1We had been looking forward to that weekend in the Lake District for months, and everything that could possibly go wrong did.
2The trouble began on the motorway, where a lorry had shed its load and the traffic simply ground to a complete halt.
3By the time we finally reached the cottage, it was pitch dark, raining steadily, and we had missed the shop entirely.
4To make matters worse, the key was nowhere to be found, despite the owner's cheerful insistence that it would be under the flowerpot.
5We sat in the car for nearly an hour, eating crisps and laughing rather hysterically at the sheer absurdity of the whole situation.
6Eventually a neighbour appeared with a spare key, and we tumbled inside, soaked through but ridiculously relieved to be anywhere dry.
7The following morning dawned clear and golden, almost as if the weather itself were apologising for its dreadful behaviour the night before.
8We climbed the long ridge behind the cottage and stood watching the mist lift slowly off the valley spread out below us.
9Strangely enough, it is the disasters we remember most fondly, not the holidays where everything ran exactly according to plan.
10Whenever we look back at those photographs now, we cannot help laughing at how miserable we were at the time.
11That gloriously chaotic weekend taught us that the best stories almost never come from the smoothest and most carefully planned of journeys.