Friday 29th August

Off down the M74 and M6 and off at the Keswick exit and then the short drive down to Pooley Bridge which was our favourite site last year, it took around 2 hours 15 minutes to get there - not bad for a late August friday evening.

The weather wasn’t expected to be as nice this year, but we hadn’t been away for three weeks so we were really looking forward to it.

We pitched up on the same pitch as last year C43 and the pitches opposite us have been given a makeover, instead of grass pitches, they are now hardstanding with tents pitched on the hardstanding, not sure it’d be as comfortable as grass, but it’s probably a lot drier.

We were straight round to order pizza again from the on-site food van, carne for me and tuna for Gayle - to pick up in an hour, which gave us some time to wander into Pooley Bridge.

It was a nice warm evening to walk into town, and it’s a pretty short walk, it wasn’t as busy as last time we were there, the beer gardens were definitely not full.

We wandered down to the bridge and had a wee seat on the newly installed benches and watched the world for a bit, the weather wasn’t looking great.

Back via the shops and arrived not long before our pizza was due, we considered getting the chairs out, but it was spotting rain at the time and we opted for the safer route of pizza in the van, and as last time, they make a great pizza.

We are watching Second Level on prime and caught a couple of episodes and did a bit of reading before heading off to bed early, it was a bit noisy but I fell asleep quite quickly.

Saturday 30th August

We were up around 7:30 and had a cup of tea and toast for breakfast and then it was on with walking clothes and down to the steamer for Glenridding.

After a quick stop off in the shops for fudge and rolls (I got a very large coronation chicken roll) we made the 9:45 steamer and arrived into a grey Glenridding around an hour later, again the lake wasn’t quite as vibrant, but it’s a nice trip.

We had plans for a walk to the Aira Force waterfall but, it started raining, and the steamers were finishing early, with the last one out of Glenridding being at 2pm due to high winds.

We did some shopping and had a really nice seat on a part of the Ullswater Way overlooking Glenriddding.

We caught the 12:20 back and popped into the village shop for some goodies including Cumberland sausages for dinner

Back to the van for an afternoon relaxing, the weather deteriorated and by 5pm it was rainy and windy

Dinner was sausage, beans and mash - the sausages were cooked in the air fryer and were very tasty.

The weather had definitely turned, and the rain was coming down quite heavily along with pretty gusty winds, so we were happy to be hunkered down in the van.

The tent across from us had to make an emergency dash somewhere to get a tarp to put over his tent, presumably they’d discovered a leak.

I didn’t envy the folks behind setting up their tent in the rain and wind, it was not pleasant weather outside.

Sunday 31st August

Up around 7am, we slept reasonably well, but we were woken at 6am by the folks who had set up the tent behind us putting them away, not a great start to the day, but it was on with breakfast as the weather was due to be a bit windy and there are some exposed bits that make driving a little hairy on the M6/M74 journey home.