Loughrigg Tarn

We made up our way past Miller Brow. The views opened up and we could see the high peaks were covered in snow. The tops were also covered in cloud. At Loughrigg Tarn we sat on a bench and admired the view. As we drank coffee a couple with a large hairy dog walked past us. The man held the dog's collar saying that the dog might take an interest in our snap. Once they were gone, I wondered about the type of dog. 'It's a Labradoodle', Calse said. This sounded a bit dubious to me, and I told her I thought it was a wind-up. She was adamant that it was true. I Googled it after the walk and sure enough it was a Labradoodle. It's a cross between a Labrador Retriever and a Miniature or Standard Poodle. I apologised to Calse, of course.

Skelwith Bridge

We descended to Skelwith Bridge through the cabin park at Neaum Crag. One of the wood cabins was up for sale and we all had a guess at its selling price. We looked it up when we got back from the walk. We all had grossly underestimated the price; it was a cool £220,000.  And that was without the annual site fees. We decided not to pool our resources to buy one.

We crossed Skelwith Bridge and headed off up the single track road to Skelwith Fold. There only seems to be  a few houses at the village. It was only when I looked at the Google Map of the place, I saw that there is a huge caravan park there. It is well covered by the trees. We continued down Bog Lane. The River Brathay had overflowed and so the name Bog Lane is probably apt. Some power contractors were in the area and a cottage had a portable generator throbbing beside it. A tree had fallen across the river at Clappersgate but given the current volume of flow it would have been a brave person to cross it.

As we got back to Ambleside we could see a huge black cloud approaching from the west. We'd only had a sprinkle of rain at Loughrigg Tarn. Nothing like the 80% chance that the BBC forecast. I guess we'd been lucky.