Lake District. Mountain Hiking & Ghyll Scrambling & The Polar Plunge.

Ello.

I spend this weekend in Lake District England which contains over 10 lakes and the largest lake in England, Lake Windemere. We stayed in a tiny village called Hawkshead which had ice cream galore!!! I ate so much ice cream this weekend...it was crazy! Hawkshead is also the home of Beatrix Potter who wrote Peter Rabbit! Fun Fact.

Thursday we left the school at 6pm on a 4 hour bus ride to Lake District. We got there at 11pm and went to sleep! Woke up Friday morning and got breakfast at the hostel...yes i had to stay in a hostel again, but this one was the best one yet but still awful. Friday afternoon me and my friends, Jessi, Sara, Molly, Clay, Katie, Chelsea, Susan, Alex, and Sarah went to a larger town called Ambleside which was on Lake Windemere. We took a ferry cruise around the lake which was alot of fun. It was an extremely un eventful day, filled with jokes and ice cream. We had a ton of fun though. We got back to Hawkshead which sits on a smaller lake in the district and had dinner at this UHMAZING pub. We had homemade lasagne...YUMM!!!...best meal i have had here. We went back to the hostel and everyone decided to have a party in my 8 person hostel room haha. We ended up going to sleep around 2 am! haha...so much for getting sleep before a day full of saturday activities!

Saturday we wake up, have breakfast and hit the moutain! We take the coach to Langdale and got suited up and hit the trail. First we went mountain hiking. Think about one of those mountains that you see and look at and you think oh that would be so much fun to climb or hike..i want to do that...but that is so steep, there is no way that I could climb it. That was this mountain. Haha! We hiked for about 3 hours...My knees were about to fall out of their knee caps. It hurt so bad! But it was the most incredible scenery that I have ever seen and such beautiful paths. We got nearly to the top of the mountain and topped a hill and inside this valley there was a beautiful frozen lake with rocks a moutains all around us. Some were topped with snow and other purely green. We sat and admired the lake for a while and then headed down. On our way down we followed the waterfall that was fed by the lake all the way down the mountain. This is what a Ghyll is. It is a mountain stream that goes down that mountain and has pools of water and waterfalls and streams. It is amazing. This was the Ghyll that we Ghyll Scrambled later that afternoon. This is just antoher term for hiking/rock climbing a stream/waterfall. We got down the mountain...after my ankles were shot and had a little sack lunch and some hot chocolate at the cafe at the bottom of the mountain. We also got in our waterproof clothing and got ready to Scramble!! There were 4 groups of 8 people...so many!!! But I was sure to get the best instructor and group! Haha! His name was Charlie and he was halarious! We were the first group to get out and the fastest...which was perfect. I had the best group. Ghyll Scrambling was the funnest thing I have done in a very long time. We took about 2 hours to get up and then we reached a large waterfall and Charlie set up the ropes at the top for us to rock climb it! I was the first to go and just as I got harnessed in all of the other groups showed up so everyone watched me climb the waterfall first haha! It was really funny. After we were all done we walked back down the mountain and stopped at one of the deepest pools of the stream and Charlie said that if we were feeling adventurous then we could jump in. Everyone immediately said no because it was cold and alot of people had slipped in and gotten their legs wet..But I immediately said "HELLS YES!!!!" So Charlie strapped my harness to a rope that was attached to his harness so he would be able to pull me out. Everyone counted down and I leaped in and it was the most freezing and liberating and exhilarating experience!!! I screamed and laughed and shouted and it was amazing!!! I tol everyone that they absolutely had to do it and live their life and a few people said they would and they did it and then everyone else started to want to do it because it looked so much fun! Everyone loved it so much and thought it was the most exciting thing ever! We called it the Polar Plunge! Not an inch on my body was dry...and keep in mind that this water was coming from a frozen lake from the top of the mountain! Haha! We continued down the mountain...soaking wet and ripped our clothes off (in the bathroom) and put our change of clothes on as fast as we could! We went back to Hawkshead and went back to the restaurant as Friday night and had a great dinner...i got a Broccoli and Cheese and Potato Casserole! yummmmay! Saturday night everyone decided to have a party in our room again Haha! We went to bed at 12 this time.

We got up on Sunday and ate breakfast and got on the coach to come home. We stopped at Keswick and went to see another beautiful lake and had lunch. We then returned back to school at 6pm. I was wonderful weather this weekend! It was a perfect weekend! I miss everyone so much. I wish that I could see yall and talk to yall more. We are only 5 hours apart for two weeks and then I have daylight savings time. Weird...i know. I hope that all of you have a great week! I will be going to London this weekend...i cant wait. I love London so much!

I have a test this week and we are having a Twilight/Harry Potter Party in the bistro and a St. Patty's day party too! hahaha! busy week...but I have been studying hard daddy! I love you so much and I will talk to you soon. Dont forget that you can click on the pictures if you want to make them bigger! I hope you enjoy all of them and my post!

Your daughter, sister, best friend,

Ali

Me Climbing the waterfall at the end!!! Awsome!

Me in Hawkshead

Me swinging in Hawkshead!

Me in Boweness...a town we stopped in on our cruise

Sail boat on Lake Windemere

Me and Molly! Lake Windemere

Me and Alex! Lake Windemere

Me on Lake Windemere!

Me on Lake Windemere!

Me on the Mountain Hike

Me and Jessi on the mountain

Me and Kerry on the Mountain

Patti, Kaitlin, Karry, Jessi, me, Whitney, Brandon

(Brandon and i share a mailbox :)

Me on the top of the mountain!! There were some CAT 5 winds up there!

Me and Kerry at the frozen lake!

Me at the Frozen Lake!

Mountain Hike Group

Polar Plunge Group!!!!

Right after Polar Plunge!

Scramble Group in front of the waterfall we climbed!

Katie, Corby, Alex, Susan, Clay, Matt, Me, Jessi

Roomies in Hostel!

Chelsea, Sara, Alex, Molly Susan, Katie

Me, Jessi

Me Scaling the Waterfall!