If you head behind St Mary’s Church in the preposterously good beer-mecca that is Kirkby Lonsdale, you’ll come to a scene known as Ruskin’s View. It was famously painted by Turner in 1818, and with good reason as it’s an achingly pretty example of the British countryside playing a blinder.

It got to be known as Ruskin’s View, however, because the Victoria art critic John Ruskin saw Turner’s painting and went to take a look himself. He declared it to be “one of the lovliest views in England” and it subsequently became synonymous with him rather than, say, the bloke who took the time and effort to paint it. I can’t help think that Ruskin’s getting a bit too much of the credit for drawing everyone’s attention to this admittedly gorgeous slice of Cumbria.

Turner's picture, which he simply called Kirkby Lonsdale Churchyard since Ruskin hadn't been born yet

It also means that Kirkby Lonsdale Brewery- as run by the owners of The Orange Tree, the village’s mightiest pub (now they’ve got rid of the smell)- have called their bitter ‘Ruskin’s’ rather than ‘Turner’s’. Despite the painting and everything. Honestly, you really do have to wonder what it takes to get your name on a pump-clip these days.

The opportunity did present itself, though, to try a beer in the exact place it’s named after, looking at the same thing that the bloke from whom the beer gets its’ moniker was also looking at all those years ago. And so an attempt could be made at trying to understand an area of brewing that’s always intrigued me- how do you make a beer taste like it’s name? As well as tasting like, y’know, beer.

Staggeringly, after a month of seemingly solid drizzle (which, typically, began on the very same day that the North West announced a hosepipe ban) it was a beautiful morning as I sat on a bench and looked out over the same vista that had so snared Turner and Ruskin. I had the beer kept close by as it was still early in the day and I didn’t fancy having all the passing dog walkers thinking I was a raging alcoholic communing with nature or, even worse, trying to explain to them the whole 30 days challenge we’ve got going on here.

After perusing the label and taking a few swigs it was intriguing to see that the chaps at Kirby Lonsdale Brewery had decided that the most appropriate way to put a drinker in mind of one of Britain’s most famous views is via a 3.9%, easy drinking bitter with a little bit of spice and a finish that’s longer than the school summer holidays. Even more intriguingly, and as a fine tribute to the brewers art, they’ve absolutely nailed it.

Ruskin's View as photographed by me. The beer tastes like this photo. Sort of.

I’ve slugged back many a pint of Ruskins on my trips to Kirkby Lonsdale (as well as the brewery’s other ales which are readily available throughout the town and highly recommended) but with the morning sun out at the place that gave the beer its’ name everything just seemed to make a little more sense. The little bit of fruit which is somewhere in the mix seemed perfect for a bright day, that spice gave it a little bracing kick which is perfect for a bright August morning and, don’t ask me how, but it just tasted like the vista. I really can’t explain how but it did.

I liked to imagine Ruskin himself gazing at the exact same view with a beer in hand too- possibly pondering how he could hijack it with it’s own name rather than the man who immortalized it on canvas. I imagine Turner himself also with an ale on the go as he painted his picture- though not too many or he’d have got a bit squiffy and not coloured within the lines quite as neatly as he did. And I looked across to the other side of the valley and right there is a stone circle from thousands of years ago, erected for who-knows-what reason (personally, I’ve always subscribed in hope to the idea that it was for the crazy, goat-sacrificing, naked-dancing, virgin-deflowering rituals that we all like to think the ancient British tribes indulged in and which live on today in places such as Burnley town centre on a Saturday night).

Historical research (and by that I mean Wikipedia) tells us that beer has been around possibly since as far back as 9,000 BC and was spread through Europe around 3,500 BC. Though I bet even then there was places where you could only get bloody Tetleys. This means that, as I stared across the countryside with an ale in hand, I was probably doing something that a bloke had been doing over 5 millenia earlier, staring back across the valley by his newly built circle of stones and thinking “if I invented painting, I could go up there and paint the view. Then some other bloke could get it named after him”.

This was unexpected. Historical perspective is rarely the result of a beer, even a really nice one, but by sampling this particular brew, in this particular place, I became crushingly aware of my own historical insignificance. Thousands of years ago, a man in this place had helped build a magnificent stone circle to beguile people through the ages. Turner had sat here and created a beautiful piece of art. Ruskin had come here and with a few words, sealed the view’s place in the hearts of so many. And me? I sat here one morning and drunk a beer.

Ruskin’s View- come for the vista and the beer, stay for the grim sense of personal irrelevance.

The day: 8
The drink: Ruskin’s by Kirkby Lonsdale Brewery, 3.9%
The place: Ruskin’s View, Kirkby Lonsdale
Positives: A beautiful beer and a beautiful place to drink it.  This is as good as life gets…
Negatives: …until the crippling sense of personal underachievement kicks in
Conclusion: Fittingly, one of the best towns to drink beer produces one of the best places to drink one.

Beers · kirkby lonsdale · kirkby lonsdale brewery · ruskin's · ruskin's view