Trev's travails: Canal walk to Endmoor

Al and I set off along the Kendal - Lancaster Canal in search of Endmoor - some eight miles or so away.

The Canal is dry for the first six miles or so and we followed the dedicated trail which took us through Sedgewick and then to Hincaster Tunnel before finding water at Stainton.

Details of the canal can be found at Lancaster Canal Trust and at Kendal Canal

Sedgewick House was originally built in 1868 by Paley and Austin for William Henry Wakefield. The Wakefield family owned one of the many gun powder works in Cumbria, this one near to the river Kent. The current house is a replacement for the original house built by John Wakefield I, great grand father to William Henry Wakefield. The house was requisitioned by the Government during the second world war and the surrounding lands used as barracks, armament stores and a munitions stores. It was in use as a school from 1945 to 1987, and from 1987 onwards has been private flats.

Sedgwick is a quiet, attractive village 4 miles south of Kendal. It is intersected by the Lancaster to Kendal Canal, and bounded on the west by the River Kent. The village has no shop, no pub, no church and about 350 residents. The name Sedgwick is derived from the Norse Sigg(e)

Old Sedgwick was the earliest gunpowder works in the area, established in about 1764, apparently as a speculative commercial venture to supply mines and quarries in the north of England with blasting powder. Until then the main buyer was the military and most suppliers were based in the south of England. The area was absolutely ideal for the task - it's sparsely populated, allowing this potentially dangerous business to be sited away from people. There was plenty of woodland to supply charcoal - a key ingredient in the process - and there were fast flowing rivers to supply power.