Strong winds buffeted parts of Cumbria with speeds of almost 80mph recorded in exposed areas.

Great Dun Fell was battered by gusts of 78mph late on Sunday, while St Bees Head recorded 52mph. Speeds reached 45mph at Shap and in Keswick gusts picked up speeds of 41mph.

It came at the wrong time for residents in Dalston who were visited yesterday ( mon) by Royal Horticultural Society judges, there to decide if the place is a beautiful as ever.

Having received gold awards at the 2014 and 2015 competitions, the village has been nominated to represent Cumbria in the large village section of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Britain in Bloom competition this year.

Alan Dinning, chairman of both the recreation association and the festival committee, told the News & Star that thanks to a team effort – and a 5.30am start by some – they managed get everything back in order in time for the judges arrival at 10am.

“It was cosmetic really. There were leaves everywhere. We had sweepers in [on Friday] and it just had to be this morning,” said Mr Dinning.

“There was basically debris about. Bits of trees and branches and a lot of leaves. It had blown the scarecrows around about the place as well.”

Judges were assessing three main areas: horticultural achievement, community participation and environmental responsibility.

On Sunday the winds added to the challenge as hundreds of competitors took on Total Warrior at Shap.

A Met Office spokesman said the high wind speeds were due to a deep area of low pressure which moved in from the Atlantic and eastwards over the north of the UK.

“That then brought these strong winds,” he said. “It’s just an Atlantic low. We get them quite often in the winter. They are less likely in the summer. We’ll probably see one or two a year during the summer months. This one was quite a deep one so it was pretty windy as far as summer months go.”

Some locations in Scotland broke their all time August wind records.

Looking ahead, temperatures are set to pick up over the next week, exceeding averages for the time of year.

The spokesman said there is the potential for part of the north to hit high twenties – several degrees higher than average – with other parts of the UK that could be hotter than 30C.

Today ( Tues) and tomorrow ( wed) are expected to be cool, with temperatures below average, before warmer weather heads to the county. Temperatures are due to peak on Monday and Tuesday next week.