Summer Holidays - Week 1

The Staycation Express

So it is officially the summer holidays and lockdown has more or less eased now. Just a couple of things left to re-open (swimming pools, spas etc). Social distancing has more or less ended - people just don't touch each other anymore. Life goes on, the only major change to life is that we will have to wear masks in shops from Friday onwards.

We had our first house guest on Monday, Jude came to stay. I spent most of the morning cleaning and disinfecting - the problem with not having any house guests for ages is that we don't tidy / clean as much as we probably should. If no-one is coming in, there is no pressure to be tidy. None of us are naturally tidy. Whilst I was tidying, the boys headed up to Ribblehead to see a new tourist train which is using a 37 - Tom's favourite.

Fine horns

The view from Storrs

Jude arrived at 2.30, we headed up to Ribblehead for a walk to get some fresh air and to train spot (of course). The evening was then spent on the cricket field for junior cricket practise which went really well - loads of children turned up (few are going on holiday this year). Everyone was as friendly as usual - no booze this time!)

Tuesday we did a quick circuit of the Cheese Press stones with Jude, had bacon butties outside at home in the sunshine. Jude then headed home. Tom went down to the pump track but came home immediately too many people and too many teenagers, so Tom and I went for a Cold Cotes cycle ride instead. In the evening the boys went back up to Ribblehead to watch the train again?!

Wednesday we spent the day with Anne and Lauren. We made a packed lunch and then headed over, we then got in one car (as I said social distancing is more or less over now - I will share cars etc with people I trust but only people I trust) and headed over to Clapham. We then walked to Wash Dubs above Austwick where we had our picnic and the kids played in the river (both of them fell in!) it then started to rain so we walked back. Was a lovely day - Lauren and Tom aren't best friends but they happily spent time with each other.

Thursday - it rained all day. I got Tom to make tea: Spaghetti Bolognaise. It took him an age to chop up all the veg but he did it 100% himself and it was tasty. Anything not made by myself is a dream!

Friday we headed to Goat Gap for lunch again - become a 'thing' now - it is much easier to have a big lunch and small tea on a Friday with a cricket match at 6.30 - especially as they all take place in the Lakes so take a while to get to (taking into consideration the heavier than normal traffic on a Friday).

Tom on the attack

Tom, Luca and Ethan then met up on the cricket field for some nets practise in the afternoon, before we headed to Netherfield for their first cricket match of the year. Netherfield are the team to beat because they are the Kendal team - so have a much bigger population to draw on. Basically they have a full team of children who are 11, whilst the Ingleton team has 1 x 12 year old, 2 x 11 year olds and the rest are 9 years and below - so never a fair contest. However, saying that they only lost by 20 runs, so they could be proud. Tom was captain for the match and did a pretty good job of organising them all when fielding. He did good with bowling and batting. In fact the whole team did really well considering there has been barely any practice at all. Oh and today face masks became mandatory in shops etc.

Saturday we had a slow morning - it was yet another grey day. We had a take out lunch from Bernies (trying to support different local business) and then we headed to Helwith Bridge where we did a short walk around the quarry and finished off on the riverside terrace for a pint - very nice too, made even better as the tourist train trundled past us.

Herdy at Helwith Bridge

Sunday, another rainy day, so we had another slow morning (we are getting good at these) and then headed to Keelham for Sunday lunch. Very nice it was too. We also went shopping and couldn't quite believe how empty Keelham was - normally it is packed with people, but it was pretty much empty, meaning it was a pleasant experience. Wearing masks in shops feels better too - don't feel so exposed as before and pretty much everyone was adhering which was good to see. The rain cleared up on our return to Ingleton and as we were all feeling stuffed (we all had 2 courses) we went for a quick once around Storrs Common to try to get digesting...