that depends entirely on the weather and time of day. In foul weather it certainly can seem bleak and the house itself is hardly beautiful (Heaton Cooper described it as "grim"). In fine weather it feels quite different.
I would love to be able to leave it open as a bothy, but sadly experience tells me it would soon be trashed. It is just not remote enough. In practice I only lend it to people I know; repairs are a major headache to organise and for various reasons it is impractical to lend or rent it to all and sundry. If anyone wants to stay there, I suggest they use the link in Faraway's post to contact Zest for Adventure, who may able to arrange something for next year.
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Thanks for all the great info, I should hopefully be able to make progress finding the owner.
As for the horror story, the place looks sinister enough with out a dubious History! Not sure if I still want to stay there now LOL.
Here's a link which has some pictures of the Lodge (about halve way down) for anyone who's interested.
http://www.walkthefells.net/ONE_WALK.asp?WALK_ID=580
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Jon - thanks for posting about Burnmoor. I think you must be right about the weather since I was there in quite bad weather or at least in the aftermath of it. It was brightening up and hadn't rained for over an hour but the stark building in the sort of cloudy weather you can get would make anywhere look dark. I felt almost the same when I went past Skiddaw House. I quite understand why you don't allow people to use it freely. It would need a lot of repairing being so close to Eskdale with people no doubt mis-treating it. I have stayed at Mosedale Cottages before now and that is open to general use but thanks to two gentleman from the Shap area with their quads (and firewood in the courtyard and cans of Carling black label) constantly up their working on repairs it is still in decent knick. Without their attention I am sure this shelter would not be useable now. People cannot be trusted these days. BTW I hope you didn't mind us having a little fire at Burnmoor on top of a previous burnt patch. A bit cheeky.
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PaulB,
no I don't mind - lots of people wander past and peer in through the windows, which is fine - I'd be just as curious as they are. As long as people don't cause damage (for example to the dry stone wall) they are welcome. I'm actually very pleased that people have respected our tree-planting efforts and not nicked the little fences (that keep the sheep and cows off) for firewood. Quite a lot of people wild camp nearby, and again that's not been a problem (apart from one weird and noisy group many years ago). I hope all the campers respect our water supply (Burnmoor Tarn)!
I'm amused when people occasionally ask if it's derelict (including one occasion when I was pointing the ridge tiles). I always reckon it would be even uglier if it was ruined. It's actually in use for quite a large proportion of the year, and I've stayed in it during every calendar month.
Mosedale Cottage is a great place to stay, but I don't think it gets as many people walking past. The coffin road between Boot and Wasdale Head is very popular, despite its own ghost story.
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Ignore my recent post, I've just seen that Jon, the owner has posted on the forum.
Jon - Thanks for the response, I fully appreciate not wanting to leave the building open to the public. The chances of the Lodge been mis treated are too great, especially as it is within an hours walk of Boot and it's three pubs. The location is stunning though, and I would imagine there would be a raft of people wanting to rent the Lodge, despite the lack of facilities should you change your mind in future.
Regarding PaulB's post on Mosedale Cottage, I stayed there earlier this year on an horrendous night with gale force winds and torrential rain. We pushed through the bog with 10KG of coal + pack each. As the cottage came into view in the horizontal rain, it was one of the best feelings I can remember. And once the fire was lit it just got better. There were ample supplies of dry peat to burn, presumably thanks to the local farmers.
The forum has already turned up the owner of Burnmoor Lodge, can it tell me who ate my Baxters Game soup that I left to restore my Bothie Karma?
This link gives some more information on Burnmoor Lodge.
http://commons.ncl.ac.uk/?q=node/20
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| Edited: 11/11/08 14:49 |
Very interesting link, Roy, thanks. I hadn't seen that before.
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Jon
Many thanks for the information about Burnmoor Lodge. I pass it several times each year when leading Americans on my version of the Coast to Coast Path and they are always intrigued by the remote location. I shall feel more comfortable now that I can give them accurate information about it.
Do you happen to know the origin of the story, as it was told to me, which you hint happened in Miterdale?
Thanks again!
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The story as I know it is:
The farmer at Miterdale Head (now ruined, about a mile above Low Place in Miterdale) went to market, telling his wife that he would probably be back the following day. The farmer's wife spent the afternoon making tallow candles. At dusk she looked out to see if her husband was returning, but there was no sign of him. To her surprise, however, an old woman, hooded and cloaked, was approaching from the other direction, down the valley from Burnmoor. The old woman asked for lodging for the night, so the farmer's wife prepared a meal for her. After the meal, the old woman fell asleep in front of the fire and started snoring. Her cloak fell back and revealed a knife and what's more, she was really a man. The farmer's wife panicked and ladled some of the hot tallow from the candle making into the man's open mouth. The farmer returned the next day to find a corpse and his wife, who had gone mad.
Since that day, a choking ghost has haunted the old farmhouse at Miterdale Head.
We used to embellish this unlikely tale by claiming that the ghost would come down the chimneys of Burnmoor Lodge on wild nights. Cruelty to teenage lads, from other teenage lads - I once had to swap bunks as the poor lad next to the fireplace was so scared.
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The other local creepy tale is to do with the coffin road. Before the church at Wasdale Head (St Olaf's) was built, there was no consecrated ground there, so corpses were carried to St Catherine's at Boot. The story goes that a funeral party were crossing Burnmoor with a young man's body in the back of a horse. The mist came down, the horse bolted and couldn't be found. The young man's mother died a few months later, so there was another funeral procession. At exactly the same place, the mist came down and the second horse bolted. After much searching, the first horse, still with the young man on its back, was found. The mother's horse has never been found ... There used to be a small harmonium at Burnmoor Lodge, and my father has a story of meeting someone at dusk and in mist, who stopped just long enough to say "Don't go up th-there - g-g-ghostly m-music on the m-m-moor!" Truly a terrifying place. It's a good thing most people stick to broad daylight 
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The Lakes has lots of ghosts and bogles in its folklore and traditions. It would be good to have them written up. It's not surprising because before the poets romanticised the region it was considered quite wild. Not like the nice teashop and country pub filled fun park it is now. I'd rather be in the Lakes than Alton Towers any day. Jon - How long has Burnmoor Lodge been in your possession if you don't mind me asking? Who owned it before? Who built it? Such an unusual place to put it, no industry like Mosedal Cottages and it is nothing to do with farming.
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PaulB - since 1988. It was built as a shooting lodge by Lord Leconfield (who also owned a lot of property in Seatoller, and if I remember rightly, much of the Scafells), in the second half of the 19th Century. I don't know much of its history, but in 1954 my father started renting it, a sub-let from its tenant. It was in very poor condition, no back door for example. It came on the market a few years later, and my father impoverished himself for a few years by buying it, mainly for use with young people in church youth groups. By about 1980 he felt he was a bit old to continue maintaining it, and I agreed to take it on in 1988. It's used rather less for youth work these days because of red tape, but it's still in regular and fairly frequent use by various people.
I doubt if the shooting was ever of very high quality. The grouse butts are still visible in a line to the south east of Low Longrigg. I imagine the location has to do with the fine view of the some of the Wasdale fells, and a reliable water supply, fishing (there are pike in Burnmoor Tarn) and some shelter from prevailing winds.
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