A GRAND old lady responsible for delighting tourists for decades was this week marking her 125th birthday.

Iconic Lake District steamer the MV Tern has travelled more than a million miles and carried 17 million passengers up and down Windermere.

It is the longest serving vessel of its size still operating on an inland waterway after being built during the reign of Queen Victoria and launched on the lake on June 27 1891.

John Woodburn, operations director with Windermere Lake Cruises, said: “The Tern is a fine and majestic old lady brought up to the highest standards.

She is even more popular now than ever before. She is an icon and people travel from all over Britain and further afield just to sail on board her.

"We look forward to giving her a great 125th birthday and many more years gliding on the waters of Windermere.”

On Monday morning 29 pupils from Levens CE Primary School joined in the birthday celebrations with Tern staff.

Eight-year-old Robson Medcalf had the honour of hoisting a newly-made birthday flag on board the ship after winning an art competition with local schoolchildren to design the ensign.

Robson said that he had thought about the colours carefully and wanted to include his favourite festive item, balloons, in the design.

“We are really proud,” said Robson’s parents, Paula and Robert, who joined the celebrations with staff and other parents. “It’s nice that the school invited us to be a part of this.”

The children also enjoyed a reading of a book called ‘Busy Little Tern’s Special Day’ which was launched by its author Janet Johnson, who used to work on Tern as the tea lady.

Janet reworked an original story about MV Tern from 1989 after coming across a copy while at work.

“It just laid there, unloved and unread,” said Janet. “I knew the big birthday was coming up so I started looking into this.”

The book has been illustrated by Jayne Rogers, who said: “I was brought up near here. It was nice to do a project that was quite local.”