The thought of driving up the M6 filled me with dread. I didn't expect the A1 to be so dreadful though. Never mind, we went across the top of England on the A66 and it was glorious. We topped up the car's battery while we went shopping in Kendal (no mint cake there!) and arrived at our lodge a while after our daughter. She was in her lodge, and had put the kettle on in ours. And jolly nice it is too, modern, well equipped and comfortable (the lodge, not the kettle).
After a supermarket lasagne and cream cakes for tea we had a restful night.
Saturday - we resolved to go for a walk above Borrowdale, but we didn't. I do not know what happened, but it wasn't me this time. The sat nav sent us completely in the wrong direction and by the time I'd realised we were in Ambleside, so we parked the car to have a walk round. We dropped into a cafe for coffee and looked at the lake and the boats. After that we drove to a small car park on the other side of Windermere where we had a nice lakeside walk along a pleasant path.
The driving on the narrow, badly maintained roads rather took it out of me, and I fell asleep while mother and daughter frolicked in the hot tub in the rain!
On Sunday it was a bit of a case of 'winging it'. I didn't want to go back to the lakeside honeypots so we headed the other way. First we went to a National Trust nature reserve where we got blown away by a strong cold wind on a stoney beach where we could watch the wind surfers falling over.
Then we went in to Barrow in Furness (which is far from the grotty town I was expecting) to the Dock Museum. This museum was small, but told the story of Barrow's rapid development and of the shipbuilding industry.
After that we randomly went to a place called Akram Pier - which is a pier made of iron slag and it separates mud flats from a splendid, huge, isolated beach. I drew an abandoned boat on the mud, our daughter went on the beach and mum read her book near the car.
We went to the local pub near our lodges for tea. We'd messed up the booking, but they got us in. The food was ok for two of us, but mine was a bit meh.
So here we are in Cumbria, having a good time in decent weather so far