Boat Ride

Day 71-74: 27th-30th June, 2019

We decided to go camping and we had no idea where to go. Martin looked up different sites and we decided to go to Coniston Lake in the lake district. While we were there we read a post about Donald Campbell, a British speed record breaker, who died there holding the world speed record for water, but we didn’t know anything about it. This was our first sign from Zach for the day. We were hoping for a quiet place to park and as we drove in, we found a spot that was at the end of a cul-de-sac so we took it. As we had never been before we had no idea how large the camp site was so after we set up, we walked around. As we looked at all the sites, we realised we were in the most tranquil and quiet spot in the whole site and all the spaces were full except the one we got! Another sign from Zach. Later this afternoon, I went to the bathroom to shower and on my way out there was a woman and her little girl walking in. The woman was on crutches so I held the door open for both of them and she said “Ella tell the nice lady thank you.” Well as you now know, Zach’s best friend is called Ella! I had just been thinking about her and knew that Zach was telling me he was with her. When I got back to the campsite, Martin was playing Zach’s playlist and Buckcherry was playing. Well when Ella, Zach, Martin and I used to all work at the farmer’s markets together selling our food, we always sang Buckcherry and we have quite a few videos of Zach and Ella singing a couple of their songs. Another sign from Zach. The next morning, I was sitting outside having my coffee and I noticed out of the corner of my eye, a shadow walk or move straight past me on my right, just as if someone was walking past. It wasn't a solid figure and I could see the whole image but I could see through it as well. I had to take a double take as I KNOW it was Zach. It was his height, his hair, his walk, even though it was just a shadow, I knew it was him. He walked from in front of the van, through the opening of the tent into the van! Yet, another sign from him! We then went for a drive to Ambleside and decided to walk from Ambleside to Bowness and take the boat back. On our way walking back, we couldn’t decide which way to go so we took Rayrigg road instead of Windermere which is the main road. Where we decided to cross the road, directly in front of us, was this plaque for a boy who was 20. We looked up his story. He had been there on holiday with his friends. and late one evening on his way home he got separated from his friends and they couldn’t find him. It took 20 days for them to find his body which was then later found in the lake. When they did find him, his phone was still on him but his service went off at 12:31am that morning. However, when his body was recovered 20 days later, the story mentioned that his phone was still on and no one understood how that could have been possible! While we were reading about his boy, we decided to eat lunch at this pub and found out it was where he was before he disappeared but we didn’t know any of this until we read about him. When we were leaving, Martin suggested that we have a whole day out and not head back too soon, so he bought tickets for a one way ride back to Ambleside. We walked along the lake where the row boats were and saw one of the boats which was named Ella! Yet another sign from Zach!

We got on one of the large boats and it started to drive around the lake, but we realised it was going to Lakeside, the opposite end of the lake to where we needed to go and it was over an hour there and back. We were worried because we only had put a little bit of change in the pay and display machine as we had only intended on being away a couple of hours. As we used to live in Windemere we are very familiar with the boats and area and Martin wouldn’t have made that mistake and we definitely wouldn't have got on the boat knowing it was heading the wrong direction. Zach wanted us to spend a little more time there, so he put us on the Lakeside boat. When we got back to the van, almost 2 hours late, there was no ticket.