Wednesday 16 January 2008

It's raining

Rain.

We get a lot of it here: the local farmers call it "Keswick Sunshine." The campsite is a mere 6 miles (as the wind blows) from the wettest inhabited place in England. Seathwaite in Borrowdale has the dubious distinction of getting a lot wetter than the rest of us, with a staggering 7' 8" of rainfall annually. The local water authority paid for the villages Christmas lights last year, as a "thank you" for their contribution.


I was going to have a moan about how much rain seems to be falling on us at the moment, but it seems a little churlish since there are 76 Flood Warnings in the South of England today. Seathwaite's record might be in jeopardy this year...

You may be wondering why we're still hanging around Keswick when the weather is dreadful and there are a thousand other places waiting to be visited. Well, we're about to move out of our flat there for good, which means re-distributing all our worldly goods - apart from the small, lightweight bits and bobs we can take with us. Since we're distributing it all around several friends and relations, packing it up is taking a lot of time. It's not like moving house, where a box gets packed at one end and unpacked at the other. Here, we have to decide what we're taking and what gets packed into which box to be sent where. It's doing my head in.

Driving into town from the campsite yesterday, negotiating the small lakes in the road on the way, we saw some absolutely amazing cloud formations hanging low in the valley. I learned two valuable lessons. Firstly, that even when the weather is appalling, Nature manages to produce something profoundly beautiful. Secondly, never leave home without a camera.

5 comments:

Rich Luhr said...

But no leaks in the Airstream, right? So perhaps a little rain test is a good thing before you hit the road.

Stikki said...

So, now that you're up and running (and waterproof), what are you doing with your time? Are you getting out and about, or are you just sitting in your new home thinking "wow, why didn't we do this years ago?"

Have you gone off and left it alone for a couple of hours yet? How did that feel?

And does it have a name yet?

Happy travels.

Pete said...

So far - so good. No leaks (yet). I wonder if it floats?....

We have managed to leave it alone for whole minutes at a time, since we're spending most of our lives packing and re-packing boxes and boxes of stuff. So we haven't actually had much chance to just relax in it yet.

And no, she doesn't have a name yet...

Anonymous said...

She?

Anonymous said...

just been checking out the blog!! Omigod how bloody exciting! and what a fabulous picture of raindrops on windscreen, did you wait until they were in the optimum position or was it a lucky co-incidence?

will tune in more frequently from now on.

and let me know when you have named her - I know that any minute now the right moniker will present itself.

love to you both, H (and Ian is here too and sends lurve too)xxx