What better way to spend a couple of freezing cold January nights than in a glamping pod up in The Lakes…

Hayley and I were glamping pod virgins before our visit to The Quiet Site but the experience did not disappoint, in fact we can’t wait to go back!

We arrived early afternoon at The Quiet Site in Ullswater and were greeted by the wonderful Sarah, quite possibly one of the friendliest members of staff of anywhere I’ve ever been. Sarah gave us a tour of the site and showed us to our lovely little pod that would be our home for the next two nights.

The camp has all of the usual facilities that you would expect, showers, communal kitchen, a little shop with all the essentials. However this place has one giant difference…it’s amazing! For a start they have baths and in the shower rooms they have under floor heating, under floor heating!! It’s just heaven.

They also have the most amazing bar, which actually looks more like some sort of medieval tavern. Unfortunately it wasn’t actually open as we were visiting in off season. We were still allowed to have a wander round though and it’s definitely a very good reason for us to return at some point.

We made our glamping pod all cosy and snuggly with the 10 million blankets, duvets and sleeping bags we had brought and went off in search of some food…

Our search, luckily, only consisted of a 30 minute walk along some pretty country roads. We found a cosy little pub with a roaring fire, real ale and some delicious food. After a pint or two and with our bellies full we felt brave enough to attempt the half hour walk back to the camp site in the foreboding darkness.

You’ll be pleased to know that we survived the walk back. Obviously because otherwise who is writing this? Unless Kate has in actual fact been abducted and replaced with a clone, who very kindly carries on writing her blog…

Or… I’m writing this from beyond the grave but lets not be silly. If I had in fact perished on the long country roads in Ullswater I would not be wasting my dead time by updating my blog. Don’t worry I would most definitely share my experiences of the afterlife with you, just not straight away, let me at least settle in, check out the neighbourhood.

Anyway!

When we arrived Sarah very kindly gave us a map of some walks that we could go on, that started from the campsite.

Our plan was to get up at 8 am, set off around 9 am, which would mean we would arrive at the waterfalls and tea rooms in a couple of hours for a mid morning snack, take some pictures of the falls, have a mooch about then stop at the pub that was apparently along the route on the way back, for a late lunch early dinner. Perfect!

Obviously this didn’t go to plan. We woke up around 9.30 and sat staring out of the doors of the pod watching the snow fall and willing ourselves to venture out in to the cold.

The freezing temperatures were soon forgotten when we got out in to the wilderness and were experiencing the most beautiful views, stunning scenery, relaxing silence and cute fluffy sheeps!

We arrived at the tea rooms just in time to watch it close… not to worry we thought, the pub isn’t too far, we can recharge our batteries and thaw out there.

We had a little wander round Aira Force Waterfalls and took the obligatory waterfalls photos then carried on with the walk.

We checked the map…

“Is it this way?”

“Yep, that looks right”

“Cool lets go”.

It soon became apparent, after about an hour that it wasn’t “this way” and we ended up on a road in the middle of nowhere with zero sign of civilisation for all eternity.  I checked Google maps and there was in fact nothing much for miles.

We were at least another hours walk from the campsite, it was getting dark, we’d not eaten all day, apart from some weird strawberry flavoured protein shake that we’d picked up from Morrisons on our way up here and it had started to snow. We most certainly don’t ever do things by halves, where’s the fun in that?

Whenever Hayley and I go away together you can bet your bottom dollar that there will be a point where Hayley falls in to a deathly silence because it’s just all become too much for her to handle and she wants to die, or she wants me to die.

This was that point, I didn’t hear a word from Hayley for the next 30 minutes of our journey.

It’s fine, its all ‘Jake Peralta’ cool. She always forgives me because I always take her to the pub to make up for it!

We eventually made it back to campsite, crawled over the threshold and jumped straight into the car. There was no way we were walking down to the pub tonight!

We had a wonderfully relaxing couple of days, it was so nice being all snuggly warm inside whilst it was blowing a blizzard outside and we got to witness the ‘Super Blue Blood Moon’ (or whatever it was called) out in the wilderness. We talked complete nonsense, enjoyed some quiet contemplation and were once again given confirmation from ourselves that we are hilarious!!

Also…! I saw a red squirrel. Two actually, in the space of 5 minutes. I have wanted to see one all my life and two come along at once, they’re like buses! Except they are absolutely nothing like buses because they’re small, fluffy and cute, the squirrels, not the buses.

This has been another successful adventure brought to you by the extraordinarily amazing Kate and Hayley!

And strictly for your viewing pleasure, here’s a representation of my stuff for a couple of nights away compared to and Hayley’s stuff…

“Life is not a fairy tale. If you lose your shoe at midnight, you’re drunk”