Where The Boat Leaves From

In this case, it leaves from Pooley Bridge to take us back to Glenridding.
Today was another Barclays Pensioners Club outing, and this time it was quite a local one for us - a cruise on Ullswater with lunch at Pooley Bridge thrown in for good measure. We had to leave home early to avoid the tarmacing gang, who had arrived in our road at 7.30am, before they blocked us in but that did mean it was a leisurely drive over Kirkstone to Glenridding and we were able to get one of the car park spaces set aside for us. We had a boat solely for the use of our group on the outward journey and, despite the atrocious weather forecast, it stayed dry enough to sit outside on the run up the lake to Pooley Bridge. It was a ten minute walk from the pier to the town centre, but that did give us a chance to properly appreciate the new, modern bridge which opened in 2020. The previous one, which had stood for 250 years, was washed away by storm Desmond in 2015. We had an “afternoon tea” style lunch at the pub, which was nice enough, though not necessarily what we had thought we were going to be served!
By that time the forecast rain had arrived with a vengeance, so it was a pretty soggy party that arrived back at the pier for the return sailing to Glenridding. No private charter for us this time, so it was pretty crowded on board. We took our chances on the upper deck, where it was cool and windy but at least there was an awning so we were protected from the rain.
When we arrived back, we decided that we were early enough - and close enough - to warrant a detour to Penrith and a visit to Cranstons Foodhall. Not the best idea as it turned out. We got some nice things for tea granted, but trying to get on to the M6 or A6 to go home, was a non- starter. We ended up basically retracing our steps back to Glenridding and then back to Kendal over Kirkstone.
But the good news was that when we arrived home, we found that the trench outside our house had been filled and tarmaced and the temporary metal plates had been removed along with most of the plastic barriers. Could this be the beginning of the end of the gas main replacement misery?