Late afternoon and evening was spent in the unique Cumbrian mountain village of Alston. The biggest issue here is transport. If you look at the sign on the picture you'll see that Alston relates to the north east as well as Cumbria. Alston is quite simply a long way away from anywhere else which gives it a unique character and means that issues of rural isolation, important in the rest of Cumbria, are even more relevant to this town. It was difficult to deliver our newspaper in Alston as everyone was so friendly and wanted to chat! We were even invited into a cafe, fed and watered, and not allowed to pay! Question Time was both interesting and challenging with a good selection of questions relevant to life in Alston. All in all, this is somewhere I could happily have spent the last three weeks and will certainly return after the election, hopefully as MP.
