What's the difference between a Bakewell tart and a Bakewell pudding?

No, it's not the start of a hilarious food themed joke. It's a pertinent question I was faced with on my arrival in the picture-perfect town of Bakewell in Derbyshire.

I had travelled north to spend the weekend at Y Not festival with my musical counterpart, Jen. As a way to ease us back to 'real' life on the Monday morning, we decided to take a detour en route home. A visit to the Peak District wouldn't be complete without stopping by Bakewell for a sweet treat. As you may realise, I find it nigh on impossible to pass up the promise of a product from a bakery. Factor in the local connection and the significance of a Bakewell from Bakewell, and my mission was clear.

We had driven through the extraordinarily green, rolling countryside crisscrossed with endless lines of grey stone walls that made me think I was in a painting of the countryside from the 1950s. Or that cartoon story of the sheepdog from 'Twinkle' magazine (if anyone can remember the name of that I would be very grateful as trying to recall it is driving me mad. And Google is not yet equipped for such vague descriptions). The scenery here is so quintessentially English countryside that it reminds you how stunningly beautiful our country is.

A fortuitous sat-nav detour took us through Chatsworth Estate. From afar we took in the grand sight of a very stately house set amongst some of the greenest hills in the land. My excitement was greater to see a herd of deer going about their business in a small valley, shaded by a few trees not far from the road. There had to have been at least twenty of them. A truly stately sight.

So, to the issue at hand. As we walked the streets of Bakewell, we surveyed the various bakeries offering a tantalising spread of goodies. We headed into one inviting establishment and stocked up. I opted for a Bakewell tart and a Bakewell pudding just to be on the safe side. We found a nice spot by the river to sit on the wall, sample our sweets and watch the world go by. Every other person who walked by seemed to be accompanied by a dog. All shapes and all sizes of dogs were lead by, trying to sniff out the crumbs dropped from our bakery paper bags. Good luck to them finding dropped crumbs from me. That pastry of my mini-tart was the crumbliest, butteriest that I've ever tasted. So clearly, every morsel went into my mouth. Good job Bakewell.

There was a street market in action on a cobbled area by the river. As we walked towards it, a tiny, elderly lady stopped us. She warned us to hold onto our bags carefully as we passed through the market. I thanked her for her forewarning but felt I had not much cause for concern. All that was left in my little strappy bag from the long weekend at a festival was a handful of Dolly Mixtures, hand sanitizer and a bunch of folded up loo roll 'in case of emergency'. I'm not entirely sure what sells well in the Derbyshire criminal underworld, but I was pretty sure my bag offered slim pickings.

In answer to my original question I invite you to skip forward with me a few days. The large Bakewell pudding I secured from a bakery in the famous town came home with me. This dessert of eggs, sugar and jam laid atop the case of flaky pastry served as afters for a family meal that week. Without the sponge of the tart, the pudding is most definitely a pudding, rather than the afternoon tea treat of the Bakewell tart. And boy is that pudding sweet. I like sweet, but even for me, it was verging on diabetes-inducing.

So apologies to the town of Bakewell, but I think I'll pledge my allegiance to the Bakewell tart, which apparently, the town of the same name has nothing to do with. Maybe they like things sweeter in the Peak District. But at least I know now. I know my limits. I'll stick with a cherry Bakewell. Good job Mr Kipling.

The continuing journey...

As you may have realised, either by my previous blog entry or by running into me in the local supermarket, I am no longer on the extended journey that I set out on last year. My adventure that took over my life for several months was, hands down, the best experience of my life. The cliches are all true. Travel does broaden the mind. It makes you more independent. It gives you the opportunities to speak to people you would never ordinarily meet. And clearly, by its very nature, it takes you places you've never been. These new places range from being wonderfully mundane to enticingly interesting. And then you stumble across the odd place that is so achingly beautiful that you cannot quite believe how not everyone is able to see it.

I'm happy to report that along my journey there was no epiphany moment. I did not 'find' myself. I have not returned as some new age hippy exalting the virtues of communing with nature. What I did find along my way was a clearer belief that the journey trumps the destination every time. 'Lost' should never be a dirty word. You find more captivating conversations and more unexpected stops along the way when you're not entirely sure of where you're headed. I have always felt reaching your final destination of a journey anti-climatic. When I think back to childhood holidays, (sorry Mum and Dad) some of the best times were watching the rolling countryside and odd villages pass outside the window as we headed West. Then the random stops at a newly discovered town market or a spontaneous detour based on an intriguing road sign. That is why we should travel. The exploration of the unknown. The joy of discovery. The tiny genesis of nerves in your stomach when you head off the beaten track.

And that is why I shall endeavour to travel. It's all about the journey.

Circumstances as they are, I cannot take up the path I had planned to continue in the far off places of this world. But not to worry. Life is what it is and as I have already said, sometimes the journey we take isn't the path we intended, but that doesn't make it any less interesting.

So I intend to travel as far as I can, and pass through as many new places as possible. I have always maintained that there is beauty and intrigue wherever you go; you just have to look close enough. So there is a whole world out there to explore. Why not start somewhere closer to home? And my travels so far have taught me that you can meet a whole range of people, no matter where you are in the world. I spent a wonderful Christmas with a group of people in Central America, three of whom lived less than five miles from me. So who knows who I'll end up meeting halfway up a mountain and listening to their tales next.

The journey is never finished.

This Isham gnome is not hanging up her travelling boots yet...