Visited September 22nd, 2025
The Campsite
Hartsholme Country Park is situated in the southwest of Lincoln, adjacent to Swanholme Lakes Local Nature Reserve, approximately three miles from the city centre. The site comprises Victorian landscaped gardens, a large reservoir, woodlands and grasslands. Many features, both natural and built, survive from the original landscaping of the 1860s.
The campsite which is in the park is owned and run by the City of Lincoln and although basic, it’s quiet and clean with everything we need for a relaxing couple of days.
This evening we treated ourselves to a steak dinner cooked outside on the hotplate – why is it that food always tastes better when cooked outside!
After dinner, we knuckled down to processing pictures and writing our journal in an effort to keep up with what is turning out to be a very rewarding trip away!
Tomorrow’s plan is to head into Lincoln and see what the city has to offer – beyond that – who knows!?
A Day in Lincoln
Something to remember – when you are moving from place to place – make sure the fridge is put on the right setting! We forgot to change from battery to electric and everything defrosted – not a huge problem it just meant that we had to have sausages for breakfast this morning – but we managed to jump in front of that bullet without too much heartache!
After a lazy start, we made it into Lincoln city centre by bus and headed straight to the Cathedral. Lincoln is a beautiful city with bright open spaces and a charming river running through the centre. It’s architecture ranges from super-sleek modern university buildings to quaint tudor shops leading off cobbled streets up to the mediaeval cathedral.
Steep Hill connects the shopping centre to the cathedral quarter and is literally just that – a VERY steep hill. With its 16.12° incline, it is the 4th steepest street in the UK. It felt like it too as we made our way up it, so before heading into the cathedral itself, we stopped for much-needed sustenance at One Castle Street, a quaint coffee shop on the corner of the crossroads between the Cathedral and the Castle.
The castle is host to one of the four original copies of the Magna Carta – but as they are too short-sighted to admit dogs, the Cathedral got our custom instead!
Once in the cathedral itself, you are wowed by the overhead architecture of the ornate buttresses, the artistry of the stain-glass windows throughout, and the sheer perfection of the craftsmanship is breathtaking – and all in the name of religion which reaches back to nearly one thousand years. That’s a lot of praying etched into every inch of the building and even for non-believers that’s pretty impressive!
Walking back out into the sunshine, we decided it was definitely time to eat. We found the Wig and Mitre on the hill leading back down to the town. A real English traditional pub with big comfy chairs, a good menu and best of all – incredibly dog-friendly. Molly even had her own water station and behind the bar with all the other crips were packets of Paw Scratchings – snacks especially for dogs. 10/10 for this pub – it was past 4pm when we finally rolled out of there into the nearest traditional sweet shop to get dessert.
Squeezing back onto the bus with the great unwashed of Lincoln as they made their way home at the end of the working day – we were glad to get off at our stop and walk the rest of the way back to MAEV in the fresh air!
Time to crash with a cup of tea and our sweetie bags – I haven’t had aniseed balls for years and they are just as good as I remembered!
Pubs & Shops
The site has a cafe nearby within the park but other than that it’s a case of jumping on a bus (the nearest bus stop is only a 10 minute walk) or driving to the nearest supermarket.