IT'S raining, it's pouring, it must be August - but rain-sodden tourists have still headed to Morecambe.

The supposed height of summer has seen deluge after deluge with floods and misery across the country.

But Jim Catterall, of the Morecambe Hotel-iers' Association, says that despite the rain, summer has not been a total washout.

"It has not been as busy as last year but it would be wrong of us to whinge," he says.

"We have suffered a little bit some weekends but overall I think it would be fair to say we have done all right.

"The number of day visitors seems to have dropped because people want to go somewhere inside but things are steady and we are looking for good weekends before the season ends."

The rest of the region has not been so lucky with heavy flooding and treacherous roads thanks to an astonishing amount of rain so far this month - 72 per cent above the August average.

A fed-up farmer from Quernmore, who asked not to be named, told the Citizen: "We've never seen anything like it. It rained so hard so quickly one of our neighbours lost 1000 turkeys and two others had water running through their houses."

Another farmer in Halton has reported electrical damage due to the thunderstorms.