Archive

  • Violinist Leland Chen in spotlight with Haffner Orchestra

    PRIZE-winning violinist Leland Chen is the soloist for the Haffner Orchestra concert on Saturday (7.30pm) at Lancaster’s Ashton Hall. Since winning the Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition, Leland has distinguished himself as an exciting presence

  • Quicksand opens at Theatre by the Lake

    ZOSIA Wand’s dramatic new work Quicksand is running at Keswick’s Theatre by the Lake until Saturday, February 26, following its successful premiere at The Dukes, at Lancaster. With Morecambe Bay providing the inspiration and striking backdrop, Zosia

  • My PC went on the blink

    YOU may have noticed that my usual, Sedbergh and Dent District news columns, are missing this week. I’ll explain. The necessary equipment went on the blink, i.e. the PC. It really had me worried. I did my best to settle myself to the possibility

  • Review - The Best of N.E.R.D

    NOT one for the feint-hearted, The Best of N.E.R.D will certainly get your pulse racing. Pharrell Williams, Chad Hugo and Shae Haley lay down some cracking beats that will pump you up for anything. Truth or Dare was my favourite of the album. It runs

  • Cumbria County Council's budget agreed

    CUMBRIA County Council has approved its most severe cutbacks in public expenditure since World War II. The 2011/12 budget was given the green light in Kendal today (Thursday) by the overwhelming majority of councillors. Over the next year

  • Prince launches red squirrel conservation project

    HRH The Prince and Wales met with Cumbrian red squirrel conservation volunteers today to launch the country's largest red squirrel conservation project. Visiting Hutton-in-the-Forest, near Penrith, Prince Charles was greeted by owner Lady Cressida Inglewood

  • Two people airlifted to hospital following M6 crash

    A DRIVER and his passenger were airlifted to hospital after their car overturned and left the M6 near Shap this lunchtime. The pair, from Falkirk, were travelling in a grey Ford Sema when it was in collision with another car southbound between

  • Windermere aims to become meerkat's twin

    WINDERMERE could be twinned with the home town of a fictional TV character in a new campaign. There have been more than 1,000 entries in a Facebook and Twitter competition to become twin town of Meerkovo – the Russian meerkat village home to comparethemarket.com

  • Victory for forest campaigners

    JUBILANT campaigners are rejoicing after controversial government plans to sell off England’s forests were shelved. Last year, the Coalition unveiled plans to change the ownership of public forests, including Grizedale, to save millions of

  • Ten years since foot-and-mouth outbreak

    SATURDAY marks the tenth anniversary of the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease which brought about the biggest social upheaval in Cumbria since the Second World War. The disease devastated the farming and tourism industries as people were denied

  • Voorts View - Thirst for a big win quenched at Manchester

    IT’S amazing how much better one’s beer tastes after a win, writes Kendal RUFC coach Ian Voortman. The players can be proud of the rugby we came up with in the first half against Manchester. With a combination of clinical forward drives and

  • Rugby - Reshuffled Kirkby show right attitude at Alt

    Altrincham Kersal 50. Kirkby Lonsdale 10. FOR all the scoreline suggests, this was a spirited Kirkby performance by a reshuffled side that had Konzinski at scrum-half and fellow forwards Galbraith at full back and Close on the right wing. It was

  • Kendal drivers facing longer journeys to work

    DRIVERS in Kendal have endured lengthy journeys to work this week. The town’s main roads have been heavily congested with some motorists seen turning their vehicles around to find alternative routes. However, Cumbria County Council spokesman

  • School staff to protest in Kendal over pay

    TEACHING assistants from across the county will protest today against new measures to be introduced by Cumbria County Council which will see a 30 per cent cut in their wages. Trade union Unison has planned the demonstration outside Kendal’s County

  • Motor Sport - Classic day returns to Cumbria

    CLASSIC trialling, one of the oldest forms of motoring competition for cars and bikes that originally started in the early part of the 20th Century, returns to the Forests of North Cumbria for the 10th running of the Northern Classic Trial on Saturday

  • Orienteering - Fleet-footed juniors runners-up in top trophy

    LAKELAND OC finished runners-up in the Yvette Baker Trophy – a prestigious national competition for junior orienteers. Twenty five runners Lakeland aged between 12 and 17 did well with some very fast runs from Katie Mitchell on Yellow, Natalie Beadle

  • Cricket - Netherfield sign South African ' future star'

    NETHERFIELD have signed a new professional in Brady Barends, a 22-year-old South African, who plays for KwaZulu Natal. Barends is a quick opening bowler tipped by ex-Netherfield and Durham star Dale Benkinstein to play for South Africa within the next

  • North Lancs Football - Ingleton upset Sam Price rivals

    INGLETON sprang a surprise when they beat a young Bowerham/Furness side 2-1 in the Sam Price Memorial Challenge Cup,. Bowerham threatened to overrun Ingleton in the early stages, but Ingleton hung on. Ingleton are great cup fighters and got back into

  • Table Tennis - Ibis stay point ahead as title race hots up

    IBIS beat third-placed Burton A to establish a slender one-point lead at the top of Division 1 in the Kendal and District League. Ibis raced to a 4-1 advantage, courtesy of Steve Dixon’s straight-sets victories. Trevor Nicholson consolidated Ibis’

  • What's on: Yuck

    Yuck, one of the hottest shoegaze acts to emerge in recent years, play Lancaster on February 20 and Manchester on February 25. The quartet is made up of brother and sister Daniel and Ilana Blumberg, as well as Japanese bassist Mariko Doi and

  • Cross Country - Knox in form ahead of National run

    A CONVINCING win boosted Kendal AC runner James Knox ahead of a crack at the National Cross Country Championships at Alton Towers. Knox, from Levens, who won the U13 National title two years ago, was first through the finish line first in the U15 boys

  • Badminton - Missed point turns thrilling final

    THERE was a thrilling finish to the Mixed Doubles final when the Westmorland Badminton League's Handicap Competition took place over three nights at Dallam Sports Centre. Branthwaite pairing Ann Dixon and Mike Wightman (Srcatch) took on Lauren McDougall

  • Fell Running - Dunn's fast descent can't stop Addison sequence

    ALASTAIR Dunn raced from the summit to the finish line of the Fairmile race in the Kendal Winter League in double-quick time, but it was not enough to stop Helm Hill teammate Mark Addison claiming his sixth straight series win. The wind and rain theme

  • Lament for the loss of the old pub life

    A MAN walks into a pub. His friend at the bar says: “Are you having one?” The man replies: “No, it’s the way I’m standing!” Now, before you think I’m about to get silly, let me say right away that there’s a serious purpose to this week’s wordy wander

  • Bacup man admits setting fire to pal's tutu

    A MECHANICAL engineer has confessed to setting a friend’s tutu on fire during an England World Cup match. Victim Stephen Barton was left with five degree burns after the grass skirt he was wearing caught fire in a beer garden behind Bacup’s

  • Lucy’s of Ambleside collapses after 22 years of trading

    THREE staff have lost their jobs after the collapse of a 22-year-old specialist food company. Award-winning firm, Lucy’s of Ambleside, was forced into liquidation following an irreversible trading slump. Director Lucy Nicholson, 52, said the past two

  • Lake District motorists overpay by thousands of pounds

    THOUSANDS of pounds was overpaid by Lake District motorists last year because they did not have the correct change for parking. Information obtained by The Westmorland Gazette revealed none of the 16 car parks operated by the Lake District

  • Suicide: Kendal hospital must learn lessons

    A CORONER has called for major changes at a hospital after a patient was able to hang herself in a public toilet outside a mental health unit. The coroner is now drawing up a report calling for a raft of improvements at Kendal’s Westmorland

  • Is this Windermere's mysterious Bownessie monster?

    A KAYAKER believes he may have caught Windermere’s mystery monster ‘Bownessie’ on camera. This atmospheric photograph, captured by IT graduate Tom Pickles, 24, reveals a strange humped shape gliding through the still waters of the lake.

  • New chapter for Words by the Water at Keswick

    THIS year’s Words by the Water line-up has been announced with a host of top names in the frame. Renamed Words by the Water, Festival of Words and Ideas, to tie with its tenth anniversary, it runs at Keswick’s Theatre by the Lake, from March

  • Kendal charity shops 'can co-exist with other stores'

    CHARITY shops came under fire from town traders last week, after an eighth store opened in the centre of Kendal. They do not pay full business rates, several sell brand new stock and they are predominantly run by volunteers. Reporter Helen Perkins

  • The carefree life of a wartime evacuee

    Greta Romaine (nee Clark), aged 78, who now lives at St Leonard’s-on-Sea, recalls life as an evacuee in Kendal during the war. I have my happiest memories in wartime. Fortunately, at the age of eight I was evacuated from Sidcup to stay with my lovely