An interesting day from a logistics point of view but not from a tourism one. Out to a garden centre for plants and lunch. Old ladies do that sort of thing you know. Then off to see the grandchildren (not mine) who were off school with chickenpox. On the top of the North Pennines the weather was chilly and foggy. Jumper and coat weather. By the time we got down to Penrith, 25 miles away, the sun was shining and by the afternoon it was t shirt and sandals – as long as you were out of the wind. The joys of the British weather. All the dogs were lying under the chairs in the shade, panting gently.

In the afternoon we drove back up Hartside Pass. This is closed regularly in the winter because of ice and snow but less so in the summer. Half way up the hill we were stopped by a policeman in the middle of the road who indicated that we should turn down a small lane to the left. Luckily we had satnavs on our phones and my friend the driver is local. God knows what the tourists did. The quickest diversion was 50 miles or so long. There were no garages so it was lucky the fumes we were running on lasted until we got to the garage we’d been planning to go to anyway. I suppose the only bright side was that the sun was shining, the fields was full of lambs and all the spring flowers were out.