I have just returned from holiday, the highlight of which was my son's wedding, which was held in a wedding venue in the Cotswolds. I now have a wonderful and beautiful daughter-in-law as part of the family. The wedding itself was a whole affair with the bride and groom parties meeting at the venue from 9:00 am. There was plenty of time to get ready for the service which was at 1:00 pm, subsequently followed by the “wedding breakfast” at 3:00 pm. It’s a weird name “wedding breakfast” - I conceive images in my mind of bacon, eggs, and sausage with a nice cup of coffee, not a dinner meal with starters, the main course followed by dessert. From 6 pm to 12 am was the cutting of the cake, dancing and socialising at the bar. A wonderful day was had by all especially the bride and groom, who had lovely big smiles across their faces the whole day. Even the weather held off - yes it was overcast but it was reasonably bright, no rain and the temperature was just right for a wedding - you didn’t sweat when wearing a suit.
Prior to the wedding, we went to the Lake District as we managed to find a B&B who would allow us to isolate if it became necessary. Luckily, that did not happen and we ended up having a wonderful time - just what you need after worrying about COVID tests before you leave Barbados and having to do another COVID test when you arrive in the UK. It’s not the test themselves that you worry about - it’s worrying about how your travel plans will be impacted if you test positive, especially if you need to attend a wedding, so it’s a relief when all the test results are negative.
Whilst in the Lake District, I achieved one of my goals - that’s one off my bucket list - mind you, I keep adding more. My wife and I climbed or walked up the fell (mountain) Blencathra. Blencathra is regarded as the finest of all the fells in the Lake District. This is odd in a way, since it is not the highest at 868 metres, and it is in the north of the Vale of Keswick which is, by general consent, the least exciting area of Lakeland. Blencathra is regarded as the hill that has it all. You can walk up to the top, it’s a steady climb, very steep in areas, you can do some easy scrambling or you can go up Sharp Edge which is one of the hardest grade 1 scrambles in the Lakes. We took 3.5 hours to get to the top with varying weather conditions all the way to the top - rain, wind, sun, cloud and getting colder as you got higher (it reached 8 degrees) - and when we got to the top, clouds killed to visibility to about 20ft - luckily this lasted for 5 minutes and then the sun came out. This was followed by a 1.5-hour walk back down- a total of 5 hours for the round trip - quickly followed by a large pub meal. I now understand why the meal servings in the Lakes are so large - when you have climbed one of these fells you develop an appetite - you need food.
I did manage to meet up with some photographers to share stories, ideas and discuss challenges. One of the photographers, whose wife is a model, does a lot of astrophotography and has a large telescope outfitted with a bunch of gadgets and cameras that takes absolutely wonderful images of the planets. I also took the opportunity to take some photographs of his wife ( attached with this blog).
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