We have just come back from a lovely couple of days away. It was all rather last minute as were going to drop Val D'Auberge and King of Angels back to Peter Bennett's for their Summer holidays in Derbyshire and suddenly thought it would be nice to keep going north and see the mountains again in the Lake District. We loaded up the three dogs and the two horses and off we went. The two horses were unloaded and off we went like a family of Pikeys. We managed to find a last minute room for the night at the Westmorland Hotel on the Tebay service station and then the following morning drove into Glenridding. Well, we didn't just 'see' the mountains, in a hare brained moment of madness we decided to climb Helvellyn all three thousand one hundred and seventeen feet of it!  It was pouring with rain and after the first hour fat Lucy and Poppy kept on trying to do a U turn and scarper back to the lorry. Doug had to be'whipper in' otherwise they would have disappeared home. Spud was his normal enthusiastic self. Four hours later we eventually made it to the top. Striding Edge was particularly hairy. The wind was howling and there was a steep drop on either side of this tiny little goat track. It was hands and knees stuff and poor Lucy had to be pushed and shoved up some of the really steep parts.

At the top and the weather clears up

Just about to attempt Striding Edge

Doug taking a breather

Stunning views

On the way back down with Spud in the foreground

As it was so last minute I hadn't packed any of my proper walking clothes and when we decided to make the climb up Helvellyn (over three thousand feet) I was a little bit 'under dressed' to say the least. It was raining when we first set off and my jeans got really wet and were uncomfortable so the only thing I could do was change into a beach dress I had scrunched up in the bottom of my rucksack. You can imagine those hardened climbers reactions at the top where they were all dressed up in their top spec climbing gear and I was there in my beach dress and pink trainers!

Most inappropriately dressed!

Top prize goes to the three dogs who made it to the top on their tiny little legs

Spud - The mountain goat in disguise!

This gives an idea of what the little doggies acheived