Flashback Friday Travel 31 – Anniversary in Cumbria

It has been a while since I have done a flashback-friday, so where better to re-launch it than from the beautiful Lake District!  We had a lovely long spring weekend here for our first wedding anniversary in 2011 – Mr P had dragged me along Striding Edge for ‘girlfriend tests’ many years before so it seemed only right that we should go back!  But this time I took charge of the accommodation – we weren’t staying in a place with one of those Fawlty Towers style silent dining rooms again…

En route to where we were staying in Cumbria, near Ambleside, we stopped at Tom’s Gill for a mid-morning stroll.  The sun popped out from the clouds just as we arrived which called for an impromptu bit of fresh air.  Early April is always touch and go weather-wise in the UK but when it comes together it is stunning.

As I mentioned – I booked the accommodation.  I had been pining after a stay at The Drunken Duck for a number of years and when can you treat yourself if not an anniversary.  We had 3 nights here and made ourselves very much at home.  The Inn has stunning views across the fells as well as being only a short drive from Ambleside and having great outdoor private space of its own.  There is also a little micro-brewery and a lovely guests lounge which is comfortable and warm.  You will see plenty of ducks – they are very tame and inquisitive and joined us for drinks on the lawn, even pottering around the hallway at one point until they were shooed away!  If the weather gets really bad (read on) then you’ll be pleased that the Inn has an arrangement so that you can use the spa facilities in a nearby hotel.

One of the highlights for us (this was before the dairy issues) was the complimentary afternoon tea which we obviously held in our diaries each day.  Tea can be taken in your room or in the bar or the private lounge – we did of course try each.  Very good scones, which complimented the duck-shaped biscuits that are in all rooms.  We could rarely eat all of the tea so packed it up for taking walking the next day! You’ll see below that our duck friend followed us everywhere – popping up onto a wall just below our room window to watch us eat our tea!

I was saying about the weather… When spring is on its best behaviour it is blooming gorgeous.  However there are those other days when, well, we are glad we have a lot of sailing waterproofs as in fact the days are good for ducks!  But hardy we are – so off we went, up a hill (Rydal Fell) and to see some white water (Dungheon Gill).  The views were incredible clearly!  Plenty of inquisitive sheep.  Only issue with the hotel – we didn’t ever find a drying room…

Not deterred by the weather on our final day we thought we would go and have a look at Scafell, the weather was nice and grotty so we thought we would just have a valley walk before heading back to Southampton.  But you know how these things go, the weather sort of clears, we start muttering that we aren’t going to be back here soon so why don’t we just carry on anyway…  We weren’t really prepared for this – we had our maps and waterproofs and water of course.  But in the food department we were restricted to duck biscuits, scones and good old Grasemere gingerbread… Minor matters.

As you can see – the walk was pretty darn soggy.  It rained and rained, all the way up to the top of Scafell Pike at 3,200 odd feet.  There was even snow on the top still. Mr P excelled himself in navigation – yes, he got us to the top, but this was via climbing a raging waterfall.  Said waterfall was supposedly a footpath, but I have my doubts… There were other people about 50metres to our right on a much simpler climb… Still – it is character building!

But then this happened when we were on the summit:

Spring came back rapidly – the clouds cleared and we could see Wastwater and all the way across to the coast.  Stunning.  The day just got better and better from here on in.  Pretty much 4 seasons in 1 day with rain, snow and sunshine. It was amazing how the countryside came alive with colour and how quickly the waterfalls (sorry – footpaths) became more navigable!  The route down was much easier… In that the scree and rocks weren’t running with water.  Most of down was scree-running (fortunately something i’d been taught to do before) or rock climbing.

It turned in to a rather gorgeous evening walk back to the car – racing to get back before it went dark.  I’m not sure we’ve ever been so pleased to see our car and some dry clothes!  We had a very long drive back to Southampton but it was a gorgeous evening for driving through the countryside with the roof down.

Gorgeous part of the world for a long weekend of the outdoors.  Very pleased we packed for a land-based holiday as if we were going sailing, it did us well!