So as I was saying, my Dearest and I had come to the conclusion that if we were to get any fun out of the coming weekend we had to put fun first. It was going to be sunny on Saturday and Sunday , but then pour with rain all day Monday, (typical Whitsuntide Bank Holiday then!), and probably Tuesday as well since I’d booked a day’s leave to take my Dad to a hospital appointment.
Saturday was to be fun day. I called my sister and planned to take her with us but she had better things to do, which is OK. Getting My Dearest out of bed, dressed, medicated and ablutions performed before lunchtime is always a challenge at the weekend, so we set off for the Lake District by 12.00, picnic packed and fuel tank filled. We took my little precious, my Mazda MX5, top down, hats firmly attached to heads and, in my case at least, sun block applied.
There is an easy walk I’m very fond of from Elterwater to Skelwith Bridge, it’s not more than 2 and a half miles and flat most of the way and yet it passes from Lakeland village to babbling brook and marshy ground, from ancient Beech wood, to open meadows full of wild flowers and sheep, a Lake with distant views of the Langdales, and then more Beech wood with cascading waterfalls, and finally to a very nice café with retail therapy opportunity for the very long of pocket.
I poked round in the shop, admiring the pretty things I had neither wherewithal nor intention to buy, while my Dearest considered whether there was anything on the menu he might eat, there rarely is in these expensive and rarefied places, he won’t eat anything he can’t pronounce.
Then we wandered down to the bridge itself, sat on a slate bench under a majestic mature Beech tree whose leaves were all newly opened and as perfect as they could be, and unpacked our picnic.
Then walked back the way we had come, there are other walks which can be taken from Skelwith Bridge, and perhaps next time we’ll trek back another way but I wanted more time in that Bluebell wood, and to enjoy the wild flowers en route.
We called in at Ambleside on our way home for coffee, I scored two more 100% cotton checked shirts in the Oxfam charity shop, £2 each, bargain. We returned home tired and someone a little sun burned, but having had a Day Out.
