Day 4

 Welcome to the Lake District! 

I had another poor night’s sleep, mostly due to coughing and sneezing, but also the sound of the rain! 

I woke up fully un-refreshed at 6am and noticed that it wasn’t raining. A quick check of the weather app, showed that I had an hour or so, before the next band of rain was due. I decided to get up and pack everything away, before the next band started. 

I set off at 7:30 and managed to walk for 10 minutes before it started raining again! 

Initially, the path continued along the river valley for about 2.5 miles before I stiff climb up onto the edge of Long Rigg. 

It was quite a nice walk over the ‘rigg’ because the rain was only light. In no time at all Sedbergh came into view. 

I’ve no idea how to pronounce Sedbergh because due to the idiosyncrasies of British place names, for all I know, the locals pronounce it Tiddlywinks! 

Anyway, I was looking forward to a coffee and some breakfast, but even though the town has 3 cafes, they were all closed for various reasons! 

Fortunately, I found a takeaway Deli that made me a coffee and bacon butty, which I consumed on a nearby bench! 

As you can see, it wasn’t raining when I ate that, but no sooner had I slung the pack back on, than the rain started again. 

I decided to make my own ‘route’ up, because the official path didn’t come into the town and went on a circuitous route around the river valley. I chose to walk over Howgill Lane and save myself a mile or so! 

By the time I re-joined the official route, the rain really started hammering down. 

I thought I was on holiday in the U.K. not India during the monsoon season! 

I got absolutely soaked and so did my phone and camera gear. I suppose I should’ve known better, because many moons ago, I lived in Cumbria for a couple of years, and it rained most of the time I was there! 

Once you are that soaking wet, you can’t get any wetter, so I just plodded on. The going was a bit tough, because conditions were treacherous under foot. 

After an hour or so of torrential rain, it eased off and gradually brightened up. I managed to take this photo of Lowgill Viaduct, with a bit of blue sky in it! 

Oh good, that’s the end of the rain. Well it was, for about 10 minutes, before the heavy showers started! 

I made a decision to book some accommodation for this evening, because my tent was already soggy and the ground in lots of places was saturated, so I couldn’t face another night under canvas! I stopped between the showers and surfed the net and booked myself into the Premier Inn at Kendal. 

With that to look forward to, I ploughed on and soon crossed over the M6 motorway and soon got some views of the fells in the distance. 

By the time I reached Grayrigg Foot, I’d had enough. I phoned a taxi to pick me up and take me to Kendal. I had planned to try walking there, but there was no pavement on the main road or any footpaths heading that way. 

The usual GPS devices that measure my walk, both stopped working due to the rain. However, I have plotted my route onto OS maps and it calculates it as 13.7 miles. I personally thought it was more like 15, but we’ll go with the Ordinance Survey experts! 

I was slightly miffed when I arrived at the hotel, to find my room only had a shower, because I was looking forward to a long hot soak in a bath. Unfortunately, no other rooms were available because I had decided to stay two nights. My plan is to finish the walk tomorrow, then catch a train back to Kendal and stay the night, before the long journey home. 

That means I’ll be able to leave most of my kit in my room, so my rucksack will be a lot lighter!