Howe Keld was an OMG! moment. After having come from Wood Cottage where, although the house was interesting and had a certain "olde worlde" ambiance, we were obliged to spend three days with the odour of drains permeating the ground floor from the laundry room and (as a bonus) I struck it lucky with bed linen full of hair, Howe Keld was five-star heaven. We were in the Junior Suite on the top floor and it was all imagined - and more. This was the perfect finish to the trip; a little touch of luxury in beautiful surroundings.

The Lake District has to be second only to the Scottish Highlands for outstanding natural beauty. We had just driven through Derbyshire, Lancashire and Cumbria and, on the trip down from Scotland, Northumbria but even in the Peak District nothing was able to match the ruggedness of the Lakeland fells or the wildness of the Highlands.

After moving the car from the Pay and Display carpark opposite Howe Keld to unrestricted street parking nearby, we did our customary exploratory tour of the town. As it was almost dinner time we scoped out all the restaurants as we walked, which seemed to be what a lot of other people were doing as well given the number of people huddled around display menus outside the various establishments. Keswick has no shortage of places to dine and I think we checked out most of them before it came to a toss-up between a pizza restaurant and a pub restaurant. In the end we chose the Woodstone Pizza & Flame Grill.

We had a lovely evening with great pizza and warm and friendly staff. Although the place was almost empty when we arrived, by the time we left it was buzzing. After cider, mezza, pizza and cheesecake we waddled back to Howe Keld, glad of the exercise to walk off some of those calories! We would definitely need a hike the next day to compensate for the over-indulgance.

Back at the B & B (a misnomer as it is much more like a private hotel) we relaxed and watched some TV then settled into comfortable beds made up with goose-down duvets and pillows covered in crisp, white bed linen. I try to avoid feathers as they do not agree with me but, as I had not mentioned this when I booked and didn't want to create a fuss, I convinced myself that they were hollowfill (partly because they didn't have the crunchy, crackly feel of feather/down). In any case, I had a great sleep!