What a stunning day we awoke to! There was frost on the ground, but the sun was fully out and stayed that way all day! We had a pretty good sleep all in all. The air bed seems to have a slow puncture, so it needed topped up a couple of times throughout the night, but with the electric blanket, sleeping bags and duvet we stayed pretty warm.

Bacon (and for Yvonne quorn bacon) butties for breakfast and we were good to go.

Our Hogmanay hike was up Walla Crag, just stunning! Then on towards Ashness Bridge, a quick side trip up to Surprise View, then down to the lakeshore to walk back through the town and up to the campsite. Our fitness (and ageing joints) are not what they used to be, so by the time we were going uphill back to the campsite we were well and truly knackered! But it was all well worth it. See the photos below – do you agree?

Once back it was so nice to have a hot shower, especially with the underfloor heating! Showered up in time to see the last of the sunset colours fading over the mountains, then an early dinner at the Hayloft, also with a very nice complimentary toffee vodka liqueur.

We are now back in our tent chilling out (thankfully not literally!) We may possibly venture into the campers room later on if there is anyone there to chat to, though we have the tent nice and warm just now, so we will see. Also we might possibly head just outside the campsite for “the bells” to see if we can see any fireworks going off while looking down towards the village, but again, we shall just wait and see when the time comes. For now we are cosy, we have put our fan heater under our picnic table with the sleeping bags draped over both the table and ourselves to trap the heat in, it well toasty!

This has been such a great way so far to spend the run up to the new year, and hopefully also the new year itself, I think we will definitely do something like this again!

SHORT UPDATE: Firstly, Happy New Year! To transition from 2019 to 2020 we first had a wee sleep, then got up and opened our Prosecco, which we took with us for a short stroll out, glasses in hand, to see if we could see any fireworks. We didn’t want to walk far, so our vantage point was limited, but we did see some, not so much from Keswick as from one of the towns further away. Sorry no photos as they are really bad! We can still hear some going off now.

Coming back to the campsite, we could see the head torches of a couple of people who were coming down from Walla Crag – now they would have had an amazing display and we would have loved to do that, but we were wary of hiking in the dark especially after a few drinks. To our surprise the campers room was empty, so it was back to the tent for a wee dram of Drambuie and shortly off to bed, ready to wake up tomorrow to a new decade….

Well, it seems that Paul has won the bet. Unless there are loads of people still to arrive we are one of only 2 tents! There are quite a few camper vans though. However, it is only 2pm, so that could change. And maybe it will be busier tomorrow for Hogmanay. We are staying at Castlerigg Farm Campsite, just up on a hill overlooking Derwentwater and only 30mins walk from Keswick.

It’s a bit dreicht but not that cold, however we are glad to have the electric hook up for our heater and electric blanket.

As it’s drizzling we abandoned our plans for a walk and are now sitting having a cuppa in the tent. The forecast on all 3 websites we checked is for sunshine tomorrow, so fingers crossed!

Excellent shower and toilet block with underfloor heating

Later… a lovely meal at the Hayloft the on-site cafe/restaurant and then back to our tent for a wee wine and before bed a wee Drambuie… bliss

A wee trip down south to visit Glynis and Tony after Xmas, then heading to the Lakes camping tomorrow. A nice catch up with family and some strolls in the countryside.

Today we only managed a short walk along the Kelvin Walkway before heading home to make Xmas dinner for the family… Merry Xmas everyone!

We got lucky with the weather and took a short paddle over to Port Bawn on Inch Cailloch. Have never seen the loch (or island) so deserted, just idyllic, we had it to ourselves apart from a jet skier who appeared as we were setting off back to Balmaha. Would have loved to stay overnight but have Xmas dinner to make tomorrow… Maybe next year a wee wild camp…

To see details in the Intex Canoe follow this links https://amzn.to/30UzSvu

Here are some pics…

Things never quite go to plan, but it all worked out well in the end!

We had a lovely and filling lunch in the Oak Tree Inn and confirmed again that they were ok to let us use their pontoon.

Access to the pontoon is limited by a single track road and the turning point is tight (no parking available there), so it is not suitable for any large vehicles or any towing ones, in which case the beach near the phone box is your best access point. However, it was fine for us as we were just in our car (our dinghy is inflatable). So after lunch, we drove our car along to the pontoon to drop off our gear and dinghy, then went back to park our car overnight in the main Balmaha car park.
Please note that the pontoon can be very busy from Spring through to Autumn, and the outer part of the pontoon should not be used then as it is used by commercial passenger ferries. We would strongly advise if you would like to use the pontoon, that you do as we did, and contact the Oak Tree Inn first by either messaging them in advance, phoning on 01360 870357 or popping in to ask.

The amount of stuff we had to take over seemed ridiculous, but (especially in winter) we couldn’t really see how we could get it down much. We knew that it would be cold so we had 4 sleeping bags instead of 2, plus a hot water bottle each and a big bag of logs from Asda to make a campfire with (even with loads of logs, they only burned for around 3 hours).

On inflating the dinghy, Paul heard a hissing noise and lo and behold, we had a puncture! Not sure how or when it happened as the last time we used it, it was fine, and as far as we know we didn’t snag it when packing it away… Our gorilla tape was in the canoe bag back at home (stupid of us) and we had run out of the Stormsure glue, both of which have done us very well in the past with canoe punctures. In the end we patched it up with a compeed, and some gaffer tape that a kind man gave us (he had some in his cruiser, which was docked next to us).

All looking well again, we set off on a flat, clam and beautifully smooth sail across to Port Bawn on the far side of the island. There is a jetty there also, so we managed to make the whole trip without getting our feet wet, which was great! We did have to be careful on the jetties though, as they were very frosty and slippery.

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Due to our later departure after fixing our puncture, we made it over to Port Bawn just as the sun was setting. Our plan to do the summit walk that afternoon had to wait until Sunday, as we wanted to get the tent pitched while there was still some light.

The island was so quiet and peaceful, with only one cabin cruiser anchored there. Later the cruiser moored up at the jetty for the night. We didn’t meet the people on board until the next day as they stayed aboard.

So we finally got the tent pitched (in between taking sunset photos) and then a campfire going shortly afterwards. We spent the early evening by the campfire, had our soup & bread and toasted some marshmallows (it has to be done!) When the fire died down we retired into the tent for an early night.

It was a cold night – we really needed these extra sleeping bags, and I couldn’t help but wonder how homeless people cope, it must really be horrific for them. Even with the extra sleeping bags and hot water bottles, it was still so cold, and as the temperatures dropped further, I ended up putting the outer layers of clothes I had shed earlier, back on again.

The next morning, we got up to mist, frost and a perfectly calm still loch. By the time we had had our breakfast the sun had started to come further up, and although the mist stayed over the loch, the mountain tops were visible as we hiked up the summit trail. It was a really beautiful morning.

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It’s an easy and short hike to the summit (20 minutes from the beach) and after spending some time taking photos and enjoying the views, we continued on to the ancient burial ground, which was very atmospheric in the frost.

As we continued along the track back to our camp, we met the couple from the cruiser coming the opposite way. Their dog bounded up to greet us, and we called out “good morning” to the couple as they approached. Well, you wouldn’t believe it, but as we came up close to them, we realised we knew them! It was such a coincidence that of all the people who use Loch Lomond, that the only other 2 people on the island were people we knew. It was just a shame we didn’t know the night before, as we could have had a good catch up round the campfire!

After our walk, Pamela & Richard (the couple from the cruiser) invited us to join them for a cuppa, which was great as half of our water supply had frozen overnight! It was so nice to catch up with them, especially in such unusual circumstances.

Paul had a wee check on our dinghy, which was next to their cruiser, and reported back that it had gone down overnight. The puncture repair appeared to be holding, so we hoped that it was just the cold air that had caused it to go down. Paul pumped it back up again and after our cuppa and catch up, we headed back up the summit trail for another look, as the mist had cleared some more. It was even more stunning, the mist was lower by then and the sun was hitting off the mountains.

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On our return, Paul went back to check on the dinghy and it had gone down again! We couldn’t find where it was leaking this time. They say it can still float with only 2 of the 3 chambers inflated, but with both of us and all our gear, we weren’t sure we wanted to test that theory!

Luckily Pamela and Richard were still there, and they offered to take us, our dinghy and all our gear back! It wasn’t quite the ending we expected from our trip, but I think we were very lucky!

So we made it back safely, after a great trip, with promises to meet up with Pamela & Richard again soon (that’s them in the pic below heading off after dropping us back at Balmaha)…

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