“There’s no such thing as bad weather, only unsuitable clothing.” ~ Alfred Wainwright, British fellwalker and author of the seven-volume Pictorial Guide to the Lakeland Fells.

Rain.

The rain drumming on the roof of our tent that first night at Coniston never stopped. Sometimes it was a gentle patter as soft as a lullaby, but more often it was a ferocious torrent, as though we had unwittingly pitched our tent beneath a waterfall.

Drifting in and out of sleep to the accompaniment of the storm I spent the dark, dreadful hours between 3 and 5am worrying about just how waterproof my old tent really was. It had withstood the occasional mountain rain shower in the past, but never such a constant onslaught of water as this. Images of us floating down the hillside on our air mattress crowded my dreams, and during those wakeful moments I waited anxiously for the first drops to begin dripping down onto my forehead.

Welcome to camping in Britain, it seemed to say.

In the morning we were awake shortly after dawn and carefully began our inspection. Like survivors of a crash who feel themselves for any broken bones, we felt ourselves for any signs of damp. The sleeping bag in the centre of the tent was dry (oh joy!), but a small moat had formed around the edges where water was seeping through the tent wall below the rain fly. We pulled our mostly dry suitcases away from the sides and quickly dressed for the short walk down to the toilets.

Extracting ourselves from our tent was no mean feat given the fact that there were seven zippers between us and the great outdoors. Clearly any night time trips to the loo would need to be executed long before the need reached a critical stage, and stealth would be difficult. Once outside Mr. H scampered off to the car to retrieve his shaving kit, while I dealt with closing the tent in a mad flurry of zipping. Then, clutching my toiletry bag to my chest, I stumbled groggily down the hill.

My hair had the texture of something that had been chewed by goats, and I futilely tried combing my fingers through it to flatten the worst bits that were standing on end. One of the chief disadvantages of camping is that you have to make an appearance in public before you’ve showered. The only comfort is that so does everyone else.

The interior of the ladies’ toilet block had the ambiance of a grotto. There were no glaring fluorescent lights overhead, just soft daylight filtering through the skylights. Condensation oozed down the walls and slugs inhabited the dark corners. As I leaned over the sink brushing my teeth I tried ignoring the trio of giant slugs racing each other up the wall. Some things are best left until after the first, bracing cup of coffee. Nevertheless, if I were a betting woman my money would be on the front runner, the Brown Bullet, who was already halfway up and going full tilt. There was something determined in her posture, and an unmistakable gleam in her jauntily waving antennae. The other two trailed sadly in her slimy wake.

Before coffee, however, came the trip to the showers. For months we had been collecting 50p coins in a jar. It was a slow process because every time I was in a hurry to catch the bus and needed bus fare I would raid the jar, but eventually we had accumulated a sizeable cache of coins. Now we gathered our coin jar, fresh clothes, toiletry bags and towels and drove down to the showers in the main campsite.

Before going our separate ways into the men’s and women’s sides of the shower block Mr. H advised me to take two 50p coins and not just one. At first I thought he was implying, rather rudely, that I take such long showers that I would need two coins, but no, it turns out that it’s always a good idea to have a backup in case the first coin doesn’t work.

I shudder to think of that first person who discovered that a back-up coin is sometimes necessary, and give thanks to that brave figure back in the mists of time who no doubt stood shivering in a cold shower stall waiting for hot water that never came. This wisdom has been passed down through generations of campers and was handed to me as a free gift, and for that I shall be forever grateful. Whoever you are, unknown dirty camper person, I thank you for sharing your pain so that others might be spared.

And now I have joined the ranks of the initiated, and I in turn pass it along. Always take two coins with you into the shower stall just in case one of them does not work.

The showers were better than I had expected, and not a slug to be seen anywhere. There were more stalls than at some of the campgrounds where I had camped in the US, and they were large enough that clothes and towels hung on the hooks did not get wet from the shower spray. The water was hot, and there was plenty of it. In fact, it went on slightly longer than I wanted it to so that I was forced to stand there waiting for the water to shut itself off before I could dry myself and get dressed. Even a nice warm shower can become an exercise in patience when you don’t have the power to control when to turn it off.

Finally the gushing water stopped and I was able to begin the delicate balancing act of drying myself off and getting dressed without dropping any of my clothing onto the wet floor or getting my feet dirty on the little grains of mud which had been tracked into the stall by my Wellies. Based on recent research which shows that being able to balance on one leg for over 20 seconds is a good indication of your dementia risk, I think I can say that so far my brain is doing all right.

By the time I was dressed and back outside Mr. H was, of course, already finished with his shower – not because he’s particularly speedy, since his water would have run as long as mine – but because once again there was no line on the men’s side, whereas there was a line on the women’s.  Some things are the same the world over.

At last, showered and dressed warmly in clean clothes, with hair as neatly arranged as possible, we were ready to join our friends down in the main marquee to begin our day. We left our towels spread out over the car seats hoping they might dry out before the next morning, then joined the steady stream of people heading down through the mud toward the marquee, where hot tea and a delicious breakfast awaited. Suddenly the day seemed very good indeed.

The rain was not a constant presence all this time. There were actually some lovely spells when it would suddenly stop, the sun would come out, and brilliant sunshine would beam down. During these brief respites trees would drip, birds would sing delightedly and steam would rise from the tents. The world sparkled. Then the clouds would come scudding back across the sky and block out the sun, the world would grow dark, and the rain would return.

Through all of this our British friends smiled and talked and laughed. We shared meals and did the washing up under the giant marquee and the adjacent tents which housed the kitchen and clean-up areas. We drank cup after cup of tea.We even had scones with strawberry jam and thick Devonshire cream.When the ground around the marquee grew squelchy with mud boards were laid down for us to walk on. People trooped in and out with umbrellas and Wellies, and everyone acted as though camping in a downpour in one of the rainiest parts of England was no big deal.

One of our friends, a veteran of many of these group camps, told us that it was actually a positive thing to have it rain on the first couple of days of camp. “The hardship draws everyone together,” he said, which is a characteristically British way of making the best out of a less-than-ideal situation.

But it was true.

For the first two and a half days of our camping trip it rained most of the time. The moat inside our tent grew deeper and seeped closer to our suitcases and air mattress. By the end of our second full day at camp my old tent, beaten and battered by the elements, finally gave up. A tear in the roof let in an uncomfortable amount of rain water right onto the centre of our sleeping bag, and Mr. H and I were forced to quickly swap tents.

It was the sort of experience which could easily have made its way onto my top 10 list of Worst Vacations Ever, but it didn’t. As our friend had said, hardship draws people together, so here is what I remember of that afternoon when I discovered the puddle in the middle of our sleeping bag and went to tell my husband that we had a problem.

I remember that I found him peeling potatoes in the kitchen tent wearing a plastic apron with a cartoon chicken talking on the telephone emblazoned across the front. I remember the surge of affection I felt when I saw him looking so at ease and happy doing something so mundane.

I remember the friend who walked up the hill with us and helped us take down one tent and put up the other. He never said one word about feeble American tents – he just got busy and helped us tackle an unpleasant, unwanted task, so that we were able to finish before it got dark and the rain returned.

I remember the friend who just happened to have brought two spare sleeping bags with her that we were able to borrow while ours dried out inside our car.

And I remember the closeness and camaraderie we had that evening as we talked and laughed together. The rain tried to spoil our camping trip, but it didn’t succeed, and in typical British style our near disaster became merely an amusing anecdote.

Our first few days of camping were typically English. It was wet. Hordes of slugs advanced on our tents like an invading army, and every morning we checked our shoes to make sure none were hiding inside before we put them on.

The British don’t let a little rain stop them; they just put on their rain gear and splash on out there. They don’t pack it in and head for home. In the end they turn the rain into a positive rather than a negative. Perhaps that fundamental difference in approach toward camping is the greatest distinction between the two countries. In the US we expect the best and are disappointed when it is anything less. In the UK we expect the worst and are pleasantly surprised when it’s anything better.

That is how what began as a rather wet, difficult camping trip turned into one full of joy and laughter. And I shall tell you all about it, and reveal some of the other ways camping here “isn’t the same” as the US, next time.

Until then remember – there is no bad weather, only unsuitable clothing.