Milly and Olly is a charming novel, our copy is particularly lovely as it has Willy Pogany illustrations.
The description of the children's first sighting of the Lake District hills reminds me of our journey home from work, up the M6. The Lakeland hills appear near Lancaster and just get more beautiful and imposing as we travel north. I don't think the view will have changed much since the novel was written.
"And sure enough, after Lancaster, mother gave a little cry, and Olly jumped up, and Milly came running over, and there before them lay the dancing, windy blue sea, covered over with little white waves, running and tumbling over each other. And on the other side of it what did the children see?....the mountains, the beautiful mountains....But how shall we get across the sea to them?
This is only a corner of the sea, Milly - a bay. We can't go across it, but we can go round it, and we shall find the mountains on the other side.
Everywhere mountains were beiginning to spring up. and when they had said goodbye to the sea the mountains began to grow taller and taller. What had happened to the houses, too? They had all turned white or grey; there was no red on eleft. And the fields had stone walls instead of hedges; and inside the walls there were small sheep....
Oxenholme, Kendal, Windermere...And what was this shining on their left hand, like a white face running beside them and peeping from behind the trees? Why it was a lake - a great wide lake, with tiny boats upon it, some with white sails and some without."