Cut-price weekend

Have you heard of the Premier Inn rooms at £29 a night, that are like gold dust?  Well a few months ago my daughter managed to book some.  We stayed in one when we went to Edinburgh the other week, and this weekend we went to Kendal in the Lake District.  When she booked this, there was a sale on and she got it for £24!  You can't get much better than £12 each can you?  Throw in some free train tickets and you've got a very inexpensive weekend away.


The river Kent runs through Kendal and has quite a few bridges over it.  This is looking from one to another

The 12th Century castle has been in ruins since the 1500s so there isn't a lot of it left now

but there are good views from up here

Kendal has lots of old alleyways going off the main street which are called yards.  Some are just walkways through, and some have shops and pubs down                                  
them

After breakfast on Monday we went to Windermere.  The lake was so still, it looked really beautiful

  
We visited Holehird Gardens which are a two mile walk from the town.  These are fantastic gardens with lots of different areas, which are all maintained by volunteers.  There is no entry charge, just give a donation.  
I took loads of photos but here are just a few.
Some lovely Hosta beds 

this is one of the Alpine houses, I loved the cushions of plants in here

We were just a couple of weeks late to see the Rhododendron and Azalea displays, but there were still a few out

We walked back via Orrest Head which has superb views in all directions and looking down at Lake Windermere

We were incredibly lucky with the weather while we were there because the forecast hadn't been good, but we didn't see a drop of rain and it was quite warm on the Sunday.