A Spring Afternoon at Brockhole

It was such a glorious day up here in Cumbria so after washing the car and having a picnic on the front lawn (in March!) we headed off to Brockhole to make the most of the unseasonally warm weather. When we got there just after 3 the car park was still pretty full even though it was less than an hour until the centre itself closed.

We put enough money in the machine for only 2 hours as we thought this would be plenty at that time of day. I had promised the children a round of crazy golf as we hadn't played for months. With it having been very wet the course had been temporarily moved to the hardstanding around the centre and it was a bit of an adventure finding it all. None of us are particularly good at golf but it was good fun:

We were just in time part way through the round to grab afternoon from the cafe as it shuts at 3:45. It was bliss sitting on the terrace in summer layers smelling the beautiful flowers and enjoying the wonderful views across to Windermere.

The grounds are really starting to come to life now and it was wonderful to pass by lovely sights like these as we finished our round of golf:

I had taken the children's swimming things and they were pretty keen on getting into the water which looked enticing:

Once they had changed and actually got their feer in the water they weren't so keen as the temperature was still pretty cool!

My daughter was braver than her little brother and went as far as sitting in the water but not for long... I'm sure in a couple of months time they will be far happier to be in the water than they were today.

It was nice and peaceful being the end of the day so there weren't many people around down by the water. The local wildfowl seemed to be loving the lack of people as well:

By now our time was running out so we followed the path along the shore of Windermere in the hope that the children would have time to play in the Adventure Playground. The sun was sinking lower in the sky and it was reflecting beautifully on the water:

It was hard to believe we are still in March as we passed Brockhole ferry jetty where people were waiting for the next boat to Waterhead (Ambleside) and then on to Bowness on Windermere. I've promised my children a trip on the ferries soon as we haven't done it since we moved up here:

The children only had 10 minutes in the adventure playground (next time I'll put more money in the car park or get there earlier!). With the new Parking Eye cameras its not worth risking going over your time...


To round off our day and as belated Mother's Day treat we had dinner at the Watermill pub at Ings. This is a very popular pub with its own brewery and yummy food. The kids both chose the burger and chips option whilst I had beef and ale pie. Whilst we were there we had a good view of the sunset out of the window:

I'm sure it won't be long before we will be back at Brockhole especially if we get more days like today.