Saturday 11 June

Our week-long family holiday arrived not a moment too soon and I was so excited to show my parents the Lakes for the first time. We left the New Forest at 4am and had a mercifully uneventful 4ish-hour drive up to Lancaster, where we parked in the centre by the bus station and met them for a bimble.

Lancaster

Lancaster is a nice city, perhaps (like most) a little tired around the edges, with attractive sandstone buildings, quirky little side-street pubs and a wide high street filled with market stalls and chain stores. We wandered along the high street, waited an age for Ryan and Angus to get a Gregg’s, then turned left down a road that led to a grand, tall-columned town hall by a quiet, grassy square, where an imposing statue of Queen Victoria stood proud on a magnificent plinth of stone and bronze.

After some indecisiveness about which way to go next, a short walk up a pretty, cobbled hill took us to the beautifully intact Lancaster Castle, whose tall, two-towered, pleasingly symmetrical gatehouse overlooks the city. The walls are made of blocky yellow, red and grey stone and it ticks all the castle boxes – battlements, arrowslits, a portcullis, a delicately carved figure inlaid above the gate and a large, well-kept lawn and pretty flowerbed out the front. A fun-sponge of a security guard told us sternly that we couldn’t take the dog in, so we peered into the courtyard and admired it from the outside, where we read about its long history as a prison and ongoing use as Lancaster Crown Court.

Satisfied with Lancaster and keen to reach the Lakes, we walked back down the cobbled hill to the car park and left the city. It didn’t take long to get through the suburbs and onto the M6, and as we approached the edge of the National Park the hills rose around us, kindling my excitement to be in the mountains again. Despite one wrong turn thanks to my poor direction-giving, we made it to Windermere in about 45 minutes.

Windermere

Ryan and I parked at Booths – a very posh, Northern version of Waitrose – and walked down the hill into the little town, having forgotten that it isn’t actually on the edge of Lake Windermere – previously we’d stopped at Bowness, just down the road and right on the water. It’s a pretty, bustling little town with lots of lovely shops but we decided it was a bit too busy with tourists like us, so having failed to bump into the others after a circuit of the centre we had a drink at the delightfully quirky Crafty Baa, a tiny, timeless pub with an overwhelming number of miscellaneous items hanging from the ceiling and a mind-boggling selection of craft beers. We sat on a pallet bench in the cosy garden out the front and sipped fruity Herefordshire cider, utterly content as we watched the world go by, then made our way back to the car.

Our first classic Lake District view came as we drove along the Ambleside road, which twists and curves along the eastern edge of Lake Windermere and offers wonderful glimpses of the rolling fells that give the water a striking backdrop as they rise up from the west bank. The peaks were tantalising, and I felt so excited to be back. We stopped briefly in the middle of pretty, bustling, outdoorsey Ambleside to grab some supplies and a couple of parking discs that give free, limited-time street parking in several areas, then met mum, dad and Angus in the car park by the northern tip of Lake Windermere. We decided collectively to give Ambleside a miss on the grounds of it being too busy, so we left for the campsite. It was early afternoon and we wanted to get pitched and settled in good time, and I was particularly keen to establish our plans for the week.

Thirlmere

The campsite was situated on the A591 road between Ambleside and Keswick, just above Thirlmere reservoir and below the hulking east face of Helvellyn. The 20-minute drive from Ambleside was lovely: twisty through Rydal and Grasmere, then incredibly scenic as we cut between the dramatic Eastern and Central fells, whose rugged, steep sides were carpeted by rough, dull grass interrupted by large patches of heather and evergreen forest. The mountains had got me again – for the first time since our March trip to Snowdonia, I experienced that exhilarating, humbling realisation, which dawns on me again and again as if every time were the first, of my own overwhelming smallness.

We got to Thirlspot Farm about 2pm, set up camp and spent the suddenly windy, rainy afternoon sheltering in the awning. Ryan and I were in my trusty, no-frills, 15-year-old tent, which has more than served its sentence over the years (as demonstrated by the heavily taped poles) but is certainly not – as it claims to be – suitable for four people, although it is perfect for two with a couple of bags. Angus was in his neat little two-man, mum and dad had their campervan with pop-top roof and side awning, and we were all crammed together between a gravel track and a wire fence.

We weren’t sure on the campsite at first, which was just a thin strip of grass running parallel to the main road that was shielded from the noise only by a hedge and a narrow line of trees, but it grew on us over the next few days. Because that road cuts along a huge valley, the campsite sits nestled below the steep, grassy, rocky western slopes of Brown Crag (610m) and Helvellyn (949m), which gave it a wild feeling and made us appreciate the vastness of the fells. The farm was pleasantly old-fashioned, the resident lambs were charming, the toilets were clean, the showers were hot, the road was quiet at night and there was only space for a handful of campers at a time, so it felt quite private.

A strong southerly wind was whipping up the valley and drizzle came and went, so after setting up we sat in the awning, ate mum’s homemade brownies, recovered from the journey and made plans for the rest of the week, which involved several books and maps, at least two different weather forecasts, a notebook and some minor frustration at everyone’s indecisiveness. Mum cooked a delicious veggie chilli con carne for tea and to our relief the weather improved that evening.

It was a very atmospheric first night below the mountainside; bright daylight reflected off the clouds until late, and I don’t think it ever really got dark – it was as if the normal rules of day and night didn’t apply in this wild place. All tired from our early start, we went to bed at 9ish and I dropped straight off, remaining dead to the world until morning.