Sam and Samantha Thompson have more reason than most couples to remember the day they got married.
At midnight on Saturday, when they expected to bid their friends and family farewell to spend their first night as husband and wife, the legal professionals from Hull found themselves stranded by the flooding in Cumbria, along with their 70 guests.
For many of those trapped by Storm Desmond, rescue couldn’t come soon enough. But for this party holed up at the Inn on the Lake in Glenridding by Ullswater, the flood waters’ retreat meant the end to what had essentially amounted to a 70-hour lock-in. Some guests were unable to return to their own lodgings as water levels rose, and ended up sleeping on sofas for three days in their wedding outfits.
In the words of one guest leaving the hotel on Tuesday morning, it was “the best wedding ever”. Another looked genuinely sad to be waving goodbye to hotel staff. “I don’t want to go home,” she said mournfully. “We will remember this forever.”
Glenridding was cut off after the A592 lakeside road flooded and a landslide hurtled down from Catstye Cam, an outlier of Helvellyn, which poured boulders through the village, smashing through the tourist information centre and flooding every property in its wake. Though most properties had power during their three-day isolation, phone and internet connections went down when Pooley Bridge collapsed at the north end of Ullswater, taking with it all of BT’s communication cables. On Tuesday 200 engineers were working to restore the service, with one local angler using his fishing line to help the repair operation.
Only on Monday did Mountain Rescue manage to evacuate the most vulnerable from the village, using rescue boats and 4x4s equipped with snorkels to power through water over a metre high.
While the wedding bash was in full swing on Saturday, the Thompsons’ wedding guests were largely oblivious to the scale of the drama developing outside, though some noticed the lake water did seem to be lapping up dangerously close to the orangerie steps.
It was touch and go whether the wedding would take place, with the registrar stuck down the road in Aira Force as the water levels rose at lunchtime on Saturday. But George Smith, the hotel’s wedding planner, was determined the ceremony take place, driving his Land Rover through water a metre deep in order to pick up the registrar, along with the flowers. The hairdresser didn’t make it; nor did the DJ. But the Wi-Fi only conked out late on Saturday evening, meaning the bridesmaid was able to run a Spotify disco as the lights flickered on and off during the storm.
On Sunday the wedding party worked off their hangovers by helping villagers build a dam to divert the flooded beck into the stream so the clear-up operation could begin. “It was brilliant,” said Samatha. “It’s really brought our families together. It’s been so good to spend time together. We’ve made our own fun – Sam and I played Mr and Mrs, we put on a pub quiz, played charades, sang, drank.”
Packing to leave on Tuesday, Sam said he wanted to thank the hotel staff and villagers for their hospitality. “On our invitations we asked guests to donate to Mountain Rescue instead of giving us gifts, and we are so glad we did. We’ll be donating too, and thinking about everybody in Glenridding who isn’t as lucky as us, leaving today.”
Elsewhere in the village, a popular location for ramblers tackling Helvellyn along Striding Edge, residents seemed a little dazed but in good spirits. They were keen to tell stories of derring-do – such as the 18-year-old lad who carried an ill woman from her home during the worst of the storm, wading through waist-high water and then returning for her dog – and the irrepressible community spirit, which ensured all 400 residents and guests stayed safe during the worst flooding since Keppel Cove dam burst its banks on the hills above in 1927.
On Tuesday morning the Ramblers Bar had been turned into a free shop, supplied by soldiers from the 2nd battalion Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, who had kipped overnight in Carlisle Castle. With drinking water contaminated, bottled water was in high demand. Baby wipes, nappies, paracetamol, juice and bread were also available free.
The Guardian hitched a lift into the village with Lynn Iredale, practice manager at Glenridding health centre. “It was horrendous. We’ve never had anything like it. It was much worse than in 2009. People are saying it’s not been as bad since 1927, when a dam at the Keppel Cove tarn burst,” she said.
Inside the health centre on Tuesday, GP Lucy Dickinson noted how important it had been to the village to offer medical support during the storm and its aftermath. “Today there was supposed to be a public meeting of NHS England in the village hall to discuss whether this practice should be closed, after the government cut our funding in half,” she said. “The meeting has obviously been cancelled now but we need to get the message out that we offer an essential service, not just in a crisis like this, but every day of the year.”
Ullswater in December was always a bit of a risk, conceded Samatha, 31. “But Sam wanted a winter wedding and I wanted to get married as soon as possible, and we both wanted to get married here, so that was that.”
