Likely Moose

We woke up at our own pace today, there was no rush. All we had to do was be gone by 11 a.m., this was not a problem because we woke by ourselves at around 9. It was the heat which woke us up, the heat of the sun through the canvas of the tent. Every other day so far we had been up before the sun could get that high. We took our time this morning, it was a novelty for us to be able to lounge about and eat slowly, not worrying about getting to the next overnight stop. Jonny went off to charge his phone in the camp sites laundry room while I ate my sweets, which I had decided was going to be my breakfast.

After an extremely long time Jonny returned to find me packed  and lounging on the comfortable grass in the sun. WE then packed the tent and leisurely made our way to the bus stop. From the stop at Flyingthorpe we would then get the bus into Scarborough and from there, trains via London, back home.

We got onto the bus, which was absolutely packed, we deduced that because of all the hot weather we had been having, many of the people on board would have been impromptu holiday makers. By some very good fortune I happened to have the exact fare for the bus left in my wallet. The bus left Flyingthorpe and winded its way up the steep hill which we had walked down the night before. When we got to the top there was another bus which had broken down. Our bus pulled over to see if anything could be done. There was no space on board to put their passengers on board with us, so we carried on, leaving all the passengers on the top of a moor, in the searing heat, with no food and no water. It was at this point that I thought how lucky we were that Jonny’s phone takes so long to charge. The bus then flew back to Scarborough, there were a few hairy moments where I had hoped the driver would slow down a bit (he didn’t), but I suppose he needed to get back to help those stranded.

Arriving in Scarborough we collected our tickets from the station. Our train wasn’t going to leave for about five hours, so after a quick browse round town, we searched out a pub to keep us entertained.  We sat at  table with plugs near it, so Jonny could charge his phone some more. We had lunch, watched the TV, found some apps to play on our phones, read the menu, anything to pass the time until we could reasonably think it time to walk over to the station and wait for the train.

We got on the train, which left not soon after. Again, nothing to do, so back on the apps for entertainment. The highlight of the journey back was probably when the trolley came past with some food on it. I had a can of Strongbow and a Mars bar. A little while later the train went through our home town, Jonny pointed out his flat as the train careered past. We knew this was going to happen, but it still was a bit depressing to know we were about five minutes walk from home and yet the train wouldn’t stop until we were in London.  When the train got into London, we swapped to another train which got us home about two hours after we originally passed through our target destination. All that was left to do was to walk from the station back to our houses. We parted company after nearly a fortnight outside the doctors and went our separate ways.

That was our coast to coast journey.

We had decided that we had to make the most of the early morning breeze before the weather got hot as it had most of the other days. We therefore got up as early as possible, as soon as the light had made its way into the tent. We were up by around half past four. We had eaten breakfast and packed up soon after and just before 6 a.m. we left the Lion Inn and made our way up the lonely moorland pass, which at this time in the morning had hardly any traffic on it at all.

The road was quiet, even the birds hadn’t started making their usual racket yet. We followed the roads and paths along the top of the moors for some time, there are some roads which seam to go nowhere up in the moors, it was puzzling to think about why they were tarmac’d in the first place. A single track road branched off from the main, which we followed for several miles, going further and further from the Lion Inn and what had been our only check-in with the rest of the world for some time by now. It felt that we were just walking further and further from reality. It wasn’t until we made it over the top of another hill much further on, where a new valley presented itself to us, there at the far end of the valley was the village of Glaisedale.

Walking down the hillside and into the valley should have been the most simple of things, we could see our target. It was right there and the map said to just follow the footpath all the way down the hill. It was getting on by now, we had been going for about three hours, the heat hadn’t really picked up but we were ready for a rest. We said that we would stop in the village, so we just needed to get there. Could we manage that? Hell no! The path just seemed to stop at a wall. We looked around for where the path might go round or over, nothing. Every time we thought we had found the path, it would stop at the edge of a cliff. Blind luck and stumbling through fields eventually bought us into the village.

After stopping for a rest on the bench in the village we carried on, passing the railways station which serves the village. Passing the railway station we also had to negotiate the works which were taking place to shore up the railway bridge. We did not have to get too involved in these as we soon followed another path which lead into the cooling shade of some woodland. It was pleasant in the woods. The temperature had started to creep up and it was welcome relief in the shade from the trees, especially as the woods were steeply banked and there was lots of up hill sections. After a mile or so, the path came out of the woods and we followed a country road to, and then through, the village of Egton Bridge. Egton Bridge is a very quiet village, and on such a nice day it seemed wrong, us tramping through, making undue noise with our footsteps and conversation. I’m sure the locals are used to seeing walkers pass through though.

From this village there was one last footpath of about a mile which lead to Grosmont. This was a footpath which was as pretty as Egton Bridge. There were lovely views of the river, and of the railway, with sheep in the fields between. The sun was out and it was getting warm. It was a very pleasant walk and made a nice way of reaching our lunchtime stop.

At Grosemont we sat out the front of a pub and sheltered under a parasol. We ate our lunch and enjoyed an ice cold drink from the pub. As we sat, we watched as the road was closed off periodically to allow steam trains to pass through the village, crossing the main road in the middle of the village. This was the north Yorkshire steam railway, where they filmed a lot of Harry Potter, just to let you know.

After we had lunch, we made our way out of the village. We knew that the next section was going to be one huge uphill slog. Jonny went on ahead, as he did in these situations, and I engaged low gear and crawled my way up the hill. As we left the village the trees and buildings cleared and we began to see more and more of a view. By the time we were two-thirds of the way up we could see the sea on the left, and next to it Whitby. This was a moment I don’t think I’ll forget, the sea! We had turned our back on the sea ten days ago and now here it was again in front of us. It was now it began to click in my head just how far we had come.  We only had a few mile to go now and we were going to do it, I could feel it.

When we got to the top of the hill, we were back in familiar territory, the sea had moved out of sight and we were back on the moors. Another vast expanse of scrub and bracken on the top of a windswept hill, with one track snaking aimlessly through it, that we were following. The path met the main road between Whitby and Scarborough, which we crossed during a gap in the traffic. On the other side, my heart sank, there before us was another valley which we had to descend and then reascend. This valley was never ending, I’m surprised that we’re not still climbing back up the other side of it now! The path down was long and windy, the path back up the other side was no where near as long, but almost vertical. For those who have done the walk and do not remember this part of the walk, that is because you turned into a wood and took the easy way up the side of the valley, passing the hermitage and falling foss, Jonny and I had seen the time and realised that we had only a few hours of day light by then. This may be one of many deviations to the official route that we had taken, but it was the only one which deviated from the spirit of the route, we knew we had to do it to catch up with our shortcomings earlier in the walk, I didn’t really want to, but we had no choice.

At the top of the valley, we could almost feel the end. We knew that it was only about four miles from the end, and it was no that my feet decided to tap out. My socks had formed some sort of solid section, god knows how, and this was scraping the under side of my toes and causing a lot of discomfort, much more than my, now subsiding, blisters. We stopped twice in the late afternoon so that I could rearrange my footwear, but it was no good. I just had to lump it all the way to Robin Hoods Bay. For those interested in the route, we followed the road all the way from the top of the valley, all the way to Flyingthorpe, which was where we had planned to camp.

There isn’t much to say about the last part of the walk, it was down the side of a fairly busy road for the most part. The very last uphill section of the walk was to be on this road, which was narrow and busy and winding. We were constantly having to cross the road to keep an eye out for traffic with the blind bends the road produced. When we reached the summit, we knew we were very close to finishing now. There before us was the whole of the North Sea with no interruptions. This spurred me on to try to catch Jonny up, at least for a bit, before I had to slow down again because the decent towards the sea was killing my knee so much.

Jonny had waited for me at the junction in the road in Flyingthorpe. We walked the half a mile or so together and made our way to the camp site. We walked in to the reception where we were greeted with “let me guess, you’ve just done the walk?” I wonder how they could have ever guessed! It certainly won’t have anything to do with my limp and Jonny’s stance, which took the pressure off his shoulder, which was by now fit to burst. We pitched our tent quite slowly, knowing it would be the last time we would have to do it. By now it was about seven o’clock. We through our things into the tent and made our way down the path which linked the camp site directly to the sea front. This was literally the final few minutes of the walk and it was such a relief to do it without the weight on our backs. Such a relief!

When we reached the sea front, we were right next to the Wainwright’s bar in the town. Next to it was a ramp for the RLNI to use for launching boats. We slowly walked down the ramp until we were close enough for the sea to lap around our shoes. I was expecting some sort of beacon of light to shine down upon us through parted clouds, upon which we would understand the meaning of life (or something at least!). All that happened was that my shoes got a bit wet. All that remained was to throw the pebble, that we had picked up in St. Bees, into the sea. I had a marker pen with me, so I wrote on mine “J & L. Coast to Coast. 2012”, so you will know where that came from if you find a pebble like that on Robin Hoods Bay beach. I was thinking, during the walk, of some cleaver words to say at this point just before I threw the pebble. Words failed me in the end and I just said something like “Good Riddance”, like that one small pebble had been what was weighing me down the whole time, and causing all my trouble. I wish I had said something nicer now, because it doesn’t sum up my feelings about the walk at all, I guess I was tired and irritable.

After all of the necessaries finishing-the-walk procedures were done with, we had officially done it, it was over, so we went to the pub where we had a beer.

We woke early on the penultimate day of the walk. We had been discussing leaving a bit earlier and although we hadn’t made a firm arrangement to do so, something must have filtered through. We were both ready and we left well before eight O’Clock. It was going to be yet another long day, nearly as long as yesterdays walk, but the terrain was going to be much harder. From Ingleby Cross onwards we would be walking in the North Yorkshire Moors, the last section of the walk and, although not the most challenging when it comes to terrain, it is still a very hilly part of the world.

To compensate, we decided to make a detour which followed a different path up the first few hills of the day, we would be walking up the same hills, but taking a more gradual, if slightly longer, route to the summit. Also our old favourite, tarmac, would take a bigger portion of the route. After the early detour, we would follow the main route for the rest of the day. We found out quickly that staying on the main path was probably for the best.

We had been walking for about an hour and a half, our route split off from the road, and we started to make our way up the side of a hill. Using this path meant that we saved some time early on, making good progress. We now had to navigate along a path that was obviously never used. I am sure that if we had stuck with the main track that we would have had no trouble navigating along a path so well trodden, this path, however, wasn’t. I knew we couldn’t be too far away from our correct route because there was another path on the horizon. There were many people climbing this path. This was the main path which we should have been taking. The heat was starting to build up, and on the horizon you could see heat waves. All of bracken was dry to the tough, it clearly hadn’t rained hear for some time. The hill top was arid, and deserted, it could have been a setting for a desert film. We did follow our own path and made it to the other side of the hill soon enough, although it did take us longer than we had thought, we probably didn’t save any time by taking this route in the end.

The next major mile stone was clay top bank. This was a valley between two hills several miles away. To get to it we had to ascend and descend at least three more major hills. Each of which was right on the edge of the moors. When we got to the top of each hill there was an amazing panorama over the flat lands which we had walked across the day before. The weather that day was quite hazy, it meant that the views were restricted to a few miles, apparently on a good day the view would reach out past Middlesbrough (Jonny went to University there and liked to point out that that’s where it was).

Each hill was roughly the same height as the other and each had heathery moor land on it, with sheep grazing. Each one was also very different. One had a large plateau on the top of it which seemed to go on forever, another had a rock formation near to the top which had to be climbed over with no clear way of how to do so, the third had a very steep decent which took its toll on my knees quite badly. I stopped when my knees were hurting and let a group of walkers  pass who were going the other way. They made polite conversation and I told them where I was heading for, they in return told me about a short-cut which would take off several miles at the very end of the day, which I felt a little dubious  about, but I thanked them and went on my way.

When I got to the bottom of the hill, near to the road at clay top bank, Jonny and I stopped for lunch and a break. We had stopped a few times during the morning, but it wasn’t much more than a few minutes at the top of each hill. This was probably the only considerable break of the day. After the usual bag of sweets and a glug of water we carried on up clay top bank.

Making our way up clay top bank was the last major climb of the day, and at half past two I thought that was quite good going, not realising that once we had made it up onto the moorland there would be another slow climb that went on and on for what seamed like an age. The grasses and bracken on the tops of this moor were no different to the others; parched, dying and lifeless. Walking along with no real land marks to guide the way I had to make do with counting the footpaths that branched off of the main track that we were walking along. Where there was an intersection and a chance to put a poster on the footpath signs, the park rangers had also left notices about how it was very easy to start a wildfire in these parts of the moors. I was suddenly getting visions of the terrible forest fires that plague Australia and North America: not scary at all. I put thoughts of such nonsense to the back of my mind, after all, there was no smoke on the horizon.

Still on the same, what seamed like never ending, moor, our route started to take a deviation. It was probably the only land mark of any sort up on top of this hill. It was a dismantled railway line, which had been converted into a bridleway. I turned to tell Jonny that it was the last navigational decision to make today because our camping pot for the night was at the end of that railway line. Hang on? I had to wait for Jonny, something’s not right. I waited for him to catch up, he wasn’t looking good. He was clearly not enjoying this walk. Apparently his shoulders were giving him more than a bit of jip by now and all the pain killers in the world were not helping. There wasn’t much I could do for him. We stopped for a while so he could take the weight of his bag off for a while, but at the end of the day, we still had to get to the end. Jonny told me to carry on and he could catch me up, I had been telling him the same thing for nearly the entire trip by now, so I could hardly refuse him the same. I left him to his shoulders, looking behind every now and again, making sure that he was OK. What else could I do? I couldn’t think of anything else for him. At least we were on the home straight.

The railway track was about five miles long, it followed the contours around the side of the hills and the valley well and there was very little in the way of climbing to do. The path was also flat, and for the most part, clear of loose stones. I felt quite good about the walk, I was starting to get a little bit tired, but then again, walking for an entire day, with very few stops in the blistering heat of the sun will do that to you. I was a bit worried about Jonny though, he was falling further and further behind. I did slow down for a bit, and then Jonny began to pick up again, “The pain killers must be kicking in” I thought to myself. Then Jonny would drop back again. By the time we meandered around the railway and the end was in sight we could tell it was starting to get dark. The grouse and the Lapwings which had been making their distinctive calls all day had started to fade away by now and although the sun was still high in the sky, the heat had started to cool off. The last bend on the railway was a long one, it seamed to make the rim of a very large bowl which we had to walk the long way around. The pub, we could see was so close, but still so far. For Jonny I’m sure it was desperately unfair.

When the railway reached the back of the pub, there was a little path which went up the side of the property, to the road and made for the front door, where we would put our bags down for the evening. This was the path which our friendly walkers had told us about earlier in the morning, I did have to laugh a bit to myself as this was actully the marked route on the map anyway! Walking up the final path was for me, a relief, a slight incline gave my knees a bit of a chance to change pace and really helped me to finish the day feeling good. For Jonny, the opposite. The last thing he needed was to be walking up hill any more and although it wasn’t far, it was enough.

We went into the pub, set up a tab, got our camping arrangements sorted, and had a large glass of Cola each. I just needed some sugar I think. We then went outside and pitched out tents before going back in to get some dinner. When we got inside we sat and had a pint, while we were there  the man who had advised me about blisters, the one leading the older group, he came up and had a chat with us. I think he thought that we would have given up long ago, I’m guessing he thought I’d be the one to jack it in and Jonny wouldn’t want to carry on by himself. He seemed very impressed that we had got as far as we had, especially with our injuries , past and present. We told him that tomorrow was going to be our last day, and how we planned to make it all the way to the sea. He felt the urge to buy us a round, such was his amazement at this fact, I think both Jonny and myself felt a little bit proud of our achievements, having earned the respect of a walker, a seasoned pro, who does this route several times a year. After dinner we made for an early night, the final days walk was approaching fast.

This was the day. Do or Die. If we didn’t make it to our target, Ingleby Cross, today, then we really had blown it. We had read in the spare time we had the night before, in the guide book, that the entire days walk was completely flat, in fact there were no contour lines on any of the maps, not out of omission, but simply because all day the ground was between such a small range of heights, that it never crossed a contour. For this reason it is suggested that people do a few extra miles who need to catch up, also it is suggested because Wainwright himself doesn’t like flat areas, not finding their beauty in the same way that he does the hills and mountains of the Lake District.

Anyway, by now you are probably getting used to the same start: hot day, left at half eight, made our way down a road until we could find a footpath. Same thing, different day. The weather, although still as sunny, was not as hot as it had been yesterday. We made good use of the cool breeze when it came and powered through the first few miles. Infact the first three miles were passed in less than an hour. This put us in a good frame of mind and we continued well for some time.

I must say that I disagree with Wainwright. Just because the natural scenery isn’t a thousand feet tall and covered in pointy boulders that can kill and maim, it doesn’t mean that it isn’t there. On a day like it was, it was lovely to walk through the fields with no distractions of scrambling over rocks, or clinging for dear life to an outcropping. Just to walk through the fields, listen to the birds, and the babbling rivers and brooks. Seeing the swifts fly past and the lambs skipping about; and not from a thousand feet up. right there in front of you. Butterflies dance past, bees scurry around in flower beds. You can see it all and it is just as nice, just as interesting and just as fun to walk through. I’m not saying that I don’t like the Lake’s; I do. Their breathtaking, wild, mysterious, and awe inspiring panoramas from the top of a high point literally take your breath away at times, I just don’t get why there wasn’t the room in Wainwright’s book to comment on the nice and pleasant parts of England, not just the aggressive.

We walked until lunchtime, along some lovely country roads and through fields which were all very nice. Until one got back at Jonny, as he was climbing over a style, his bag got caught on a fence post and jarred his shoulder. Now he had two bad shoulders. This was the start of things to come with Jonny, although I did not notice it at first. When we arrived at our lunchtime halt, Danby Wiske, and its village green pub; the white swan. We had a large drink in here because the sun was starting to get to us a bit now. Along with that we had some lunch. Sitting on the green out in the sun were several different characters which we had already met along the route. A father and daughter duo, we had met in Reeth, a troupe of cyclists, a man who was walking solo, and a couple of different groups of slightly less young groups, one of which had given me the blister packs the day before.

We carried on after about forty minutes. We could have stayed there all day, when not walking the weather is most agreeable, and sitting in the sun with a glass of ice cold cola was heavenly. I did feel a bit jealous of the father-daughter pair, who were staying in the pub that night. Nothing else to do but sit in the sun. Most of the others who were sitting on the green had all left by the time we decided to go. It was just gone two o’clock. Really there is not much to say about the next few miles; more sun, more fields, more heat. We passed through field after field of sheep and tractors and the like.

A bit later we passed trough one gate which was slightly disturbing, we knew it was coming, it was in the guide but still to find a gate adorned with skulls, rats and owls, even on the brightest and sunniest of days was slightly grim. I wondered what this place had to do with death, not one hundred yards further on I got my answer, this was where we had to cross a railway, no bridges, no tunnels, no footpaths. Just a gate on either side of the tracks, and this wasn’t some pokey little branch line either, this had plenty of traffic going up and down. What had this place to do with death? I asked myself, I had my answer. Of course I haven’t uploaded this blog via a seance so you realise both Jonny and myself managed to cross the tracks unscathed. When we got to the other side, Jonny commented on how weird it was to have a footpath crossing the railway in such a manner. We’re all taught at school that the railways are dangerous places and that we should stay clear, here we’re told to cross, with nothing to stop you tripping on the tracks, no warning lights and no aids. Just a sight saying “Stop, look and listen”. More of this feeling was to follow.

The path, we could see on the map, meandered up and down, for miles. From the railway to Ingleby Cross should only have been a few miles as the crow flies, but were were walking for many miles more than that. We were starting to grow a little weary, I was certainly. I knew that when we reached a large overhead power cable we were only a few miles away. When we did finally pass the cable, I secretly celebrated the landmark with a dextro tablet. This probably was all that kept me going until the next hurdle.

The next hurdle was the A19. A very busy dual carriageway, the main way in and out of Middlesbrough, and we had to cross it… at evening rush hour. It was around half past five. We had to pick our moment carefully and go for it, otherwise we would be waiting for a big gap in the traffic until it had gotten dark. Again, you must have realised that we’re not dead. We got across unscathed, well, mostly unscathed. Running across the road I jarred my knee, which was aggravating. From this side of the A19, we had only one small hill and about 15 minutes of walking to do. Here I’d like to be dramatic and say it felt like hours and it was torture, but it seamed to take about 15 minutes, and although I was bushed it hadn’t been any more difficult than any other day.

We arrived at the Blue Bell pub, where there were people sitting outside enjoying there beer. They recognised a fellow walker, and the usual encouraging well done’s were made before we went inside. We booked a table for dinner (it was steak night) and had a quick drink, before we went back to pitch out tent. Tent pitched we enjoyed a beer and a steak the likes of which I haven’t had for a long time (seriously, I had forgotten steak could be that good). During dinner we talked to the two gentlemen who were drinking their pints when we arrived, one of them had come all the way from Australia to do the Coast-to-Coast walk. He was saying how it is one the best things he had ever done. I think I have to agree with him. Like he said, “better than pissing away your money at a bar in Bali”. After they left we were joined by the man we had seen earlier that day at the White Swan, we talked with him for a while about walking in the Lake District, and fishing in Milton Keynes before we settled our bar bill and turned in for the night.

I genuinely thought that today we would make some headway in catching up with our target. We were still about half a days walk behind where we had planned to be. I thought, you see, that because we had no tent to pack away, and the facilities were better, and we’d have had a a better nights sleep, that we would get going a bit earlier and make better progress during the day. When the alarm went off the first thing that happened was the television went on. Instead of making a quick getaway in the early hours we instead sat and watched the weather report… twice. It was quite nice to see the penguins at the zoo in background of the report, not really helpful in getting ready though.

We did eventually get our act together and ended up leaving at about the same time as usual. It was probably the hottest day of the entire walk, there were no clouds at all that I could see and the sun was beating down with a lot of heat right from the get go.

Leaving Reeth, we walked along the side of the main road and soon took the side road for Marrick Priory. This was supposedly a quiet road, that lead only to a farm and an old building, now an educational centre. On the way down this road we were met by many other walkers, we had to move to the side to allow loads of traffic to pass, a heard of cows blocked the road for a while, and a group of squaddies marched through, putting all the walkers to shame. Quite a busy little road for something no more than about a mile long and a dead end.

At the end of the road, by the priory, a new path lead up hill. In the heat the hill was mercifully covered by trees. I was glad of a little bit of shade. The path lead to the top of the hill and the village of Marrick. Here the path levelled out a bit, it undulated, but wasn’t steep in any way. Both Jonny and myself made good progress here while the ground was soft underfoot.

As we walked along the path towards the next village, I found myself slowing down. It was not only the heat of the day, which was getting more and more intense as the morning sun moved towards its mid day high, but also the sweat was causing some rubbing, which was very irritating. Jonny stopped in the village of Marske and we had a break on the bench in the middle of the village. Another group of walkers passed us and made a joke about waiting for a bus and that we were cheating, we took it as the joke that it was meant to be, even though the Marske isn’t on a bus route.

When we set off again that is when the rubbing began to really take its toll. I think this was probably the slowest I walked throughout the trip. Jonny was having to wait for me to catch up so much that he probably spent more of his time waiting than he did walking. A further group of walkers passed us on a country road. They could see that I wasn’t really enjoying myself and asked it I was OK. I blamed my sorry face on blisters, not wanting to go into detail about the other intimate rubbing issues with old ladies. They were very kind and gave me a pack of blister patches. I now had the dilemma of stopping to put patches on in front of  these people, onto a blister that doesn’t exist. I said I would put the patches on when I got into Richmond. I said my thank-you’s to them and tried to show my appreciation but I could tell that their guide was not impressed. He strongly advised me again to sort my feet out NOW. After which, he, and his group left me alone to waddle on by myself (I say waddle because that is genuinely what I was reduced to).

We passed the group (with the insistent leader) while on the top of the last major hill before Richmond. They had stopped for some lunch, while Jonny and I had said we would have lunch in town, and then carry on, trying to get as far as we could on the other side of Richmond before nightfall. Inevitably, after they finished their food, the group now behind us, caught up again and passed in a small wood, which was nicely sheltered. Their leader let the group carry on while he had a private word with me, trying to tell me that I really should put the patches on. By now I had had enough, I realised that they were all trying to be nice and I just didn’t want to make a fuss about such matters, in the end though as it was just him there I said that the rubbing “wasn’t going on in my boots”. He got the hint straight away, he obviously has done a lot of walking and it has happened to him before in the past as well. He told me that there is nothing that can be done for that problem, gave me a good old fashioned “stiff upper lip” pep talk, and then walked ahead to catch up with his group.When I caught up with Jonny, he told me that the leader of the group had told him that “He had seen it so many times before. People giving in and not continuing with the walk, all because they didn’t use blister patches.” Of course he still didn’t know where my problems were. I can’t really blame him, he was only trying to give what would normally be good advice. As the day went on, clearly there was a bit of hillside gossip going on. At one point I was stopped by someone going the other way. “Are you the one with the blisters?” He asked. I confirmed the rumour, still not wanting to broadcast where my injuries were. The man then helpfully gave me directions to the Boots Chemist in town.

Once he had gone off ahead, I caught up with Jonny, who himself was slowing down a little now. We both walked into Richmond at about the same time. Here, we found a supermarket and filled up with supplies, I also got some sun cream, so I didn’t have to keep on borrowing Jonny’s (which was better than nothing but only factor 15, and my hands were going a sort of copper-bronze colour). After having some lunch (a packet of cola bottles for me), we carried on through Richmond and its wonderful olde worlde charming buildings. If I had had more time I would have said we should stay in Richmond for a day or two, explore the town and try a few of what looked like rather excellent pubs.

The road out of town meant climbing a hill, which we just couldn’t be bothered with. Once we had got to the top I knew I really just wanted to rest, let the rubbing heal up a bit. I suggested to Jonny that we take the next camp site that we could find. I think Jonny was beginning to feel the strain on his shoulders. We walked to Brompton-on-Swale, where there is a camping and caravanning park. We pitched our tent by the river, it was still fairly early. We just sat there for a while, before we did anything else. We were still near enough to Richmond and we sat on our phones, checking emails, calling people, sending txt messages. The novelty of having reception kept us busy for some time. Eventually, we made some food, had a wash, I sorted out my wounds as best I could and had an early night (and that’s early by the trip’s standards, probably wasn’t even half past eight!).

We woke to grey skies, Jonny, after opening the tent door, immediately asked where the sun from last night had gone? He started asking a higher power for the sun to come back. By the time we had the tent packed away, Jonny had got his wish. The sun had broken through the haze and looked like it was going to make for a glorious day.

We set off, made out way through Keld village itself. A friendly vicar said hello while he was sorting out the posters on his church, I did wonder how such a small village could fill a church so large. On the other side of the village we cross the river and start to ascend up the side of the valley again. From here the path went round a hill, still climbing, along a path which was very tricky to negotiate. There were several points where there was a near sheer drop to the valley floor and into the river at the bottom. A few times standing on loose stones left my heart in my mouth, slipping quite close to the edge. There was one moment after I slipped where a rock did go over the edge, followed by nothing, no sound of it hitting the bottom at all, like a cheap moment in a bad action film set in the mountains.

The path merged with another about a mile from Keld, and this allowed the path to widen. Also the path moved away from the edge of the cliff face. Moving from the edge meant that we were more sheltered from the little breeze that there was that morning, I soon began to suffer the heat. I slowed down a lot and ended up struggling up the side of the valley on to the moorland above. Half way up I heard voices behind me, a group of (how to put this nicely?), less youthful people, were approaching me fast. I decided that I should move to the side to let them pass. As they passed they were all very friendly, well mannered and the like. I was not impressed with one bloke though, who thought he should rub in the embarrassment of being overtaken by coffin dodgers by telling me “I’ve got a tin knee, ya know?”. Thanks mate.

Making it to the top we had a quick stop and carried on. We went over the moorland above the valley for a while. This was better, the wind was blowing over the moors more, and there was some intermittent cloud cover. The moors gave way to another valley quickly, back in the shade, out of the wind. This valley was very short we were down one side and climbing up the other within what seemed like only a few minutes. We stopped for a quick breath at the bottom of the valley amongst the ruins of an old farm. The climb up the other side, seemed to take hours. In all the time that we were climbing we saw no one, and we had no confirmation that we were going the right way up the valley. The path was not very distinct and I was worried that we were going to reach the top and find we had climbed up the wrong part of the valley. The valley disappeared completely before we reached the top. We ended up trudging over heather and bracken, trying to find a path which alluded us until we had actually gotten to the top. From here all we had to do was follow the track, which was easily big enough for a car to pass down, to the road at the end. At this point we can’t really call it moor land, that seams to nice. It was more a baron waste land, with no plant life at all, just rocks as far as the eye can see. I said to Jonny at the time that if it wasn’t for the track, and the occasional fence, I would have no reason to presume I was even on on earth. It could easily have been the set of a science fiction film. It was a place which left me cold, there was no beauty here at all. I think I would have been more sympathetic to it if the weather matched its mood, but the weather was quite cheery, and the landscape, dull.

The heather returend a lile or so later and was joined by a more industrail scene. Here the remains of an old lead mine tower above the track. I saw the buildings, with the wide track from the road and thought to myself that here is a place which could easily be turned into a youth hostel, much in the same way as Black Sail hut had been in the youth hostel. Then it hit me, water supplies; lead mines, probably not the best mix.

Looking on the map it seemed like we would be on this path for some time, it was many miles to travel until we crossed the road, the first sign of civilisation since we left the Keld. However, it was all downhill, on a large, even track and we were at the bottom very soon. We had a quick stop at the road, where we decided to detour again from the prescribed route, again favouring the route which followed a road meant for all traffic. This was another road, much like yesterday afternoon. The first section had very little in the way of any life, the second, as we began to approach Reeth, began to fill out with farms and villages.

We eventually reached Keld at around four o’clock. We hung around in the village centre for a short while, enjoying a can of fizzy pop, going into the local supermarket and getting dinner for the following day. We didn’t buy much because we knew we would get more tomorrow. We then went down the road to our camp site on the other side of the village. We knocked on the door where we were met by a slightly over friendly man. He told us that he was doing a special offer for all those on the coast to coast walk: a caravan for the same price as a tent pitch. Naturally we didn’t argue. It wasn’t the best caravan I’ve ever seen. There was no plumbing and we still had to use the campers toilets, but these weren’t far away. On the upside, we didn’t have to pitch or take down our tent, we had a TV and a charging point for our phones. We also had a bed each, which was more comfortable than the floor.

On the moors I found myself bored with no beauty to look at or occupy my mind. I decided to think up names for my blisters. Having a caravan made it a lot easier to burst Rebecca and Jemima because I could sit on the door step. Bertha, wasn’t so much an issue today, but the colour of what came out of Lindsay was disgusting, a sort of baby food brown.

Seeming as we had a luxury caravan, and had finished at the luxury hour of four o’clock, we decided to finish off the day with a luxury pint and steak pie at the local pub. A nice way to finish off a day which all in all I didn’t enjoy that much.

I woke up really early this morning, the sun had obviously risen from the light coming through the tent, but I could not tell if it was time to get up or not because my phone was on charge in the farm house. The same was true of Jonny. We both sort of guessed when it was time to get up, and we got it pretty much right. After having a wash in the shack which they called the toilets and getting some breakfast, we knocked on the door, got our phones back and left. It was half past eight on the nose.

Following yesterdays horrible final few miles we decided that we would do as much as we could by road. We left the farm and followed the country road for several miles, no real traffic to speak of, only the occasional tractor or quad bike. A few quaint little villages nestled in the hillside which looked perfectly idyllic in the warming sunshine which beamed down most pleasantly. It was not so hot today, perhaps because it was still morning and the sun wasn’t so high in the sky yet, possibly because we were lower in the valleys and we were not so exposed, but defiantly contributing was the cooling breeze that was constantly blowing and the slight haze in the sky.

Our walk took us off the edge of the map and we had to follow instincts to get back on. We could see the main road and we knew that we just had to follow that to wiggle our way to Kirkby Stephen. The main road was fairly busy, but there was a wide verge for us to walk along. This wasn’t too bad, the grasses were soft, but on some stretches the grass was long and easy to trip over in. Along this road there was only one hill of any really note. It was getting to the top of this hill that we eventually walked back onto the map.

To save some time, and to keep with the ethos of walking by as much road as possible for the day, we took a path off of the road and headed for the village of Nateby. The path was not well marked, very few way markers and several times, in what is only a short distance, we ended up in a farm yard or on a hill with no where to go. We eventually reached the village by sneaking through a gated courtyard of another farm.

We stopped in Nateby at one o’clock. We stopped for a packet of sweets and a quick breather before we started on what was a single road all the way to our camp site for the evening. Back at the main road we could see our path snaking its way up the side of a steep slope and over the top of the horizon. Seeing the contours on the map confirmed that it was going to be a steep climb and finally when we embarked on the road, the road signs 33% gradient made sure that we were fully aware of how steep the hill was going to be.

By now the weather had clouded over slightly, just as well because the hill was hard work to get up. There was no obstacles to climb or rocks to slip on. Nothing to think about, just a constant climb. Jonny disappeared round a bend in front of me fairly soon, which left me by myself to appreciate the wilderness because after leaving Nateby there was absolutely nothing. The occasional car passed, quite a few motor bikes cruised past but they were the only people. There were no farms, no roadside cafés, nothing. When I reached to top of the hill, I looked back. Beneath was the main road, a few villages and Kirkby Stephen, which we had skirted round. And in the distance was the outline of the Lake District on the horizon, now left well behind. Turning back towards the east, there was just a baron wasteland, where sheep seem to have right of way on the roads, and buildings lay rotting and abandoned, the only thing which grows is the heather and the only noises come from the wind and the birds.

That was how it stayed. Eleven long miles with nothing but quiet, no distractions from the views, save the occasional dive to the side of the road to avoid an oncoming biker gang. I kept a tab on how far I had travelled along the map, noting the corners. Every time I went around another corner I knew there would be a long straight and I thought to myself that I’d see a small red dot in the distance (Jonny), I didn’t.  Jonny must have powered up the steep part earlier to have gotten so far in front.
I nearly forgot to mention, as we went over the summit on the road, there was the sign that we had kind of been waiting for… “County of North Yorkshire”. Finally out of Cumbria, this was a kind of mile stone for me along the walk, having successfully traversed an entire county. Just Yorkshire to go.

The last few miles and then there was suddenly something to comment on. I passed a farm which still had people in it, things were working and it wasn’t in ruins. Just past that, a telephone box, which still had a phone it, that was working too. After that the road take a big dip into the valley, the decent was steep and put a lot of strain on my knees, nearing the bottom I was actually hoping for some up hill climbing to relieve my knees from the pain. That was exactly what I got as the path got to the bottom of the valley and started to climb the other side. This was not so bad, the climb was not far, and then it levelled out, the road then followed the contours pretty much all the way to Keld, the village that we would be staying in.

When we left Nateby me and Jonny discussed which camp site in Keld we would rather stay in. I said that we should go for the one further in the village, in case there was a pub or something to do in the middle of all the house (when I say all the houses I mean a cluster of about 20 houses). Knowing this decisioned I was prepared to plough on straight past the first camp site. Literally as I was walking past the gate Jonny came walking around the corner back towards me, he gestured towards the first camp site so I walked in. Jonny put his thumb in the air, so I knew I was doing the right thing. I asked Jonny why we had gone back to the first camp site, on the edge of the village, apparently the other camp site had no one at the door. Jonny had knocked several times, given them 10 minutes, gone to the toilet, come back and still nothing. There loss.

We rang the bell at this camp site and a man came to the door within seconds, he pointed out where to pitch, all the amenities, and told us we could buy a beer from him. I sat down with my beer and enjoyed the weather (the sun had come back out), I told Jonny to do the same, but he decided he wanted to put the tent up first. I felt bad about not helping Jonny put the tent up, but I did say I’d help him after I’d had my beer, and that he should do the same. I was glad of the camp site, sitting in the sun by the river, I’m sure the other camp site was no where near as nice a sight, with such splendid views of the valley walls and the river. I was quite happy until a smug Yorkshire man with a big grin on his face came over to tell us the score of the Luton game. Jonny said he was glad he hadn’t got a television to watch now with a result like that, apparently some of the other games that weekend hadn’t gone his way either.

When Jonny had finished putting up the tent he did sit down and enjoy his beer. We toasted to having reached the half way point, and despite being behind out own schedule, five days in and being half way through a ten day trip, we’re not that far off track.

***Squeemish, or those eating, stop reading here*** That night, after the beer and dinner, I set about clearing up my feet. The compeeds had stopped working and there were some serious blisters forming. I thought I’d best do my best to relieve them. Against all the advice you ever here about blisters, I made merry with a safety pin. Some came quietly, leaving little more than a flap of skin, others needed several holes and was more like surgery to relieve them. There were a couple which somehow or other had become infected, these were not your usual blisters, they had filled with puss. I managed to drain one fine, but the other was a bit of an issue, I got most of it out but the last little bit was staying put, so I squeezed hard, and the last burst over the side of Jonny’s tent. It was quite impressive it you could see the distance travelled. Clearing up with wet wipes on both the tent and my feet took some time. Followed by twenty minutes or so of Savlon application. This was going to become a nightly ritual from now on, blister draining and foot cleaning.