STOUT footwear with a cleated sole is recommended. This magical, wonderfully old-fashioned piece of advice appears on the front of Lakeland Leisure Walks -- a series of useful leaflets to be found in tourist information centres and other places throughout the Lake District.

They tell you the distance you are likely to walk and give you all the information you need, such as where to begin, where to go and where to end.

This is a comforting world filled with sturdy bridges, indistinct grassy paths, fine views and ascents which should be treated with suspicion (strenuous) or descents which should be enjoyed (gentle).

One day, when my current boots fall apart, I will go into a shop in Keswick and, keeping my face straight, ask for stout footwear with a cleated sole and wait while some well-meaning youth searches desperately for a trainer sponsored by Guinness.

In the meantime, I will continue to celebrate the fact that nothing changes much in this paradise blessed with accessible lakes and mountains.

Or does it? We have recently returned from our annual week in a small village near Keswick and can report that some hotel owners round about are hoping to get planning permission to turn their premises into holiday flats or nursing homes.

Their owners presumably believe there is more money in self-catering and "granny farming" than there is in running traditional Lakeland hotels.

You cannot blame them but you have to worry that this sort of thing will reduce the choices for weary travellers in need of food, drink and a bed for the night. Mountains such as Helvellyn and Skiddaw attract both types of walker -- the superfit with all the expensive gear and others like me. The former are the sort who "knock off" several peaks before breakfast and "drop down" from the tops instead of merely staggering home in a state of exhaustion.

It is profoundly depressing to stand proudly at some windswept cairn and realise that the young people skipping past you are in the middle of a far greater enterprise which also involves swimming and cycling.

For some years I organised a walking weekend in the Lakes for a group of friends.

Fitness levels were variable but these "Four Gentlemen of Bolton" were able to "bag" a number of peaks and enjoyed memorable moments such as the time I had a sandwich seized by a woolly mugger -- a sheep -- on the summit of the Old Man at Coniston. But greater hilarity ensued when I led us up Scafell Pike and embarked on the route which would have returned us to our car in Borrowdale if we had not got lost in the mist.

Instead, we found ourselves some time later sitting in the pub at Wasdale Head -- on the wrong side of the mountain -- discussing our plight. Everything went quiet as proper walkers (check shirts and beards) grinned knowingly as I used the pub phone to ask a Keswick taxi firm to send a car for us and take us back -- for £50 or so.

"It's another Borrowdale job!" the landlord said loudly, splendidly unconcerned about our embarrassment. Having ascertained that I was responsible for this debacle, he presented me with a ceremonial glass of Jennings ale -- and everybody had a good laugh.