Blisstocracy

The High Way and the River

2011-05-17T13:17:00.000-07:00

A walk on the
Dales High Way & the Teesdale Way - 2011

Day one Thursday 21st April – Saltaire to Ilkley – 7.5 miles
This walk originated in the depths of a horrible winter out of mental desperation to get out there and also to send a firm message to my body that bad backs, knees, and shoulders would no longer be tolerated. The bad back, knees and shoulders did have a fair comment however in that the belly really was getting too large – and the brain made the bold statement prior to departure that the belly would be deposited out on the moors. Grumpus said I couldn’t do that - it could slither up and attach itself to someone else.

The Dales High Way was developed by Tony & Chris Grogan as a high level alternative to the Dales Way, running from the Grogan’s home in Saltaire to Appleby – with the intention being that walkers could reprise their walk at the end on the Settle to Carlisle railway. My intention had been to walk over the Easter bank holiday and to snuff out the royal wedding. So I needed a few days more walking and chose to head onto the Pennines at High Cup Nick (one of my favourite places in the universe) and then follow the Teesdale Way into Darlington.

Whether my knees would be strong enough to carry my 17 stone plus my 2 stone rucksack became immaterial in the preceding days as I broke a tooth and eventually decided that I needed some emergency treatment on the day of departure. Happily my dentist fitted me in early on and sorted things out and Grumpus deposited me at New Street station for the somewhat packed 12.10 train to Leeds – which seemed to take forever. The little train from Leeds to Saltaire was much quicker – only allowing me time to plaster on sun cream and put boots on.

Titus Salt’s mill would have been interesting to visit, but I just wanted to get going – it felt good to be striding purposefully along the Leeds Liverpool Canal and then up through the boulder strewn and ancient Trench Wood. The weather and the ongoing forecast were astonishingly spectacular.

Emerging into the open under Hope Hill – which the guide presented as an option to climb (declined) - the path meandered over a horseriding track – not easy to walk on – and then around Weecher Reservoir. The water levels were very low, but on the local news later on, I discovered that this was because of works being done on the reservoir, not the lack of rain. These works prevented me from taking the short cut onto the moors, but not too sure that I wanted to encounter the particularly angry looking cows in that direction. Bingley Moor was a welcome return to windswept moorland. Somewhere round here, I received my first text from my friend Susie – with Grumpus being abroad, I had given her my itinerary, and our exchanges of text during the walk proved comforting.

Bingley Moor became Ilkley Moor, and I parked myself in the centre of the Twelve Apostles stone circle – my reveries punctuated by several stringy runners, and an assortment of birds chirruping, whirring, and clicking in the heat haze. With views down Wharfedale lost in the haze that was to mark the first three days, the descent through Ilkley Crags and past White Wells was tough on the knees, but I was happy enough to edge my way past the throngs out in Ilkley to the Riverside Hotel. In my book on Africa, homo sapiens sapiens had eventually made an appearance, and it turned out that DNA evidence had shown that all humanity had derived from one woman. The book also made the point that a key reason why humans had been successful was because of their efficient means of losing heat – although a drawback had been the amount of food needed to feed the brain …

Day two Friday 22nd April – Ilkley to Skipton – 11.5 miles
… sleep is also good to feed the brain as well. Craziness in the pub – evidence of which was on show in the bar in the morning – had kept me awake until about 1am. Oh well. Everything aches and I’m tired but I’m off at 8.15 up through Ilkley and onto the moor. It was sure a beautiful walk along the ridge, but the “long views over Upper Wharfedale” announced by the guidebook were not available due to the haze.

If I had been in any doubt about where I needed to turn off to descend the ridge to Addingham – and it did seem to come on me sooner than I expected – the appearance of the Hound of Windgate Nick would have alerted me to the fact that something was happening! Post walk investigations revealed that no one actually knows who put the hound there, but it can be seen for miles around.

The green meadows of Addingham and the subsequent arrow straight Rombalds Way were pleasant enough, but I found myself coming down the tree lined avenue into Skipton (past the old toll house where a young girl asked me if I was going fishing) before 2pm, and I started to realise that the distances that the guidebook had suggested were a wee bit short for a day’s walking. Oh well – I ended up having a pint and checking into my B&B and having a nice bath before walking around Skipton trying to find somewhere to watch the Forest match. Didn’t find anywhere (and they ended up with a nervy 3-2 win over Leicester) but ended up having sausage, mash and real ale in the Narrowboat with the Skipton old giffers club. Quite pleasant.

Day three Saturday 23rd April – Skipton to Malham – 13 miles
Sitting in the Lister Arms at Malham waiting for the YHA to open, I felt the need to write a string of invective about the bank holiday crowd that had taken over the village. The bank holiday was the reason why I had not been able to book into a B&B at Malham, leaving the YHA as the only alternative. Malham turned out to be an ordeal to get through.

I had lost the sun on the climb up to Sharp Haw, but the boggy descent and the amble alongside Flasby and Hetton Beck were pleasant enough. I indulged in a brief stop at the Angel Inn before heading up Moor Lane to be greeted by the view of the long haul up to Weets Top. The climb up was punctuated by meeting a man from Leicester who thought he was near Grassington. Fortunately he did have an OS map, and so I spent some time explaining to him that green lines are footpaths; black lines are field boundaries; brown lines are contours etc. The climb was a bit of a slog, but whilst the book said I would be able to see Ingleborough from Weets Top, sadly not much was visible in the haze. The world turned seriously weird from Gordale Scar onwards – lots of people intent on having fun, but the banks of wild garlic just coming out at Janets Foss was a minor compensation.

Day four Sunday 24th April – Malham to Stainforth – 10.5 miles
No sleep till Stainforth! Not quite sure why, but I couldn’t get to sleep at Malham YHA. I shared the room with one man who was doing the Pennine Way for the seventh time (in 11 days) who left at 5am (although he was very quiet) and another guy who turned up at 11pm and immediately started snoring. I dread to think what it would have been like had the room been full to its capacity of 8 people. That Malham YHA wasn’t full on a bank holiday weekend perhaps says something about YHAs. Even the bonhomie and sharing of walkers tales that had been present the last time I had stayed at a YHA did not seem to be there in Malham. Quite sad. I wouldn’t have been there if I could have booked in elsewhere.

During my lack of sleep, I worked out that my first four days should have been three – stopping at Addingham, Hetton and Stainforth – giving me reasonable distances to travel each day. That way, I would have stopped in quieter places; I wouldn’t have gone into Ilkley at all; and Skipton and Malham would have just been pleasant breaks en route. Anyway I might have got about an hour’s sleep around about 4am, but I left about 8am. After a rather sorry breakfast, there didn’t seem to be much point in hanging around, even though I only had 10 miles to go today and the weather was overcast. The Cove was not visible from the path as I started, but this soon started lifting as I got to the top (were the clouds a final downer on Malham?). I have always liked the Dry Watlowes Valley, although it was interesting to come out of it to the left as opposed to the Pennine Way which cuts back to the right. The sun came out as I climbed, as did views behind to Malham Tarn and Pen Y Ghent.

One view gave way to another down to the Settle valley. The path then skirted under the noble Attermire and Warrendale Crags, passing through fields of fluffy cows – the first with horns (I got through that field a bit quicker – I really am a wuss – who could be worried about these cuddly bunnies?), the second without.

Prior to catching the plane to Milan, Grumpus rang on my descent into Settle, from where I could see Woodlands – the chateau where we had celebrated my 50th birthday the previous December. The path I was coming down had seemed steep from over there – and it was! The Lion Inn in Settle had been done up, which meant that my roast beef Sunday lunch was expensive – but welcome nonetheless. The after lunch amble down the Ribble to Stainforth was very hot and relaxing, punctuated by two lambs lovingly posing for the camera and occasional pauses by the river.

I had been looking forward to a nice peaceful meditation by Stainforth Force (watching the salmon jumping as promised by my guidebook – hmmm – maybe not) … ouch – not a bit of it. I knew there was a problem when I got to the beautiful green meadow where the path comes away from the river because it had become a caravan showroom, full of competing shiny beasts – most with banks of solar power cells throbbing happily in the afternoon sun. My ambitiously planted “alrights” to the various people situated within this home on the range seemed to fall on deaf ears – but even all this did not prepare me for the Butlins that Stainforth Force had become – sizzling sausages on barbeques, ghetto blasters pumping out the musical equivalent of Britain’s Got Talent, bulging red bodies trooping down from Stainforth with bulging bags of Carlsberg, and with the voices of many progeny echoing around the Force. The horror the horror. No doubt any self-respecting salmon would be miles away, and that’s what I did … well as far as the Craven Heifer in Stainforth …

Day five Monday 25th April – Stainforth to Chapel Le Dale – 11.5 miles
… which was a great place to stay primarily because of the warm welcome from Patrick and Jane, the new proprietors for whom nothing seemed to be too much trouble even though it had been a busy bank holiday evening. I was honoured to be the first person to sign into their guest book.

This was a wow day – revisiting Feizor and its environs, an exhilarating approach and climb up Ingleborough followed by an enjoyable stay at the Old Hill Inn at Chapel Le Dale (and Forest winning again – just about!).

Two notes in the guide book had attracted my attention – “sharp climb up stone stairway, veering round to right over steep rocky edge. Take care” and “very steep descent – hair raising at first sight – take care – avoid in icy conditions”. Hmmm – well unlikely to be icy conditions today, but of course this had amplified itself in my mind, and I needed to ring my Yorkshire friend Richard to reassure myself that I was coming back alive from Ingleborough. He said his kids had done the climb with him many years ago – but then kids know no fear. Oh well - I was resolved to go for it rather than take the bad weather alternatives.

The weather was bright and cheerful leaving Stainforth and only one plastic bag of discarded cans marked the bacchanalia that had taken place at the Force yesterday. Perhaps my assessment of the multitude had been wrong?

The climb up to Smearset Scar was an opportunity to reminisce back to my 50th birthday walk, and I could not resist photographing “Molly’s Stile” – previously I had been carrying a friend’s child over the stile which she had not appreciated. I texted Molly’s father Matt who had no idea what I was talking about. Someone was burning plastic in Feizor and occasional smelly black clouds were drifting up the valley. Although it was still early, I had a cup of tea at Elaine’s Tea Rooms in Feizor just because they were there.

Ingleborough came into view shortly after the climb out of Feizor – looking fairly innocuous at that range. The sunshine invited a break at the Clapper Bridge, and after the climb up from Crummack, I resolutely escued the bad weather alternative path. There had been a lot of tracks jutting off the main path, but the Grogan guide came into its own once again – providing exactly the right information to locate the path. I was carrying OS maps, but the effectiveness of the guide was such that I never once needed them on the Dales High Way. Strangely whilst the weather blowing over Ingleborough and towards me remained blue skies for most of the day, it looked decidedly rough over Pen Y Ghent. I could not use the weather as an excuse not to go for the steep rocky edges and hair raising descents of Ingleborough.

Traversing remarkable acreages of limestone pavement, I joined the three peak track for the gradual ascent of Simon Fell and took a breather to contemplate the final climb up Ingleborough. I could see people on the skyline of the climb – always a bad sign for me, but it looked doable. The final climb and the vertiginous drop to the right was unpleasant, but over very quickly, and I was onto the moonscape plateau of Ingleborough, quite heavily populated it being a bank holiday Monday.

The views from the top of Ingleborough were staggering – across to the Irish Sea, Coniston, the Langdales, the Howgills (basking in the sun), Whernside, the Ribblehead Viaduct, Great Shunner, Pen Y Ghent (resolutely still hanging on to the cloud). The view made the three peak challenge quite clear and some people at the top outlined it to me – starting at Horton Post Office, up and down Pen y Ghent quickly, the 8 mile trudge to Whernside, then over to Ingleborough and back down the track I had come up to get back to Horton – a total of 25 miles (or so they said). Doable for me? Maybe.

The weather front we had been promised was also very clear on the top of Ingleborough and seemed to be closing in whilst I was there – so I knew I had to face the descent. And what a descent! If I had had any hair, it would have been raised. At first, the path just disappears and is near vertical. But I had seen the alternative path from higher up and that looked even worse, so I had to go for it - step to step and rock to rock, and with a lot of embarrassing heavy breathing to dissipate my terror. But then by half way down I was able to joke with people coming up – and the relief at the bottom was so intense that I sat down and watched people climbing up the way I had come down.

As I walked away from Ingleborough, I started to wonder whether I’d have been able to get up it this way if this had been the first sight I’d have had of the vertiginous sections. The football had started as I was recomposing myself at the bottom of the descent. By half time, Forest were 2-0 up against Bristol City, and most of the other results were going our way as well. By full time I had reached the Old Hill Inn and Forest had surrendered this lead but had just about held on to a 3-2 win. The Old Hill Inn had something of the League of Gentlemen about it as I entered – partly because the rooms there are particularly dark and partly because the pub wasn’t open and so the only people there were me, two other people stopping overnight who were also doing the Dales High Way, and the landlady. But in fact, it was a good place to stay with somewhat gastronomic food.

An update on the Africa book is needed. As if to go with the general clouds over Malham, the passages I had been reading there had been about the onset of the ice age, how it had made Africa hotter and led to the development of the Sahara. The people who had lived on the edges of what had previously been rain forests generally made their way to the Nile Delta. Subsequent chapters detailed the spread of the four main African language groups – Bantu being the main one, and the book highlights the achievement of a common language across such a wide area; the use of iron on the continent – but interestingly not for weapons; the birth of civilisations – the Pharoahs and the subsequent Meroe civilisation. Whilst the book suggests that these cultures took their hierarchical structures from external European cultures, it suggests that many features of African culture were indigenous, and at the Old Hill Inn, it left hanging the question as to whether a non-hierarchical culture had developed in Africa …

Day six Tuesday 26th April – Chapel Le Dale to Sedbergh – 16 miles
… and it had. At Jenne-jeno on the Niger Delta, there is evidence of a culture of artisans that existed symbiotically with each other. With constantly changing environmental conditions requiring different approaches to ensure survival, different groups had formed separate “towns” which had supported each other. And significantly, no artefacts were discovered that suggested that any one group was in charge over the others – they all performed different functions at different times.

At breakfast, the landlady at the Old Hill Inn told me how she and her husband had ended up there ten years previously. Both she and her husband had been chefs – and hence the excellent food. Having looked at another pub in the area which she didn’t like, she had said to her husband that the only pub she would consider would be the Old Hill Inn. In the next couple of days, the Old Hill Inn had come up for sale, although they had had to do a lot of work on the place. I decided that the place did have a certain amount of style and resolved to return …

… although perhaps not as soon as I did. Almost in Chapel Le Dale, I found that I had walked off with my key and so had to return. Because of that, the second time out, I resolved to take the short cut towards Whernside cutting out a mile detour. The weather changed today – there was a strong wind and a forecast of rain, and I had further to go today, so I didn’t want to hang around.

The optional path up the side of Whernside said a very strong NO to me – it looked like a stiff climb and it was very windy. I had seen the Ribblehead Viaduct for the first time from the Pennine Way, wondering what it was, but the views towards it from under Whernside were probably the best views available. I had read in the book my fellow hotel guests of the night before had had that every sixth pillar in the viaduct had been strengthened so that if one section gave way, the remainder would remain intact.

Blea Moor Junction was very blea – windy and bleak, and I had to put my coat on for the first time on the trip in order to retain warmth. After the Settle to Carlisle railway dashed off under Blea Moor, a stiff climb past Force Gill was unexpected, but it lead to a broad grassy path on the top – largely shrouded in grey clouds, but with occasional blue patches over Dentdale.

A wide grassy path took me over the top of the moor, and I mistook Artengill Viaduct on the valley floor to the right for Dent Head Viaduct – under which I had walked when doing the Dales Way in 2008. The path skirted round and started descending quickly on a rocky path to the beautiful Dentdale, flecked by sunshine. At the bottom, the path met up with the Dales Way, and I recalled the day of heavy rain I had had there in 2008. I was pleased with my progress – having done 9 miles in 3½ hours, and so I rewarded myself with some fish and chips at the Dent Brewery Tap.

The section from Dent to Sedbergh was particularly notable for the developing views of the Howgills, the destination for the next day, and the gradual appearance of the climb up into them. I was pleased to have been able to cope quite comfortably with the extra distance covered today – and bought more sun cream in Sedbergh in anticipation of good weather tomorrow.

The African book explained to me how the sickle cell gene had been a genetic response to dealing with malaria, and that sickle cell anaemia is caused by both parents having the gene. It also explained that lactose intolerance is a particular feature for adults of African origin. It suggested that these things, and the incidence of disease in Africa, are the result of a longer evolutionary period.

Day seven Wednesday 27th April – Sedbergh to Newbiggin – 11 miles

The cheap and cheerful Bull Hotel served up an arty breakfast – poached egg on circular toast and circular bacon. Beautiful weather outside, and a beautiful walk into the Howgills beckoned – a day better explained in pictures.

The climb up into the Howgills had looked vertiginous from Frostrow but was not – it was quite steep and hard work, but astonishingly beautiful – as were the views back to Sedbergh and Dentdale.

For several years, Grumpus had told me not to use the word “Glorious” and this had been explained on Facebook by saying that I used the word legs astride like Henry 8th. Hmmm – I decided that the climb up into the Howgills – accompanied by the bright early morning sunshine – was proper Triple G Henry 8 Glorious.

With spectacular views back over Dentdale as far as Whernside, the Howgills were displayed in their full majesty – slumbering giants, fold upon fold of cuddly curves. Their bowl shapes – steep sided at the edges with wide grassy plateaus on the tops – meant occasional steep climbs, such as up to the top of Calders – a climb that came into view as I skirted the flank of Arant Haw. Having negotiated that climb, I rested at the top thinking that I had reached the Calf, but the whitewashed trig point further on informed me that that this wasn’t the case, so I moved on and rested there.

I knew that this was another short day, so I dawdled around as much as possible. Views developed of the Pennines to the east – Cross Fell and the ping pong ball on Great Dun Fell clearly twinkling in the sunshine; Lakeland to the West; and as the day progressed to Orton Fells to the North.

In fact perhaps the ridge walk to the northern end of the Howgills got a little boring – one ridge summit after another. But just before the final descent to Wath, I sat for a good while and enjoyed the view – the stretch of the Coast to Coast walk from Shap and the M6 to Nine Standards Rigg in the Pennines. I remembered a different day in 2007 when walking the Coast to Coast when a deluge had caught me near Sunbiggin Tarn, and I had arrived somewhat damp at Kirkby Stephen (and how on the following day, the weather had been so bad that I had not been able to see Nine Standards until a few yards from them. Today, my camera zoom managed to find the Rigg, even if I couldn’t see them with naked eye).

On the descent into Wath, I passed the skeleton of half a sheep, wondering what had happened to the other half – which I encountered shortly after. Clearly some carnage had happened here at some point!

The final section along the road from Wath to Newbiggin was generally tedious – the sun burning the back of my legs and it seemed much longer than it looked on the map. I eventually reached the Tranna Hill Guest House where I had a beautiful room – with a bath – yippee! With the nearest pub in Ravenstonedale being 2 miles further, I needed to eat at the guest house - the food was good, but it had to be early because the landlady was going out. So – having watched some snooker with some elderly fellow guests, I was in bed early.

Day eight Thursday 28th April – Newbiggin to Dufton – 17 miles
With the Dales High Way running out at Appleby, today had an end of term feeling – although I still had another 3 more days of walking to Darlington to go. But another fantastic day weatherwise.

Walking up from Newbiggin, I soon reached the Coast to Coast – right on the section where it had been shelling it down back in 2007. No C2Cers out today, but Sunbiggin Tarn was particularly beautiful in the early morning sunshine. I missed the turning to go up Great Kinmond – perhaps dazzled by the views back over the Howgills, but found my way easily enough onto the deceptively hard climb up through the limestone pavement.

A work phone call brought me back down to earth when I got to the top, but the gentle amble down to Great Asby took me back to where I had been. Beautiful meadows and wide views across azure skies. Horses - but no cows as promised by the guide book – or at least not until I went through Clockfield Farm which the guidebook announced as a “busy working farmyard”, but which actually seemed like something of a mess.

Asby Gill was dry and the pub at Gt Asby was shut (it was too early), so I moved on pretty quick. An annoying road stretch led me to the delightfully meandering walk alongside Scale and Hoff Becks, on whose banks I made many stops. I also paused briefly at Ritter Mill, but it being private made it inconducive to having a break there. Even having to walk through fields full of cows (my experience of cows coloured by a previous encounter with a frenzy of frisky Friesians) did not cause me any concern on a day like today. These cows were singularly uninterested in me.

The walk by Hoff Beck became even more delightful and I should have stopped, but I had resolved on taking a break at the pub in Hoff – which turned out to be closed. So I walked a bit further on, and parked myself by the river there, starting to listen to Tchaikovsky’s Pathetique. Can it get much better than this?

I joined the “Bliss Way” (the path I had previously followed from Shap to Appleby) at Bandley Bridge just as the final emotionally drawing movement came in. Not entirely sure how the cow trying to get onto the back of another cow in the next field I had to walk through quite fitted in with Finale – Adagio Lamentoso – Andante.

The final stretch into Appleby under the gaze of High Cup Nick – and then I was walking up the slightly unpleasant approach into the town. This was the end of the Dales High Way, and the final use of the wonderful Grogan guide, the excellent companion that had nestled in my pocket since Saltaire. And a fine walk it had been.

But all Appleby was to me was a trip to the Post Office to post surplus weight home; and visits to the fruit shop to buy fruit; the sandwich shop to buy a sandwich for tomorrow; the newsagents to buy some nuts; and a camera shop to buy an extra memory card for my camera (CARD FULL – too many shots to show Grumpus). The plethora of absurdly oversized cars picking kids up from the school on the road out of town (have these people not heard of buses?) resolved me to get out and off the road as quick as possible.

Now using an OS map, I found my way over some beautiful paths over fields – negotiating more cows on the way - to take me to the secluded and wooded Dufton Ghyll and then up into Dufton. I rewarded myself for my 17 miles with a T bone at the Lamb Inn (surprisingly very few walkers about on a sunny bank holiday weekend) but tomorrow was going to be a longer 21 mile day to Middleton.

It was also going to be “Poly Styrene” day. I was annoyed that there had been no mention of the death of Poly Styrene on the BBC morning news. I remembered going to the 1978 Rock Against Racism gig in Victoria Park with X Ray Spex, Steel Pulse, Tom Robinson and the Clash. Although Poly Styrene had been pretty weird and her contribution short lived – she had been an integral part of the monumental cultural journey that lifted us out of the racism, sexism, homophobia and dull grey post hippiedom of the 1970s. That period certainly was formative in my life big style.

How can anyone imagine that the UK PLC Hollywood fairy tale officially planned for the next day in Westminster Abbey could possibly have the same kind of positive impact on the lives of ordinary people? I had partly been out walking at this time in order to blot out the royal wedding, but I had forgotten that when staying at B&Bs, it’s probable that I’d be turning on the morning news to catch weather forecasts – and so I got the wedding coverage full frontal. Media frenzy had been trying to make it into an episode of history – my notes (admittedly written after a couple of pints in the Lamb) say that the formation of the Great Rift Valley; the migration of peoples from the Sahara; the spread of the Bantu language across sub-Saharan Africa – these are all history. No one could convince me that the marriage of Prince Wills to “commoner” Kate (David Starkey had said in an excellent TV programme the night before – so common that Wills had been able to land his helicopter on her parents’ lawn) was anything other than just saturation media coverage.

So I decided that instead Friday 29th April was going to be Poly Styrene Day.
OH BONDAGE - UP YOURS!

Day nine Friday 29th April – Dufton to Middleton – 21 miles
Tough tough day – 21 miles and the weather changed – a cold headwind on the climb up into the Pennines, and then bits of rain on Falcon Clints – and as well as that, I didn’t sleep well for some reason. And I knew how tough this section was from my Pennine Way walk in 2006. On that occasion, I had run out of water around Wheysike House and it had been tough to get to Middleton.

I left Dufton at 7.30, in bright sunshine but fighting hard all the way up the climb against a strong cold wind blasting down at me off the Pennines – telling me over and over again to go back. I remembered a day in 2005 when I had left Brow Farm to head the other way on the Pennine Way and had eventually been forced back by sheeting rain and headwinds off the steep climb up to Knock Old Man. Today it wasn’t raining and I knew that once I got over top, it’d calm down – so I sang “The Day the World Turned Day Glo” to myself and forced my way on.

High Cup Nick looked foreboding – and it was much too cold to hang around – so I pressed on, and the wind started to ease off as I got away from the Cup. It got quite pleasant by the time I reached the bridge over Maize Beck. It seemed like the weather was picking up as I crossed the Fell. A man coming the other way told me it was a “nice day” and I enjoyed a nice rest after 8 miles in the sunshine at Cauldron Snout overlooking the Tees – my companion over the next three days.

The weather worsened as I hacked my way around the ankle twisting Falcon Clints, and I started to feel drops of rain, not heavy but after the excellent weather of the previous days – a bit depressing.

Having sandwiched near Langdale Beck, with a doe eyed dog staring at me, I pressed on to Cronkley Scar – where I was dive-bombed by a pair of what I was subsequently told were probably Wagtails protecting their ground nests. Interfering with their nests was the last thing on my mind – around here I discovered I had run out of water again, and there was still another 6 miles to go. Great - I thought I had brought enough. Oh well – nothing to do except press on.

At least the sun started to come out, and the walk is very scenic along the Tees – past High and Low Forces. But all I wanted was to get to Middleton – which just never seemed to arrive. When I did get there (at 4.30pm – pretty good for me – 21 miles in 9 hours), I checked into the first pub available and downed a pint of water in one to the astonishment of the barman. Happily not much evidence of the Westminster fairy tale in Middleton (despite the name) – and the bath at the Belvedere Guest House was most welcome. And a hearty dinner at the Teesdale Hotel restored my strength for the next day.

Day ten Saturday 30th April – Middleton to Barnard Castle – 11 miles
To describe a river through its ever changing moods and movements is perhaps not easy. Best to leave it to the pictures again, but then that could get a little boring to anyone who was not there. Let’s just say that the Tees is a beautiful river that takes on many characters. I had previously been at its source under Cross Fell before, although this walk didn’t start out there (is it possible to walk from Cross Fell along the Tees to Cow Green?). Difficult to imagine how it became this gushing river from its boggy beginnings.

My ongoing companion was also the Teesdale Way – theoretically it had been my companion from Dufton, but the Pennine Way had a greater claim until Middleton. The Teesdale Way works well – ducking and diving back and forth to the riverbank – occasionally taking the walker off somewhere else, but always returning you to the river to see its many moods. And the river could not have been displayed to greater perfection in the weather I was going to get over the next three days. And given that I was not going far on any of the remaining days, I had plenty of opportunity to sit and relax by the river.

The first five miles were an opportunity to get the measure of the river and the path – sometimes broad - sometimes a small sliver balanced delicately on the river bank, festooned with lots of wild garlic – now with its white flowers opening – and bluebells – and sometimes a grassy edge to a field overlooking the river. On one dive down to the river, I met two bird experts with a big camera who told me that yesterday’s dive bombers had been Wagtails – yup, that’s how I knew! Their identity was clear from the dive bombing and the tuft on the back of the head.

I took my first break on a grassy bank at the side of the river just before the path made its first detour up the hill to Eggleston. The views at the top – over Teesdale to the South and back to Middleton and back to the Pennines to the West were good but not Triple G and maybe only Henry 2 or 3, and the busy road walking down past Eggleston Hall made me question the value of the detour. At Eggleston Bridge, I had the choice of walking on either of its banks. The eastern side looked attractive, but I opted for the Kirk Inn at Romaldkirk on the western side, a short walk further on.

At the pub, a lively team of walkers informed me that I was now in Durham, not Yorkshire – not sure if that explained the acid wit of the barman. Perhaps befuddled by my lunchtime pint and the afternoon sun, I headed off from Romaldkirk on the wrong path, although this did mean I got to meet a pair of sad donkeys (actually they could have been quite happy, but donkeys always look sad). I got it into my head that the best way to regain the path would be to find the river and head along its bank. I did find the river, but it was clear that heading along its bank at that point would have involved wading through undergrowth on a near vertical bank – so I had to find my way back up to the path – which after careful consideration of field boundaries, I did. The river took on another character at this point – skittish and gushing and the path became a slippery sliver perched high on the river’s edge.

Crossing the River Balder at Cotherstone, I disturbed a family of ducks. The mother duck took off and flew off down the river leaving her ducklings to fend for themselves. Ducklings can swim quite fast. The third Forest match on my journey started and we quickly established a 2-0 lead on Scunthorpe – although managed to make it 2-1 by half time, just to keep the nerves jangling.

I rejoined the river after another detour at Pecknell Woods, just where the dismantled Bowes to Barnard railway line crossed the river. The two stout ends of the railway stand sentinel on either side, but the bridge has long since gone – a railway line that would no doubt be very scenic, but stands no chance of being reinstated.

I was still early, so I sat by the side of the river just before Barnard Castle. Here the river was slow and lugubrious, with birds playing some sort of chicken run game, where they took a long run up and then skitted along the length of the river, inches from its surface.

The Deepdale Footbridge over the river into Barnard Castle was a bit bouncy but it afforded excellent views down to the castle along the river. I found the Homelands Guest House (an excellent room in the back garden, but my most expensive stop) as Forest ran out 5-1 winners (meaning that for Forest to lose their place in the play offs would require Leeds to score 6 goals away to QPR and Forest to lose at Crystal Palace – neither of which came anywhere close to happening. Not much chance of winning the play offs, but it’s a bit of end of season excitement - as it happened didn’t do us any good – we played badly at the City Ground, and then despite playing better than Swansea, lost the second leg at their place).

Day eleven Sunday 1st May – Barnard Castle to Piercebridge – 11 miles
And more of the same today. More beautiful weather. More beautiful river.

Not far to go today, so I left about 9am - edging round the castle, which I had walked round some time last year with Grumpus. In the meadow as the path came out of Barnard Castle, someone was camping in the far corner, with bottles, cans and a shoe strewn all around – some party. Quickly back on the river (albeit walking past a sewage farm on the other side of the path), the early morning sunshine was delicious reflecting off the water. A group of dog walkers were looking at yet another fleet of ducklings (sorry - I had to look that up – the collective word for ducklings is fleet – apparently a pair of ducks is a “brace”; diving ducks are a “dopping”; a group of flyings ducks are a “plump”; a group of ducks on water are a “paddling”; and brooding ducks are a “flush” – well there you go).

Over Abbey Bridge and the river started to flow through a gorge lined by rectangular limestone slabs –difficult to get photos of it because most of it was hiding behind trees. For some reason, I wrote in my notes that it was like Nepalese river the Dudh Kosi. Looking at photos on the internet now, it doesn’t look anything like that. Something in the way it flowed slowly, darkly, silently and brown through the rocks made me think of something from my youth in Nepal. All staggeringly beautiful, and even more so at the aptly name “meeting of the waters”, where the River Greta, which I had encountered in 2006 in Bowes when walking the Pennine Way, joined the Tees. A big sign told me that I wasn’t allowed to go down to the river, but I ignored that (not for the first time today) – a confluence of smashed square slabs – like some ruined cathedral. It’s difficult to imagine that the slabs are not man-made, but I don’t think they were.

And then suddenly up and out into a violent yellow field of rape, a field of llamas and heading up to a field path overlooking the valley occupied by two large black cows (with horns). Coming back down to the river, the path crosses the Whorlton Suspension Bridge – built in 1831 when crossing it cost 1d for any “foot passenger” (more for horses and cows). Nowadays it is advised as a “weak bridge” – certainly it seemed quite “flexible”, and the road bit was made up of wooden slats, and you can see why it is suggested that only one car should cross at a time.

The path then dives into another stunning riverside ramble through wild garlic and bluebells. An overgrown old house stood sentinel at a vast promontory sticking out into the river – if it had ever been occupied – what a stunning place to live! Then the path doubles back and climbs up to fields and it all changes again.

I decided to take a detour to hit the pub in Winston – easy enough to find the path over the fields, but the pub was shut (that it was shut on Sunday lunchtime on a bank holiday weekend suggests that it might have been shut for good). Still the Church of St Andrew, perched on the side of the hill, seemed worth the detour, but it meant I had to join the busy A67 for a stretch before the path headed off from a layby back down to the river. Another dismantled railway line (this one Darlington to Barnard Castle) crossed the river at the West Tees Bridge – this time the bridge remaining intact, if overgrown. Walking the other way afforded a small section of tree lined path before once again hitting the A67, and although the map suggested that the path would come away from the road, I didn’t find it, and it wasn’t long before I was walking into Gainford, where two pubs meant that at least one would have to be open.

It was the Cross Keys I hit first in Gainford, and the sign saying “a welcoming atmosphere” was promising. Hmmm – the bar was full of people watching the Man Utd/Arsenal match so not much welcome there, so I went outside in the sun. One of the smokers was staggered at the size of my boots (not quite sure why), and he had never heard of Saltaire (“is that in Lancashire?”). As per normal, the post pint afternoon stroll in the sunshine was a little woozy, but I only had three miles to go.

This section of the path was festooned with signs saying it was a private riverbank, and so – red rag to a bull – I descended to it for a long and beautiful rest in the sun. So beautiful in the warm and hazy sunshine – not unlike the river me and Grumpus had found some years ago between Slovenia and Croatia. Sadly it was not far to Piercebridge and the George Hotel – yippee – the woman behind the bar had heard of Saltaire. In fact, she knew someone who lived in one of the flats in Salts Mill. It was a beautiful evening by the river, but now only a few short miles to go.

Day twelve Monday 2nd May – Piercebridge to Low Coniscliffe – 5 miles

My original plans suggested that it was only 2 miles from Piercebridge to Darlington Station and that I would deal with these before the 10.13 train back home. Turned out that it was actually about 9 miles. I had booked on to the 12.11, and I wasn’t confident of getting there in time. So I checked bus times, and worked out that I’d be comfortable if I walked 5 miles to Low Coniscliffe and caught the bus from there.

A short stretch of river walking akin to the previous day to take me into High Coniscliffe (where the pub was very definitely closed down) and then the river changed again in this final stretch – now a broad and slow moving mature river, meandering around south of Darlington. I was keeping up a pace conscious that I needed to catch the bus. I could have taken a detour to cut off some of the final loops in the river, but I didn’t and was rewarded with some lovely final river walking and wild vegetation in a loop that saw me walking briefly in completely the wrong direction. A broad straight stretch and then I was under the A1M (audible some time earlier) and then I was there (although I found one last spot to head down to the river to say goodbye.

Of course, I had to wait about a half hour at the bus stop, but that gave me time to put things away and adjust myself. I was glad I didn’t take the walk on into Darlington because there didn’t look like there was anything to see, and I was in good time to catch my train.

Two great walks – blessed by some of the best weather I’ve walked in – and I was really pleased that my back, knees and shoulder just about stood up to the pressure. Tough to get back into work again – and I have now made an arrangement with my friend Richard to do the Three Peaks Walk with him in September – 21 miles and three tough climbs … can’t wait.

Pennine Way 2006

2008-06-18T11:32:00.000-07:00

A title would have to meander across half a page to encapsulate walking the Pennine Way. It would have to encompass the challenges, the aches and pains, the journey into self, the breathtaking scenary, the humour, and the splendid isolation. Pennine Way 2006 will just have to do.

This journal was written nine months after the event. Writing it was an epic trip in itself that helped me to relive the event (without the aches and pains). Hopefully on paper, I have matched the outstanding nature of the achievement with appropriate levels of pomposity and verbosity.

I was defeated by the Pennine Way in 2005. Argh. Having tromped from Edale to Malham in wet weather gear with Grumpus (my beloved, who makes a, possibly somewhat reluctant, appearance later on) at Easter (Black Hill particularly living up to its name and reputation), I then squelched from Malham to just north of Hadrian’s Wall in late July, and the sheeting rain and wind having forced me off Cross Fell, I eventually decided that soggy feet disappearing into endless bleak moorland bogs was just not fun.

But I was not to be defeated. Having consulted Piers Corbyn, solar flare interpreter and soothsayer extraordinaire, I knew that July 2007 would be the time to renew my acquaintance with the Pennine Way. Armed with my weather predictions, I had booked my B&Bs in February, and anticipation mounted throughout the year.

THURSDAY 6TH JULY - GETTING THERE

As I trained up from Birmingham to Berwick, I questioned whether I’d have the stamina to cover 265 miles with a heavy pack on my back. The train, bus from Berwick to Kelso, and bus from Kelso to Kirk Yetholm all had a Heart of Darkness feel that I was getting deeper and deeper into wilderness. Well not really, bathed in sunshine, the approach to Kirk Yetholm seemed not unlike my far off Peak District destination.

FRIDAY 7TH JULY - KIRK YETHOLM TO USWAYFORD (14.5 MILES)

I woke up to the sounds of woodpigeons, sheep and occasional cows and knew this was it guys. The Pennine Way welcomed me with a brief spot of rain, but after an obligatory photo at its start, and one of a Scottish flag at the last house in Yetholm to remind me where I was, I wandered off into the Cheviots.

Beautiful green rolling hills quickly took me up into emptiness and meandering views. I felt tired already as the path circled gently up through fern patches on Green Humbleton, but found my rhythm on the subsequent spongy green paths before the first real climb of the day up Whitelaw, and the long slope up the Steer Rigg buttress. With the vertical ascent of the Schil coming into view, I paused briefly to chat with a woman who was also staying that night at Uswayford Farm. Resting at the top of the Schil, the solid bulk of the Cheviot loomed up ahead, with the startling ascent to Anchope Cairn running down its flank. I guess the guidebook didn’t mention that climb because most people would be coming down it and it would seem irrelevant that close to the end of the Pennine Way.

Treading the first Pennine Way flagstones, I played cat and mouse trying to take photos of birds flitting from fencepost to fencepost. I then held my own personal two minutes silence for those who had died in the Tube bombings thinking it sad that they would never enjoy the spectacular valley below me.

I was asked by someone at the mountain refuge to look out for Dave coming up from Byrness. Not sure what I was supposed to do when I found him, but hey – the Pennine Way is made for meaningless but community spirited encounters. The climb up to Anchope Cairn involved putting one foot in front of another, and was crowned by the views, a sense of achievement and a realisation that I might have the stamina to do this. The detour to the Cheviot summit allowed me to leave my pack for a breather, but there wasn’t anything much up there, and so I whistled back quickly, meeting Dave on the way.

The walk down from the Cheviot to Uswayford was a dull relentless trudge, marked by a worrying twinge in my right knee. The turn down to Uswayford was a welcome relief. However, the forest, full of flies emerging from the impenetrable blackness behind the mossy banks and twisted tree roots, was a steep downhill detour of 1½ miles, and seemed to go on for ever.

At the idyllic but cheap and cheerful Uswayford Farm. Mrs Buglas, confirming what the guidebook said she’d do, told me that it wasn’t the farm, the pun being that there isn’t anything else for miles around. She didn’t seem like the sort of person it would be wise to cross. But she made me (and the other person who I’d met previously) welcome and regaled us with stories about the perils of sheep and goat farming. The latter were British Toggenburgs, as I have subsequently found out, apparently the most popular breed in the UK, but rare enough to me.

SATURDAY 8TH JULY - USWAYFORD TO BYRNESS (15 MILES)

Waking up early, I walked back up to the trail in sunshine and apprehension about my knee holding out. Windy Gyle lived up to its name, and shortly after I met the seven day man (doing the Pennine Way in seven days, originally planned six but got ill). Although he paused for a chat, he was gone pretty quick.

The first part of the day worked its way through big sweeping vistas alongside the fence border between England and Scotland, and was dominated by the ever present but gradually-more-distant Cheviot. And I finally managed to photograph a bird on a fencepost. Following a brief attack of second day tiredness and a short flurry of rain, I was joined at the mountain refuge by an Irishman working off a hangover.

Having now been joined by the fellow traveller I had met at Uswayford, we skirted the Chew Green Roman remains, prominent on the map, but barely evident on the ground. The bleakness of the landscape suggested this wouldn’t have been a posting relished by legionaries. The path dipped in and out of Scotland and then up Ogre Hill, aptly named because of its steepness. Walking over wooden slatted paths, and chatting to a squaddy who’d been sitting in a field since early morning, we then made our way down a steep wooded descent into Byrness, finding the Byrness Hotel as it started to rain. My encounter with the windswept but cuddlesome Cheviots was over. Pleasant enough it had been as a start to the walk. I was glad I’d done them in two days rather than the one the guidebook suggests some people do.

Built initially as a pub for workers building a nearby reservoir, the Byrness Hotel was now just a B&B, but a comfortable enough one. We shared dinner with a couple of bikers attending a biking rally in Kielder Forest. I retired to watch the Portugal/Germany World Cup Play Off match, not a match I particularly remember now.

SUNDAY 9TH JULY - BYRNESS TO BELLINGHAM (14.5 MILES)

Third day and it all might have gone wrong here. It started out raining, eased off, then came again. So there was some squelching today. Plus I was suffering – feeling quite exhausted at various stages, and my knee was suffering. And apart from towards the end, it was a pretty nothing stage whose only purpose was to get from the Cheviots down to Bellingham, unless one likes relentless forests.

I set off early in drizzle and full wet weather gear, past the cute Byrness Church behind the Pennine Way notice board, reassuring in that they appear several times on the trail. The walk along the River Rede was pleasant, but the unceasing trudge along the happily signposted forest walks was only mitigated by their less squelching solidity. I should have been thankful for the two scenic detours off the main tracks, the sun emerging during one, but the dense wet undergrowth added to the water in my boots. The Forestry Commission welcomed Pennine Way Walkers, but my wet feet didn’t reciprocate the feelings.

Branching out of the forest brought different challenges. A squelch up Brownrigg Head, leading to a steep descent in rocks and mud, followed by an equally steep climb up Padon Hill, punctuated by an encounter with a Texan whose cellphone had been stolen from a campsite shower block. The guide book told me that Padon Hill was named after a Scottish Covenanter who held services there to avoid persecution. His congregation must have been hard, particularly if they enjoyed the same heavy rain that greeted me there. I can't complain. I had only 1½ hours of rain on the whole 265 miles of the Pennine Way, and this half hour batch stopped as the terrain changed into windswept moorland.

By then my legs and feet were hurting, and I felt exhausted. It didn’t help that the path became vague, but the scenary and weather brightened up. My spirits were lifted by a radio 4 programme about the Berlin World Cup final venue reclaiming its architecture from its Nazi origins, followed by a battling but unrewarded performance by Rafael Nadal in the Wimbledon Final. The descent into Bellingham seemed positively sunny.

Not sure that Bellingham or the Cheviot Hotel particularly welcomed Pennine Way walkers. I went to bed to watch Zidane’s sending off. In writing this, I had to check who France had been playing in the World Cup final. The anti-racist statement that got Zidane sent off seemed more memorable and more important than Italy’s uninspiring performance.

MONDAY 10TH JULY - BELLINGHAM TO TWICE BREWED (15 MILES)

My concerns from the previous day were forgotten as I crossed the Tyne in bright sunshine. A walk through the beautiful rolling green farmland around Shitlington Hall was punctuated by a detour where I lost the path. I was joined by a guy from Manchester whose girlfriend was ferrying his luggage for him. He was going as far as Greenhead and so we parted as I took a break shortly after the place where my previous year’s exploits had ended in soggy bogs. This year’s contrast could not have been more dramatic.

2005 had seen me, and a fellow walker, miss the path turning in Wark Forest. This had meant a lengthy walk in the rain along forest tracks with concerned compass checks indicating the wrong direction. Eventually finding the Pennine Way signpost at the northern end of Wark Forest had been a relief.

The right path through the forest was more exciting, the relentless conifers relieved by the gap at Hawk Side. My spirits were lifted considerably by the first sighting of Hadrian’s Wall where the Pennine Way emerged back to the forest track where we had missed the path in 2005.

With the wall ahead and dry weather, the dull trudge between Wark and the wall went by much quicker than it had done in 2005. Despite the sharp climbs and descents on the wall, my spirits were high. My knee required me to take the three steep descents slowly, but on reaching the Twice Brewed Inn, despite discovering that my knee was "scrunching", I realised that I had now acclimatised my body to walking with a pack on my back. So I rewarded myself with a long soak in a bath in a more expensive room.

TUESDAY 11TH JULY - TWICE BREWED TO HOLMHEAD (7 MILES)

Something of a rest day, I dawdled along the wall, resting at both the first and second quarries, contemplating the three long days to come. Having seen the wall the previous year, it perhaps wasn’t as interesting as the first time round.

Leaving behind the views up to Crag Lough in the East, the South Tyne Valley, my destination of the next day, started to emerge further West. The wall’s constant ups and downs were none too friendly to my knee. This was partially solved by the addition of a support bandage bought from a kiosk at the second quarry, an aid I found surprisingly useful over the next few days. The sun came out in earnest as I arrived quite early at Holmhead Guest House.

With some time on my hands, I visited Thirlwell Castle, and then walked along the railway to Greenhead. Back at the Guest House, I met up with some Norwegians from Stavinger, who lived in a housing co-operative, interesting to me due to my working in that field. They told me that the cost of living in flats is more expensive in Norway than houses. The B&B had a particular Norwegian connection, with the proprietor Pauline Staff having been an air stewardess in an earlier life. It turned out that the other people staying there were also Norwegians, from Bergen. Apparently, so I was told, Bergenese are noted for their arrogance, whilst Stavingerese are noted for their puritanism.

Having enjoying an artfully crafted dinner over a half bottle of wine, Pauline asked the Norwegians to translate a none too complementary review of her allegedly fussy guest house. The tourist board had also suggested she dispense with some of the copious decorations, curios and information on the Wall (of which she was a particular student) to make the place a standard B&B. To me, its character, the home made muesli and fresh kippers the next morning, and Pauline’s cat, whose name I can’t remember, all made it a great place to stay.

WEDNESDAY 12TH JULY - HOLMHEAD TO ALSTON (16.5 MILES)

I have a confession to make, no doubt shocking for Pennine Way purists. In 2005, I had diverted from the path near Alston to go along the disused South Tynedale Railway to take advantage then of a slightly less soggy path. This had meant that I had enjoyed the beautiful Lambley Viaduct before rejoining the Pennine Way above Lambley. I decided I wanted to see it again this time. So I missed out on a stretch of the trail the guide book describes as not a scintillating one. Apologies to purists!

Setting off from Holmhead, crossing the railway and a golf course, I climbed up Blenkinsopp Common, remembering its stamina sapping sogginess of last year. I got lost again on Hartleyburn Common, where only frantic map and compass checks had returned me to the trail in 2005. This year the abandoned bus in the first house after the Common showed me the way. The diverted path at Hartley Burn (a raging torrent last year, this year a minor stream) meant I lost my way again, and ended up on the road down to Lambley.

Last year I had walked in front of the beautiful Lambley Station, with the viaduct winding across the valley in its front garden. It was now a private house, so I took the detour under the towering stone pillars of the viaduct. As I rested there, a red squirrel flitted by, momentarily sizing me up, and vanishing as soon as he had appeared when I moved to get my camera. The walk down the railway was punctuated by regular visits from jets screaming up the valley and various bits of abandoned farm equipment.

Walking through the old Slaggyford railway station, a bizarre poster screamed religiously about the perils of Sunday Pleasure Trips. Shortly after Slaggyford, I rejoined the Pennine Way on a nondescript section, but the approach into Alston proved scenic. Having caught the post office just before it closed to post home surplus weight, I checked into the same room I had had the year before at Alston House just as it started to rain.

THURSDAY 13TH JULY - ALSTON TO DUFTON (19 MILES)

A bright sunny day, the climb up Cross Fell, the dazzling views across Cumbria to the Lake District, and day one of the second test against Pakistan on the radio. Who could ask for more?

In 2005, I had been forced back by torrential rain and wind before I finished the steep climb up to Knock Fell. Getting from Dufton to Alston by public transport so I could continue the next day had involved the lengthy process of getting a lift to Appleby, a train to Carlisle, and a bus to Alston. All purged from memory as I set off from Alston in brilliant sunshine along the South Tyne.

The beautiful walk from Alston, punctuated by stiles and overgrown dewy fields and by the ever present Tyne, led to the quietly contented village of Garrigill. From there the path labours interminably up and across towards Cross Fell, along a miner’s track, described by the guide book as an old corpse road, due to a previous lack of consecrated ground further down. The bleak and empty engulfing open spaces were a contrast to the test, just starting on the radio.

I reached the isolated Gregs Hut Mountain Refuge for lunch, recording my presence in the visitor’s book. Having doggedly picked a way through the boggy section below the summit, I reached the top of Cross Fell, the highest point on the Pennine Way, and the second highest point in England. The guide book advised me that the weather would be the making or marring of my Cross Fell encounter. Right enough in 2005, but this time round, the weather was fine but windy, and the views across Westmorland and to the Lake District staggering.

The wind on top of Cross Fell did not invite a lengthy stay. Edging over the stony Cross Fell moonscape plateau, I picked out its southern descent leading to the boggy Tees Head, thankfully bridged by Pennine Way flagstones. The windbreak on the summit of the pimply Little Dun Fell did afford a brief rest, and then the path skirted up to Great Dun Fell under its giant ping pong ball radar station.

I lost the path on the approach to Knock Fell, not appreciated by my now tired legs. The only way I could find Knock Old Man, heralding the Dufton descent, was by checking all the stonemen. Eventually finding it led to the steep descent that had defeated me as a climb last year.

I think I had almost made it to the top in 2005, but the lack of visibility would have made it perilously difficult to have found the route over the fells. My previous year’s encounter made me apprehensive about the descent, but apart from its steepness crunching my knees, the descent was beautiful in the late afternoon sunshine. I got to the bottom as Cook and Collingwood scored centuries. A large hare running across the path (apparently I sent Grumpus a text asking "is a rabbit with big ears a hare?") led my tired legs into the cute village of Dufton.

A beautiful golden sunset glinting off the red sandstoned Dufton buildings, experienced walking back to Brow Farm B&B from dinner at the Stag Inn, forecasted a forthcoming cloudless day for the exciting walk to High Cup Nick and along the Tees.

FRIDAY 14TH JULY - DUFTON TO MIDDLETON (21 MILES)

Wow! 21 knackering miles under gorgeous primary blue skies, reflected in the bubbling waters of the Tees, and matched by the primary green colours on the ground. Grumpus thinks I use the word too often, but this really was glorious! Setting off early from Dufton in crisp early morning sunshine, the climb up to High Cup Nick was exhilarating. Rejecting the notion that I should jump on the back of a farmer’s trailer as it passed me, I reached High Cup Nick by 9.00am.

Arriving at High Cup Nick the first time from Dufton Fell had been mind blowing, and that had been on an overcast late afternoon. I’d subsequently brought Grumpus there on a crisp sunny winter’s day when it had been icicle cold. This time the early morning warm sunshine with views stretching out as far as Lakeland made it different again. There isn’t a way of describing High Cup Nick. Although it tells you to expect something special, the guidebook doesn’t prepare you for its magnificence. And although the photo below currently welcomes me to my computer, photos can’t tell the story of the majestic sweep of the curve carved out of the valley; of the statuesque organ pipe vertical rock faces holding back the hill sides on either side of the valley; of the twinkling river that babbles down into the cheeky little stream meandering and laughing along the valley floor having been its architect over the centuries; of the chequerboard Westmorland opening out at the end; of the blue shimmering and jutting Lakeland hills in the distance; and of the peacefulness contrasted by magnificence. High Cup Nick says with dignity but not without humour – I’m here and I’m not going anywhere. You fit your life around me.

Yeah – having said all of that, my visit was punctuated by the farmer on a quad bike rounding up his sheep, although I was impressed by him scootering up the steep left hand side of the valley.

Conscious of the further 17 miles left to go, I waved goodbye to High Cup Nick. The dull trudge between Cauldron Snout and Maize Beck of last year (after 17 overcast miles) became a happy stroll over Dufton Fell and Rasp Hill, chatting with various walkers coming the other way. At Cauldron Snout, the Tees cascades down into its river bed from Cow Green Reservoir above. Its thrashing demands a pause, not least by the path clambering down boulders at its side, not easily negotiated with a heavy rucksack. But maybe it’s a bit pedestrian in a day filled with other natural wonders.

I preferred the path stretching alongside the Tees below the Falcon Clints cliffs, despite the difficult stepping across boulders on two stretches. As the path opened out into greenness, I paid homage to the Tees by cooling my feet in it as I stopped for lunch. The path then wandered over a nature reserve to Langdon Beck, habituated by birds whose names I knew not, dense meadow grass, and cows stolidly occupying the path. As I rejoined the Tees, getting quite knackered by this point, I needed another pause under Wheysike House.

Following an abortive attempt to replenish my water supplies at Cronkley farmhouse, my tiredness made it increasingly harder to enjoy the little enclosed climb up from Cronkley, the heather growing on the crags on the other side of the Tees and the clonking and dust from Force Garth Quarry. Somehow I quite admired that someone could have the perversity to punctuate this idyllic landscape with such a carbuncle.

I’d seen High and Low Forces the previous year, so I didn’t do the detours to view them this year. I preferred the lugubrious and tranquil flowing Tees, although by this point, getting over the many stiles on its banks was becoming arduous. I was encouraged by Ian Bell reaching his century, which led to an England declaration and a subsequent tumbling of Pakistani wickets. Knowing from last year that the Belvedere House B&B had a deep relaxing bath managed to eventually coax my aching muscles into Middleton. I had completed the three longest spectacular days. The notes made that evening simply say "Made it".

SATURDAY 15TH JULY - MIDDLETON TO BOWES (13 MILES)

This might not have been the most riveting of stages, sitting between the Tees and the Yorkshire Dales, after the previous day’s wonders. Its shorter length meant it was something of a rest day for me. But the dazzling sunshine, the brilliant blue skies, and the reservoirs and bridges all served to make the day enjoyable.

Walking over Harter Fell, I met a speed walker heading for Cauldron Snout, intending to do more than 30 miles, but worried because his son was lagging behind. My mum rang on the walk down to the Grassholme Bridge, which was idyllic and beautiful in the heat haze.

Reaching Grassholme Bridge, I remembered feeling exhausted here the previous year in overcast weather having walked up from Tan Hill. The climb from Grassholme goes through a thicket of trees, where I was joined by a bevy of flies. The path headed down past Hannah’s Meadow Nature Reserve, set up to preserve natural pastureland. It was named after Hannah Hauxwell who farmed nearby Low Birk Hat Farm with no electricity or piped water and who had a TV documentary made about her struggles for survival. Having passed the pretty Blackton Bridge, I headed off on the Bowes Loop option of the Pennine Way. This decision was to give me a different path than last year, to see what Bowes was like, to avoid Atherstone Moor, remembered from the previous year as having what the guide book notes as few redeeming features, and to make a shorter walk after the previous day’s 21 miles.

Gratefully replenishing my water supplies at a farmhouse, I headed off into moorland and up the gritstone outcrop at Goldborough, where I paused for lunch. From there I could see that the path across Atherstone Moor on this side was as featureless as it had been on the other. It proved tricky finding it, and I was not unhappy to cross the fields opposite, displacing an annoyed group of sheep from the only shade in their field as I crossed a stile. This led to the road into Bowes, past the signs saying this site contains unexploded ordnance and toxic material, not a problem evidently for the cows chomping away on it.

Bowes was cute enough, but not sure that my visit there was that worth it. The castle, the room I had at the Ancient Unicorn Inn having a window across one side creating a sweltering greenhouse effect, eating crocodile for dinner and having three pints of beer are points that stick in my memory.

SUNDAY 16TH JULY - BOWES TO THWAITE (15 MILES)

A day of contrasts. Verdant greens through farmland in the early morning, the bleak vast expanse of Sleightholme Moor, the rough descent down and along the shoulder of Stonesdale Moor, the hidden gem of Catrake Force, and then the scramble around Kisdon Hill down into the Yorkshire pastureland of Swaledale – all shepherded by constant blue skies.

A crisp morning ushered me past Bowes Castle, and then along lush green pastures and farms alongside the tranquil River Greta, which the path seemed to cross on several occasions. Shortly afterwards I rejoined the other Pennine Way, and headed into the gorge like Sleightholme Beck, before setting out onto what the guide book refers to as the delights of Sleightholme Moor, a soggy expanse of bog and low tussocky moorland. Nothing particularly boggy about it in this weather. In fact, the sun, the cricket (Yousuf scoring a double century), the heather almost emerging, the shimmering heat and sense of space spreading across the Moor, the chasmic slash of Frumming Beck, and the gradual mirage like appearance of Tan Hill Inn on the horizon all kept my momentum up.

Having encountered a pint, a posse of ducks, and the tame sheep at Tan Hill Inn, I wandered off down the nondescript path down towards Keld, the only points of note being an attractive stream, an abandoned railway carriage, Pieterson throwing his wicket away, and the emerging views of Keld, Swaledale and Great Shunner Fell in the distance. Catrake Falls were shady, busy, and relaxing.

I hadn’t remembered the sharp climb up the conical Kisdon Hill. In 2005 it had been downhill. But I did remember the steep slopes tumbling down to the Swale valley. Skirting round the hill, I descended to Thwaite through fern patches, pondering why England had not declared, especially after Ian Bell was run out.

The stay at Kearton Country Hotel was notable for a tiny bedroom; a small rainbow to the West despite no clouds in the sky; roast beef and yorkshire pud for dinner; and two young couples from London satisfied with achieving the 8 miles from Hawes that day, but setting themselves an ambitious target of 22 miles the next day to Middleton. One of them asked “What was the point of the Pennine Way?” expecting it to have been an ancient farming, miners or Roman track. I knew enough to know about its 20th Century origins, leading to a discussion about the Kinder Trespass. I went to bed satisfied that my efforts were part of a proud political tradition of land access rights.

MONDAY 17TH JULY - THWAITE TO HAWES (9.5 MILES)

Another rest day! Just the climb over Great Shunner Fell and down into Hawes, once again in brilliant sunshine. Remembering it as a painful descent from the previous year, the climb up the fell, although requiring some energy in the last section, was uneventful. A party of girls doing a Duke of Edinburgh (DoE) award scheme were resting at the windbreak at the top, carrying packs that looked bigger than they were, and sounding distinctively miserable. I don’t think my suggesting that they would have fond memories of their efforts helped any.

Views stretched in every direction. Great Shunner is a vast plateau between the bleak acid moorlands I had come from, the green chequerboard of Swaledale, the rolling Wensleydale, and the three Yorkshire peaks of Whernside, Ingleborough and Pen-Y-Ghent, the latter two now visible in the distance. When a very large Bombus Bombularium joined me, it was time to move on.

Grumpus had joined me in the rain for last year’s ascent of Great Shunner. It had been an interminable trudge up its many false summits. This year the descent was a simple meander down through cotton grass. The Northumberland National Park website tells me that cotton grass is a type of sedge, with the cotton made of long white hairs that help the seeds disperse in the wind. Grumpus tells me it’s Eriophorum. With the emerging views of Hawes and Wensleydale, the descent was marked by a debate on whether England should have declared earlier and forced a result. The cricket had been a constant companion over the last five days. I was not sure that a drawn test match had ever been quite so poignant.

Not being in any rush, I enjoyed a pint in the Green Dragon Inn at Hardraw, a pub that time had forgotten, and then explored Hardraw Force in their back garden, a delicate plume of water spraying down into a secluded rock pool.

It was now seriously hot, and I was glad that the walk over to Hawes was now a short one. I reached Hawes just in time to do some washing at the launderette (a collection of machines in someone’s front room), and hang it out on the line at Herriotts Hotel overlooking the slate roofs of Hawes. I finished my book on Bismarck before going to bed in my tiny room.

TUESDAY 18TH JULY - HAWES TO HORTON (15 MILES)

Yet another blue skied crisp morning saw me exiting Hawes through the church yard, past horses and cows, and then up a steep climb up Rottonstone Hill. Half way up my mum rang me, who got concerned about my breathing, heavy due to the climb, probably amplified by the mobile, but nothing of any concern.

The stretch from Ten End to Kidhow Gate was a more steady climb up an old packhorse track, alongside pockmarked undulations stretching down into the deep-set valley of Snaizeholme Beck, and with the summit of Ingleborough peeking over the horizon (although I mistook it for Pen-y-Ghent).

A DoE scheme supervisor on a mountain bike was resting at Kidhow Gate. He asked if I’d seen a group of lads coming up from Hawes. Apparently this group were neither quite with the spirit of the scheme nor the best navigators. Earlier they had left Hawes, only to return moments later by another path. He explained that DoE scheme participants are required to carry everything they need for a three day period (except for water but including tents), and hence their massive packs. He said supervisors have to encourage participants to leave behind make-up and designer clothes, the sheep not being impressed by either. I moved on reluctantly, my interest tweaked about the missing group of lads.

The guide book described the walk down from Kidhow Gate along Cam High Road, a felltop trackway in use in Roman times, as uninspiring. I remembered it being uninspiring when it had been uphill last year. This year it was notable for encounters with several groups of enthusiastic walkers and two less enthusiastic DoE groups. The boy group looked really miserable; the girl group were at least talking to each other. The path gradually emerged into the massive expanse between the three peaks (Whernside, Ingleborough and Pen Y Ghent). Some walkers I had met had suggested the Pennine Way is deficient for not including them all. Nonetheless, their presence certainly dominated this part of the trail.

Noting the continued presence of the bones of a dead sheep I had seen the previous year, I reached the attractive bridge over Ling Gill for lunchtime, where a large group of elderly walkers almost left one sleeping walker behind. The final five miles became a grind in the heat, with little shade, my water running out, and an uncomfortable descent into Horton along a painful stony track. Still the views of Pen-Y-Ghent and Horton and its clonking and dusty quarry were refreshing.

With the famous Pen-Y-Ghent Café closed, I refreshed myself in the Garden at the Crown Inn, and then checked into the beautiful Knoll Guest House, with its friendly proprietor Patricia Crewdson. What she had done to another walker’s boots was a grim reminder of the need for regular boot maintenance. Grumpus rang me at the Knoll. I was particularly energised that she was going to join me at Malham at the end of the next day’s walk.

WEDNESDAY 19TH JULY - HORTON TO MALHAM (15 MILES)

There were two parts of the Pennine Way that had stuck in my memory as being vertiginous. The descent of Pen-Y-Ghent was one of them! Last year, first seen from Fountains Fell, thinking I’d never be able to get up it, a feeling that worsened as I got closer, the climb had been over quickly. This year, the climb from Horton, along the same stony paths from the day before, seemed interminable, with Pen-Y-Ghent looming up, but not seeming to get any closer. The actual diagonal climb was sharp, but mostly in shade, and it wasn’t long before I was sitting in the stone semi-circular wind break on the summit, much needed in the strong breeze. The views across to Ingleborough and Whernside on the one side and Fountains Fell on the other made the climb worthwhile.

Strange how photos don’t capture the vertical horror remembered! Getting down was about going for it, taking it step by step. With the drop on view ahead, and a heavy pack on my back, going down might have been worse than going up. But after the worst bit, I felt OK enough to take photos. Vertiginous horrors are about anticipated apprehension. The doing is never quite the same.

The wide detour between Pen-Y-Ghent and Fountains Fell screams out for a more direct path. Interrupted by a dog chorus, I knocked at the door of a farmhouse seeking in vain to replenish my water supply. And the bubbling streams I remembered on Fountains Fell that might have been a second option weren’t there in this heat. So reaching the top of the fell was a thirsty struggle compounded by what seemed like a major back twinge when I took my pack off next to the jutting stone man at the top. Looking back, the three peaks of the last two days lined up to say goodbye, Fountains Fell being the only place from where they can be seen together.

Happily my back twinge was soon forgotten on the descent from Fountains Fell, described by the guidebook as a sprawling, rather cheerless hill. As a descent it was pleasant enough, especially with Malham Tarn twinkling into view in the distance. I did manage to replenish my water supply from a mountain stream, but the little black things swimming in it meant I didn’t use it. Emerging from the fellside into rolling green pastures and buzzing meadowgrass, the path meandered along drystone walls and around rich green tussocks onto the edge of Malham Tarn. Eventually I managed to get some clean water from the idyllicly sited Malham Tarn House National Trust Field Study Centre.

Walking through the little clump of woods around the Centre, I paused by the side of the Tarn, thinking that it would be nice to come up to the tarn with Grumpus and a bottle of wine later on. But then I realised that in the real world you can’t drink bottles of wine whilst driving a car. Oh well – the real world hadn’t really been with me for some time and the pleasantly soporific haze of the tarn in the dazzling sunlight with birds frolicking and swooping invited a lack of reality.

I was further mesmerised by some climbers on top of the rock climb up Great Scar Close that skirts the tarn who seemed to be about to climb down it. I was confused by what they intended to do with their dog. An ice cream van and a group sunning themselves at the tarn’s south side temporarily reminded me of reality. But then the path took me back into the unreality of a Wild West style jagged deep ravine.

I had to escort another DoE supervisor down to Malham Cove who was having problems map reading, although there was only one way through the ravine. Malham Cove was a picture postcard, with its shelves of giant molar teeth, and its panorama over Malham with the Pennine Way slicing across rich greenness.

The sharp descent at the side of the Cove reminded me of the knee problem I thought I had left up at Hadrian’s Wall. It then led to a gradual stroll into Malham and to the wooden-panelled Beck Hall, where shortly afterwards I was joined by Grumpus. We shared what I have called in my notes a humdinger of a meal at the Buck Inn, where all the DoE supervisors I had met over the last few days were all also eating. Apparently the group of lost lads had completed the course.

THURSDAY 20TH JULY - MALHAM TO EAST MARTON (8.5 MILES)

Grumpus’s arrival meant that I no longer had to carry my heavy pack. The original plan was that Grumpus would get the post bus from Skipton to Malham and would join me on the Pennine Way. Hence planning two short days south of Malham. So much for plans. Romantic joint walking between Grumpus, usually walking at Olympic pace reading a book, and me, strolling along nonchalantly admiring the view, doesn’t really work. So she arrived in a car, and hence my worldly goods being daily transported from now on. Oh well, even if purists are shocked, my knee was not unhappy with the weight reduction. It did mean that from this point South, I had to elicit by conversation the Pennine Way walker camaraderie that my heavy pack had previously earned.

The weather also became more changeable. Heavy storms had blasted overnight, and the first half of the day was overcast (but no rain), and the ground wet. The scenary also changed firstly into a riverside stroll and then across rolling fields. The walk along the River Aire was a duller green than the brilliant contrasts of the previous days, but wandering through the attractive village of Hanlith, over the grounds in front of Hanlith Hall, and over the elegant Newfield Bridge was all pleasant enough.

I met a father and daughter bickering the Pennine Way. Grumpus might have considered the combination of pompous older man and tolerant practical younger woman reminiscent. The path then set out across fields before meandering into the town of Gargrave, where I paused for a pot of tea outside the café with the strategically placed sign announcing 186 miles to Kirk Yetholm and 70 to Edale. My calculations had been that the walk was 265 miles, but maybe that accounted for detours to get to overnight stops.

From Gargrave to East Marton was a short step over fields, and the sun came out as I waited for the arrival of the proprietor and Grumpus. Newton Grange Farmhouse was an imposing and beautiful Victorian country house, and a good choice of overnight stop, a better alternative to the mouldy shack we had stayed at in Lothersdale the previous year.

Today’s walk having only been a short one, we took a spin in the car to Skipton. Strange to be in a car after the last two weeks of solitude. Grumpus played me music by Portuguese fado band Madredeus. She reckons I need to mention that they were remixes. We returned to a sumptuous dinner at the Cross Keys Inn overlooking the Pennine Way where it joins the Leeds and Liverpool Canal.

FRIDAY 21ST JULY - EAST MARTON TO COWLING (9 MILES)

Another short day, although made slightly longer by my having to return for my walking stick. Crossing more fields, I dodged vast cuddly pink cylinders strewn across the path to make a new gas pipeline. Grumpus joined me for the walk along the canal under the double arched bridge under the Cross Keys. A hilarious monument to unnecessary human endeavour, the bridge was double arched because its single arch had apparently not been high enough.

Leaving the canal, the path drops into a creek and wanders past a farm with flowers growing in a bath, and then climbs into Thornton in Craven, before descending into a buzzing nettle strewn field and crossing a disused railway line. Before the ascent starts across Elslack Moor, the path negotiates Brown House Farmyard. Last year, two sets of gates across the Pennine Way had required unravelling fiddly twine. This year, the farmyard was a smelly quagmire.

I remembered the climb to Pinhaw Beacon as longer last year, possibly due to not being able to see through impenetrable clouds mantling the moor. The guidebook raved about the views from the Beacon giving walkers a foretaste of impending Malham delights, perhaps not so special having just come from there. Still the emerging pinks and purples of the heather were attractive.

Descending into Lothersdale with its exclamation mark chimney stack, I met Grumpus for lunch at the Hare & Hounds, and headed over ridges and fields into Cowling. The approach to Cowling was pleasant enough, past an abandoned farmhouse, and then across Gill Beck, but Cowling was tightly packed industrial terraces sprawled across a busy lorry festooned main road with kids hanging around with nothing else to do. Whilst the owners of the slightly misnamed Woodland House, walkers themselves, made our stay pleasant, Cowling wasn’t nice.

Oh well, we had the car. Having had another short day, we drove off across narrow winding country lanes into the Bronte bedecked Haworth, and then across to a pub recommended by our overnight hosts, with the drive back gilded by a golden sunset that made Cowling seem an idyllic pastoral setting.

SATURDAY 22ND JULY - COWLING TO HEBDEN BRIDGE (14 MILES)

The weather forecast was for torrential rain, which hastened my pace for most of the day. Grumpus having returned me to the path in the car, I climbed up from Cowling onto Ickornshaw Moor in weak sunshine. I discovered from a man in one of the squat little huts on the edge of the moor that their official use is peat collection. I suspect their probable uses are solitude and fresh air. The man did say they played a part in the recuperation of World War 1 gas victims.

Swiftly crossing the featureless Ickornshaw expanse, I found the correct descent where we’d got lost last year, past a rubbish tip that had now all but gone, to the severely depleted Ponden Reservoir. Skirting the reservoir, I now climbed up into Bronte Country firstly marked by chequered fields and drystone walls, and then by bleak windswept moors. Thunder clattered somewhere as I reached Top Withins (Wuthering Heights’ alleged inspiration), so I didn’t wuther about.

Climbing over the moor above, a little Stoodley Pike announced its presence in the distance. Thankful for the sun emerging, heavy black clouds brooded over the neighbouring valley, fierce lightning jagging down from them. I descended past more parched reservoirs, and then took a slight detour to the Packhorse Inn. Knowing that I now only had the short crossing of Heptonstall Moor, I ambled over a couple of pints in the sun with a lively couple on their third day. What style! I wished them well as they trundled off after at least three pints, hand rolled cigarettes trailing from their mouths, heavy camping packs on their backs.

Now happily relaxed, I headed off into a hazy afternoon down the steep but attractive Graining Water ravine, and then back up through ornate double gates that seemed to lead to nowhere onto Heptonstall Moor. After a pleasant stroll across the moor, the views of the diminishing Packhorse Inn turning into the distant Hebden Bridge. The path then headed down towards Calderdale, pausing to navigate the steep descent into the heather lined Colden Clough ravine. It then skirted fields at the side of Badgerfields Farm, an overnight stop remembered fondly from the year before, particularly for its fresh roast parsnips.

Having driven down into Hebden Bridge to get some money, we shared a delicious Badgerfields dinner on the outdoor verandah with the dewy eyed Badgerfields dog who managed to charm even the cat-loving Grumpus, and with three tired horsewomen on a three day excursion.

SUNDAY 23RD JULY - HEBDEN BRIDGE TO DIGGLE (16.5 MILES)

This day was about the Pike (or the Poker as Grumpus irreverently christened it), reservoirs, edges and windswept views. Setting off in full wet weather gear with the Poker barely visible through brooding storm clouds, it was already raining as I made the steep descent into the sliver of Calderdale Valley, down narrow winding tracks past solid stone cottages. Crossing the railway, road and canal (a condensed history of Industrial Revolution communications) in the valley floor, the silent canopy of Callis Wood sheltered me from the rain as I started climbing the other side. In stark contrast to the sodden blistered descent from the Poker in 2005, my feet were dry due to the remarkable invention of waterproof socks. Grumpus had bought me a pair the day before, and I texted her to say that they had stood up to a stern testing. The rain had stopped by the time I started climbing to the Poker and blue skies appeared as I reached it.

Stoodley Pike was built (and apparently rebuilt following a lightning strike) by local people to celebrate Napoleon’s defeat. A bold exclamation mark punctuating the horizon for many miles around, it now serves as a reassuring beacon for walkers. With Napolean’s wars now long forgotten, it’s difficult not to admire the statement of will and lack of functionality that went into its dark brooding stones.

As I arrived at the Poker, two walkers emerged from its much steeper north climb, and led me up a very dark and hidden flight of stone steps leading to the Poker’s first level. The views stretched out over the Calderdale valley rift, across vast sweeping moorland slopes, chequerboard fields interspersed with tussocks of trees and occasional sprawling settlements.

With the Poker gradually shrinking behind me (not seen last year until within 30 yards), I headed off along the vast Coldwell Hill Ridge. A scrubby and featureless drainage system that curved into Warland Reservoir led to three miles of relentless reservoir paths. Eventually I circled a smouldering peat field, and met Grumpus for lunch at the White Horse Inn, perched in its isolation beside a Pennine road crossing. The peat field had apparently been burning for several days. They thought they knew the culprits, but couldn’t prove it.

With a belly full of pork dinner and beer, I set off up Blackstone Edge. The path circled a drainage system and then snaked up a stone road. The guidebook questioned its origins, but its intricate geometric stonework and drainage implacably striding straight up the ridge suggested Roman. My climb was accompanied by two noisy motorbikes scrambling up.

Pausing briefly at the weathered Aiggin Stone, I remembered my mum ringing me here through the clouds of last year.

This narrow ridge of moorland between industrial Manchester and Huddersfield had been an illusion of remotest wilderness, and the Blackstone Edge trig point had been a sentinel looming out of the clouds reassuring me I was on the right path. This year it was a twinkling white pinnacle contrasting with the array of scattered hewn black stone blocks that give the edge its name.

Jagged rocks and sand gave way to a spongey moorland descent, with the sounds of the M62 startling across the moorland gradually amplifying. The guidebook tells how the Pennine Way was there before the M62, and so the road builders had to build the elegantly curved bridge that ferries walkers across. Its delicate nature and the drop down to the cars whizzing along obliviously below meant that, with no other way to get to the other side, I was happy to get across it quickly, eyes resolutely focussed ahead, one foot in front of another.

I walked past the giant Windy Hill telecommunications mast I had been oblivious to last year. The walk up White Hill was noticeable only for the gradual decrease of car noise, and for a strange man striding by with stetson and binoculars who I took for a bird watcher. Catching him up shortly afterwards, it turned out he was a farmer searching for lost sheep. I walked with him over the remaining miles. This was one of those chance encounters that greatly increased (possibly over increased) my rudimentary knowledge of sheep farming. This included how far sheep can stray; buying sheep farming land usage rights from the National Trust; neighbouring farmers’ illegal encroachments; wild west style attempts to run him off his land; and rounding up sheep for lambing and shearing. I also learned of the consternation of the people of Saddleworth that they are now considered part of Lancashire rather than Yorkshire, and of the Standedge railway tunnel between the two. Once we got onto the detailed immortalisation of local poet Ammon Wrigley, memorialised on Standedge, I decided that I now had sufficient knowledge of local anthropology. I wandered on down to the car park I had hitched a lift to last year in clouds and rain, and waited for Grumpus to take me down to our overnight stop at Diggle.

The sign outside the Diggle Hotel, perched above the Standedge tunnel, the only place serving food in the vicinity, said that there weren’t serving anyone else. So we were thankful again that we had the car, although we drove many miles beyond Mardsen to find somewhere to eat. So much so that I had to drive even further, through desolate industrial terraced housing to find petrol for the car. Still it was a nice restaurant, and on the drive back, we enjoyed a spectacular golden and pink sunset that heralded the return of blue skies the next day.

MONDAY 24TH JULY - DIGGLE TO CROWDEN (13 MILES)

Grumpus having deposited me back at the path at Standedge, I ambled past isolated reservoirs bathed in brilliant early morning sunshine, until the path started to trend down towards Wessenden Head. The descent, across the shoulder of a steep cutting and then straight down the vertiginous bluff beyond it, was unexpected. But the alpine splendour of the Wessenden valley in the crisp heat haze took my mind off its steepness.

As I started walking up the Wessenden reservoir valley, a group of farm workers herding sheep through the steep fern covered slopes renewed my acquaintance with sheep farming. In one of the many inlets of the valley, I found a small group they had left behind. I fancied that one of the lambs had become my friend as I paused in the balmy heat, although it was just trying to get past me to get to its mother. Chatting with some people rebuilding the path, I was soon at the top of the valley, remembering reading a sodden map there last year in driving rain.

Crossing the A635 the path was clearly visible slashed across the peat moorland up to Black Hill. Last year, this had been miserable wet clouds with no hint of the massive expanse of views stretching down to a tall thin mast pinning out on the plains below. Climbing Black Hill this year was a delightful stroll in the sunshine watching the views unfold, and chatting with a couple of walkers for whom this was their second day. I was already beginning to feel the same mix of achievement and sadness that the end was in sight that many Pennine Way walkers must feel. Still I knew that several delights still awaited me.

Book after book tells you of the horrors of Black Hill. Hah – it’s a pussy cat in baking sunshine, and after its hellish qualities of the previous year, I drew a perverse sense of delight from its taming. Its trig point bobbled invitingly amidst the baked peat sea, with its white flagstone path snaking across the bare morass. I was joined by two other walkers at the trig point, one who had walked up a path along the peat, jointly celebrating Black Hill’s temporary calmness.

Descending from Black Hill, and then easily picking a way through what had been the soggy meandering mud of Crowden Great Brook where last year I had got my first boot full of water, I chose to take the lower path under Laddow Rocks. I could have kidded myself that it was because I wanted a different route or that I particularly wanted to see the rocks or even that Wainwright says he prefers the lower route, but the real reason was I didn’t feel the need to relive the terrors of being perched on the narrow path above the Laddow cliffs.

Having chosen this route, presumably not used much, the overgrown vegetation made it hard to find at the northern end of the valley. But pushing through green fern tussock patches and scrubby heather, ambling down the stony stepped dusty paths, crossing bubbling brooks, with the statuesque presence of the Laddow rocks to the right and the slash of the valley to the left, and all in a constantly enchanting still heat haze, it proved to be a spectacular descent through a spaghetti western valley. The only negative was the gradual emergence of my nemesis at the end of the valley. More of that tomorrow.

After the delights of the day, the Crowden Valley seemed functional with its hurtling busy trunk road. I remember a restful stroll through a wooded section, and then the secluded path under the railway tracks up to the Old House, but hey – Torside is just another reservoir!

We had remembered the Old House as being a nice place to stay, but this time the different room in the attic with no windows and without the bath I had been looking forward to all day, meant it wasn’t so pleasant. I think again we drove some distance to find somewhere to eat, but can’t remember where we ended up. Grumpus did let me into the secrets of Hadfield, Royston Vasey of The League of Gentlemen, although some local shops for local people might have brightened up what was a pretty mundane Manchester overspill town. I don’t think I got a lot of sleep that night. My nemesis was to come.

TUESDAY 25TH JULY - CROWDEN TO EDALE (15 MILES)

When building the Pennine Way, someone must have thought that positioning a particularly vertiginous section at the end of the first day or beginning of the last day would sort the men from the boys. The path could have been about ten yards further back or could have snaked up the beautiful Torside Clough. But no, instead the path does a sharp ascent, and then clings onto a narrow path that skirts the rim of Clough Edge with a spectacular drop below. Thanks guys.

This was the second section of the trail I had not been looking forward to. Last year I hadn’t known what to expect, and, whilst experiencing mild terror, I had put one foot in front of another and got round it. This year I had to really steel myself, knowing that a sharp exhausting climb would be followed by the terrifying Clough Edge, and that I’d have to do it to get into the final day’s delights.

The climb up was fine enough, until the path veered left and entered the Clough Edge rim. I barely remember the next section. Pounding heart. Legs automatically moving forward. Trying not to look down. Desperately trying to keep to the right of the piteously narrow path. Not noticing the lack of wind. Not noticing the beautiful Torside Clough slicing invitingly down. A path along it would be nice.

It seemed ages, but probably wasn’t that long before my legs happily took me into the paths that started to venture into the heather bank to the right and away from the rim. Presumably I hadn’t been the only person who didn’t welcome a narrow path on the edge of a precipice. As the path veered right towards the climb up Wildboar Grain, I felt an enormous sense of relief that I had conquered my nemesis and I started to enjoy the clattering stream, the radiant blue skies welcoming me to my last day and the purple heather patches emerging from the peat bogs.

I rang Grumpus to let her know I had emerged victorious, and in my cocoon of relief, the rocky climb up Bleaklow was uneventful. Bleaklow – an imposing bulk with the Torside terrors on one side and a gargantuan impenetrable sludge of peat groughs on the other. Appropriate that its moonscape summit was announced by a plank of wood unceremoniously speared into a pile of rocks.

Remembering being perplexed last year about the many direction markers left for someone initialled PW through the peat groughs, I successfully charted my way through the twisting labyrinthine mass of brown peat cakes. I crossed the A57 Snake Pass road, described by the guidebook as a corridor of noise and movement in the timeless silence of the moors. Then the Pennine Way’s final ribbon of flagstones twist for three miles across the Featherbed Moss expanse, with the edge of Kinder Scout beckoning on the horizon.

The climb up to Kinder Scout was sharp but brief, and I was welcomed onto the top of the plateau by an old man who seemed astonished that I had nearly completed the Pennine Way. The Kinder plateau, carved stone medallions scattered across twinkling sand, scene of the mass trespass, is both a geological and political crowning glory of the Pennine Way. But there had been so many crowning glories, and I had been here before. So I unceremoniously paused briefly for lunch at a sun-baked Kinder Downfall, pondering whether to take the official Pennine Way that continues round Kinder edge and down Jacob’s Ladder, or across Kinder’s pathless peat mounds and down Grindsbrook Clough, the path that it had been diverted from to prevent erosion.

Figuring I’d never have such clement weather to cross Kinder again, and having done the Jacob’s Ladder path before, I headed towards Kinder Gates on the advice of another walker who ventured the opinion that “you follow the river bed, head out across the peat, and you won’t get lost”.

He was right. At first, the river bed, flanked by brooding rocks at Kinder Gates on either side, formed a natural sand highway across Kinder. Although heading out across the peat involved constant compass checking across numerous pathless ascents and descents of vast mud cakes with boot prints leading beguilingly in every direction, their dryness made their passage easy. Sentinel stones appearing on the horizon announced the top of the Edale Valley ahead, and coming down a particularly large peat grough on my backside, I emerged back somewhere between Crowden Brook and Grindsbrook Clough.

Grindsbrook Clough curves delicately and invitingly down from the plateau flanked by green slopes. Its initial descent was steeper and rockier than I had remembered, painful on tired feet, but not much would have taken away from the satisfaction that I was completing the Pennine Way down its historical and beautiful start. Declining the invitation to join a couple of lads for a dip in one of the many rockpools alongside the path, I strode on down the gradually shallower descent, admiring the heather slopes and the emerging Edale views below.

Elated after the fitting sunny end through electric green fields and over a shady stream crossing, I had already drunk one celebratory pint by the time Grumpus joined me at the Old Nags Head. The barman seemed decidedly nonplussed about my achievement. Oh well, I guess he’d seen it all many times before. Instead my achievement was formally celebrated by a Pennine Way badge for my walking stick that Grumpus had bought me, and a photo under the start sign, ironically leading to the official path I didn’t take.

ENDNOTE

Over a stone lighter, with strange sunburn stripes across my legs, with torn trousers, with knees now accustomed to continuous battering, I had completed this epic journey. Forgotten now are the aches, challenges and periods of walking on against exhaustion. It had been a breathtaking slice across a panoply of natural wonders. It had been a sometimes emotional and isolated exploration of my abilities, my endurance, and of what makes me what I am. And it had been a homage to the pioneers who had carved out the land rights that made the Pennine Way possible. Feeling a strange sense of discomfort sitting in a car speeding back along the M1, I knew it would take a while to readjust to normality. This journey had touched my life and would remain with me for ever.

Cold sheep on the Windrush Way

2008-05-14T00:00:00.000-07:00

The reason for this is so that I have somewhere to put my walking journals. These were some cold sheep from a crisp and keen walk in February 2008.

The path of the pipple - Coast to Coast 07

2008-05-13T23:24:00.000-07:00

Pipple is a reference from Birmingham band Church of Elvis who I had recorded several years earlier. They had a lyric that went “Beautiful world full of beautiful people” sung several times – then “I wish it was I wish it was I wish it was I wish” to conclude somewhat negatively “but it’s not”. The only problem was that singer Nick Beales’ rendition of people came out as pipple, emphasised in several repeats of the line. At the time, this was extremely amusing. It seems fitting that the C2C be a path of the pipple.

It didn’t bode well. The weather was looking decidedly iffy. Banks of thick impenetrable clouds rolling across a misty sodden England throughout June and the same weather forecasted for July. With my successful Pennine Way experience the year before, the Coast to Coast’s 190 miles seemed unlike the same challenge and romance. And I hadn’t had the time for the same pre-walk exercising. Pressures of work having closed in until the day before I travelled up from Birmingham, I wasn’t well prepared mentally or physically.

So why the Coast to Coast? It had gained some romance for me when I had crossed it at Keld on the Pennine Way. Its status as the second longest UK path, and also in the North of England, had been the clinching factors for me. Surprised not to find it on ordnance survey maps, I had learnt that the C2C is a Wainwright creation, lovingly handwritten alongside numerous pen and ink maps and diagrams. Wainwright’s vision was to place a start and end point and invite people to find a way between, traversing an odyssey stretching from the Irish Sea to the North Sea, across the Lake District, Westmorland, the Pennines, Swaledale, the Vale of Mowbray and the North Yorks Moors.

Despite the C2C not being an official national trail, it is a path of the pipple. Because it neatly fits into a two week holiday, and with generally short stages, more people walk the C2C than most other UK trails. And, as I found out, the C2C is defined by people you meet who are liable to reappear over several days.

As the train clonked and ground its way firstly past a contrast of wind farms and industrial desolation, and then round narrows shelves clinging to cliffs above the Irish sea, the weather worsened, and the first spots of rain welcomed me to the red bricked St Bees, hidden behind coastal cliffs. But whether it was the determined cricketers, playing on in a torrential downpour; or the stolid red-brick church with its ornate arched doorway; or the friendly welcome at Abbey Farm Guesthouse, I liked St Bees.

Friday 6th July – St Bees to Ennerdale Bridge (13 miles)

The first day of the C2C circles a shoulder of Cumbria that buttresses between the Irish Sea and the Lake District. With only the C2C and the coast to draw tourists from Lakeland, this brief chequerboard plateau is a remnant of a former industrial era that takes C2C walkers invitingly along the coast before diving inland to the edges of Lakeland.

Starting out with the obligatory C2C ceremonies (the pebble to be carried from the Irish to the North Sea; the boot in the ocean; the photo at the start in full wet weather gear, the forecast in the morning having been for gales and heavy rain), the path took me quickly up along the cliff edge skirting St Bees beach. My apprehension from the previous day evaporated quickly as the path snaked around the precipitous South Head, and I was engulfed by warm feelings as realisation dawned that I’d set out. As I descended into the fissure of Fleshwick Bay, the leaden sky started to become dimpled with patches of blue.

Fleshwick Bay was punctuated by a symphony of birds swooping, diving, gliding, spiralling and generally cacophonying. Sometimes ascending startlingly over the shoulder of the cliff, and then hovering invitingly near enough to see the twitch of a wing tip feather launch them screeching into the distance. The cliff tops were their playground, teasing people walking along the cliff for their earthbound existence. Birds are not easy to photograph. They’re there one minute, and gone by the time the lens clicks. But I spent an enjoyable half an hour clicking at empty sky, trying to fathom out complex bird interaction. It abruptly concluded when the sky emptied after a chorus of gulls ruthlessly chased off a cormorant that had forgotten its place.

Having passed the North Head lighthouse, the path crept round the headland along a path that clung precariously to cliffs that felt they might give way at any moment (not entirely pleasant as the threatened gales started blowing), and then headed inland towards Sandwith. The path inched nondescriptly towards Lakeland. A farmer at Desmesne Farm bemoaned his “cheap and cheerful” Polish tractor that wouldn’t start. I suggested he needed a Polish repairman. Having gone the wrong way into the desolate Moor Row, I had a celebratory pint (the first eight miles done or just feeling good about being on holiday) in the Three Tuns in Cleator, which welcomed “muddy boots, pets, but not horses, cows or pigs”. That pint set me up for a slightly woozy ascent of the conical Dent Fell, from where the Cumbrian plateau, the sea and the Sellafield Nuclear Power Station, all now bathed in sunshine, were laid out to the east. To the west, thick clouds peaked over the summits of the Lakeland hills.

Briefly chatting to an Australian couple on Dent’s summit, I then opted for the slightly less steep zigzag path down to a verdant and lush Nannycatch Beck, where I met the Australians again. They had not booked any accommodation in advance, and so had a tent with them, or with their baggage carrying service. Most of the people I met on the C2C were using a baggage carrying service. I had opted not to. It seemed like part of the challenge that I should carry all I needed with me. I don’t think I ever regretted that decision.

As we meandered up the beautiful Nannycatch Beck valley, we met “the Americans” tumbling down the steep path from Dent, an option I hadn’t chosen, tight contours and a heavy pack not being a good pairing for a descent. But the Americans … these guys featured throughout my crossing of the Lakes. I’d met them first at Abbey Farm in St Bees. Mark and Elkie from San Francisco, with a daughter and a friend of the daughter. Nice enough at first, but as the Lake District wore on, Mark just always seemed to have to get to the top of a climb first. The rest of his entourage had to make do as best they could to Mark’s chorus of “good job”, like they’d successfully used a potty. So no surprise that Mark had tumbled them down the steep macho descent from Dent. Walking with them into Ennerdale Bridge, probably slightly faster than I would have chosen, the first rain of the day started to fall.

Whether it was that or recently mown hedgerows, shortly before Ennerdale Bridge, we encountered two tiny curled up baby hedgehogs, shaking with fear from the five large humans above them.

Arriving at the Cloggers Guesthouse, the sun came out and I met Alison and Pat, two retired English nurses from Woollagong, Australia. Due to Pat having a problem with her foot, they had taken a taxi from Cleator, and they let me use the bath first. After that I chatted to the dour proprietor, Mr Whinfield. I quite liked him, but he was not to everyone’s taste. Apparently he personally blamed the Seattlers I met later in the walk for the introduction of the grey squirrel. I met the current Americans again later on in the pub. Good job.

Saturday 7th July – Ennerdale to Stonethwaite (13 miles)

This day takes the C2C off the Cumbrian plateau and into the Lake District. Brooding clouds menaced across the tops of the peaks as I skirted the start of Ennerdale Lake on the narrow path built across shale and rocks. As I paused briefly at Robin Hood’s Chair, buttressing out into the lake, for a photograph that Grumpus described as Ferengi-like, the sun started to emerge as I scrambled across the side of the lake, casting shafts of light across the gloomy grey.

The difficulties of walking along the rocky lakeside path distracted from the occasional sunlight dappling through trees at the water’s edge. The path eventually emerged at the lake’s end across pastures to the northern side of the valley. Clouds hung over the crags enclosing the valley.

Pillar barely showed itself, but as the track winded interminable on, the Gables occasionally shimmered into view, brooding over the valley.

I reached the isolated Black Sail Youth Hostel shortly after Alison, who had parted company with Pat for the day, had got there,. Having enjoyed the hostel’s tea making facilities, I followed Alison along a high track towards the climb up Loft Beck, with some misgivings. I wasn’t sure that this was the right path.

She was right. From the higher path, we could see the Americans down below who had taken the lower path, scrambling across the River Liza. Our path meant we emerged half way up the steep Loft Beck climb. However, of course Mark was not to be outdone. He motored past us half way up the climb, leaving his wife, now suffering from blisters, to climb at a more sedate pace.

I steadily pulled up the climb with heavy pack, actually quite enjoying the C2C’s first steep climb. Mark dispensed “good jobs” liberally to his family as they reached the top and then promptly moved them on. I paused to wait for Alison. Happily the clouds had retreated as we climbed, allowing the opportunity to enjoy the spectacular views of Ennerdale, Crummock Water and Buttermere that grace every C2C journal, pocketed by volcanic folds stretching down to their shores.

The path then snaked around Grey Knotts, and over the shale slopes to Moses Trod, the old tramway track up to the slate mine above Honister Pass, now a museum. It being a weekend, there were numerous day visitors. As the path descended, partly along the road, down into Borrowdale, the sun came out, brightly contrasting the blue of the sky with the greens of the valley.

Tired by this point, and conscious that Grumpus might be waiting for me at Rosthwaite, I pressed on down through Seatoller and through a wood that fringed the River Derwent, where the path clung to smooth rocks above the river, an ancient chain granting the only means of scrambling around them. As I walked along the road to Gillerthwaite, I met Pat wondering where Alison was, worrying because she had gone on ahead of me at Moses Trod.

Shortly after I arrived at Gillerthwaite, Grumpus turned up, hot and sweaty from the drive from Birmingham. We were fortunate to get a table at the Langstrath Country Inn in Stonethwaite. The food was delicious. Pat and Alison were both there, as were the Americans, eating burgers. The sunlight hazily slanted over the trees on the slopes above Rosthwaite on the walk back to the bed and breakfast and suggested that the weather tomorrow would be kind.

Sunday 8th July – Stonethwaite to Grasmere (7 miles)

And it was. Crispy morning sunshine up Greenup Gill, extensive views from the top, and then back down Helm Crag into Grasmere. A short day, but the Lakes at their best with gorgeous blue skies. Some logistical problems – getting Grumpus’s car from A to B – involved checking buses in and out of Keswick. We had a deadline for today – getting into Grasmere in time to catch the 3.15 bus.

But deadlines and cars were far from our thoughts as we bridged Stonethwaite Beck and meandered alongside its grassy banks towards the imposing massif carved out by the bubbling Greenup Gill. Blue skies and the lively beck along a gentle grassy path were scant preparation for the long climb up to Lining Crag.

The path meandered in and out of rock pools, waterfalls, and tributary rivulets joining the babbling gill, carved through the green slopes and disappeared cheekily through the strewn rocks. Just when it seemed like it had dragged you to the top, Lining Crag’s final energy sapping buttress teased “hey, you’ve still got to get up here. I’m the steepest bit”. But this was the most beautiful that the Lakes had been, and that me and Grumpus shared this part together added something special - although most of the time Grumpus was bounding along up ahead reading her book, whilst I trudged sweatily up with heavy pack. Just before I reached the summit, Mark bounced up from behind. It really wouldn’t do that I’d get to the top first.

Lining Crag afforded spectacular views. The roof of the lakes - mountains, ridges and crags jutting up all around. Scafell Pike shimmering in the distance.

The path to the top and over the ridge to Easedale Gill was boggy and wet – not particularly a problem for us in good quality boots, but the sight of American trainers sinking into bogs elicited wry smiles. “Unsuitably shod” read my notes! We paused at the top of the ridge, partly so that I could enjoy the view, partly so that Grumpus could read more book, and partly to shake off the Americans!

The day being only a short one, we chose to take the higher ridge route to Helm Crag. A good choice, but the sharp and rocky climbs and descents were beginning to wear on my feet, and the sharp drop at one point was a bit alarming. Apart from a pause to photograph a lost black lamb, bleating painfully and perhaps beguilingly, Grumpus became a small figure somewhere in the distance jutting in and out of the rocks, as I meandered on.

Half way along the ridge, we encountered the Americans again. Elkie was clearly not enjoying the pace set by Mark, and the sense of annoyance was palpable. As we joined them climbing up the Helm Crag pimple, Elkie pointedly remarked that she liked my pace, and having reached the summit, Mark led them swiftly on whilst we paused and enjoyed the tilted boulders strewn across its summit. The guide book suggested that visitors should touch the top of the “Howitzer” slab, but not try to stand on top of it, due to the vertiginous drop on the other side. Fortunately I managed to persuade Grumpus not to attempt it.

Grumpus tried to turn the descent from Helm Crag into a “Slovenia moment” by disappearing off down the Crag’s steep side. New Year had seen us walking into the snow clad Julian Alps, where we had missed the path to find ourselves attempting to traverse a somewhat dangerous mountain ledge – a Zlatarog path, as Grumpus called it – after Slovenian mountain goats.

But we regained the more gentle descent down the Crag’s grassy shoulder, passing the Italian mountain biker who had mysteriously managed to haul his bike half way up the mountain and sighting our first deer, we pressed on quickly into Grasmere, our pace speeding up in order to check into the hotel and have some lunch before meeting the 3.15 bus.

The shocking £5.70 bus fare from Grasmere to Keswick (even the bus driver said it was unreasonable) meant I took the bus on my own, where I met Emma from Clitheroe escaping a domestic situation with her sister and ex-boyfriend. I tried to offer some wise words of advice about not running away from troubles, but it sounded to me like she just needed to get out of Clitheroe (wherever that is)!

The bus from Keswick back to Rosthwaite was late and an equally shocking £2.70, but had the advantages of being open topped, which was entertaining in the late afternoon sunshine, although dodging the occasional branches hanging over the road was interesting. Strange to return to the source of our day’s walking, and stranger still to be driving back listening to PJ Harvey blasting out into the Lakeland countryside.

Grasmere Hotel, the most expensive place I was staying on the C2C route, was intended as a special treat for Grumpus and I. Unfortunately it wasn’t! Perhaps designed for people of advanced years rather than walkers, we were somewhat disenchanted by being told not to sit at the only available table in the lounge and by its meagre meals. So we consoled ourselves with perhaps just a little too much wine …

Monday 9th July – Grasmere to Patterdale (7 miles)

… which didn’t really make the next day any easier. It was only another 7 miles, but I was quite tired by the afternoon. Maybe it was something to do with it being the fourth day as well, always for me the watershed after which the walking becomes easier. Still, the afternoon was sunny and relaxing next to Grisedale Beck was not unpleasant.

My notes tell me that the Grasmere Hotel’s parting shot was a small sized kipper for breakfast. The sun greeted us to a strange detour shown on the map out of the back of Grasmere, which meant that we avoided the main road, passing the Americans on the way. But it had started clouding over as we reached the bottom of the fern lined Tongue Gill sloping gradually up to Grisedale Tarn. Not a lot to say about the climb – a long and gradual skirt up the valley, with clouds gradually winning the battle for the sky, and then a slightly more accentuated climb on the final section. Here we caught up with the Australian nurses, gradually charting their way up the climb, and shortly after, as we reached the false col just below Grisedale Hause, Grumpus turned to go back to Grasmere to pick up her car. Maybe it was a good decision to turn back before Grisedale Tarn, because as we skirted over the hause and rested by the side of the tarn, it started raining.

Was that the excuse I needed for not taking the zigzag path sheering up the imposing bulk of Dollywagon Pike opposite towards the summit of the famous Helvellyn? Or could I use the hangover I was still nursing? Hmmm – let’s face it, the reason I didn’t tackle Helvellyn and Striding Edge had more to do with self-preservation, and seeing photos at Grasmere Hotel of the jagged rocks and sheer drops stretching down either side of the Edge. And wise decision it was. If I had pressed on, I would have had to scale down Helvellyn’s steep slope with the drop in front of me. Later on in the summer, revisiting the area, I walked up Grisedale Beck from Patterdale with the intention of scaling Helvellyn, only to turn back on reaching Red Tarn having seen the sharp final ascent, covered in an ant like trail of humanity scaling its flank. The reports of deaths from falls in winter confirmed that this kind of activity was never going to be for me!

Anyway, the rain excuse did last long enough at Grisedale Tarn to be an excuse. The Americans had good jobbed their way past us whilst we relaxed at the tarn, and then the Australian nurses shuffled on when the rain started. I sat it out. The black clouds gave the tarn a quality of brooding stillness that chimed well with my hangover.

The sun came out brightly as I descended into Grisedale. Striding Edge stood boldly at the side of the valley behind Ruthwaite Lodge, teasing me for my lack of fortitude. Further down I relaxed dreamily by Grisedale Beck in the summer sun.

The walk down Grisedale was a casual amble in the sunshine, ruminating on what the guidebook told me was the beginning of the descent from the centre of the lakes, and on the diagonal path scarring down on the other side of the valley that I would have descended had I attempted Striding Edge. By the time I skirted the top of Ullswater, the heat had become hazy and relaxing.
The additional walk from Patterdale down to Greenbank Farm, our overnight stop, was not particularly welcome, but it was punctuated by the sign for red squirrels crossing (I didn’t see any), and next day’s path steeply announcing itself on the other side of the valley. Greenbank Farm was a good place to stay – a working farm with welcoming hosts. It was sheering time, and so we watched indignant sheep lose their coats. Our hosts told us that the sheep are ornamental. The Government pays farmers to keep them so that the lakes don’t lose their historic tenants. Tourists expect sheep!

We walked back to the White Lion in Patterdale for dinner, once again perhaps having a little too much alcohol. Back at Greenbank Farm, we fell asleep to the sounds of bleating, baaing and barking.

Tuesday 10th July – Patterdale to Rosgill (12 miles)

It was all going to be change today. Grumpus was heading back. It was going to be the last day in the Lakes. And I was staying with my friend Caz at Rosgill, some four miles short of Shap, where I was planning a rest day. I had arranged to meet Caz on Kidsty Pike at midday – something of a poignant rendezvous for someone I hadn’t met for about twenty years!

But first, it still being the Lakes, the day’s walking was greeted with a savage climb up to Boredale Hause and then later to the solid bulk of High Street. Coming from Greenbank Farm, a mile south of Patterdale, the final ascent was particularly sheer just before it rejoined the C2C route from Patterdale. As I scaled the final slope, my heavy pack carving out each trudging step, I had a brief sighting of the Americans above.

After Boredale Hause, the path levelled off. The views back to Helvellyn, down to Greenbank Farm and to Brotherswater were ample reward for the climb. The path ambled along the ridge until it suddenly opened out above the delicate Angle Tarn, a mirror lake that demanded a moment’s reflection. At the tarn’s southernmost edge, I glimpsed my last sighting of the Americans. Good job.

I met Alison at Satura Crag, looking out over wild deer and the emerging view of the Pennines on the other side of Westmorland. Deep in conversation, we missed the path and scaled Rest Dodd thinking it to be the Knott, the buttress that would lead us to High Street. We joked about wanting to bag more peaks. A muddy but well-used path down Rest Dodd and up to the proper path suggested that we may not have been the first to have made this mistake. I waited for Alison after the second climb, feeling guilty about our extra exertions, although I was conscious that my midday rendezvous on Kidsty Pike was fast approaching. But it wasn’t far from there to Rampsgill Head, where the imposing mass of High Street came into view above the stark and solitary Hayeswater Gill valley.

Happily our detour up Rest Dodd had not been as serious as that I heard from some C2C walkers later on the walk. They had reached Rampsgill Head in poor visibility and had marched straight on up High Street and down into the next valley, and getting a taxi from there to their day’s destination at Shap had been their only option. When we got there, Kidsty Pike, perched to the left of the Riggindale valley circled by birds, was clearly visible, as was the tip of the sprawling Haweswater.

We reached Kidsty Pike shortly before midday, and Caz joined us there just after. Alison walked on, and I wasn’t to see her again. Caz became a mine of useful local information, not least knowing that there was a path – not marked on any map – that was to prove a gentle descent to Haweswater that cut out half of the interminable slog around its shores. As we descended, the radar station on Great Dun Fell announced itself far away along the Pennine ridge from Cross Fell, and I remembered looking from there to the Lakes in 2006.

We emerged onto Haweswater in a flurry of ferns and heather and the brief path along the lake was a pleasant epilogue to walking in the Lakes. Caz provided me with plentiful information. Haweswater’s flooding had meant that a hotel had had to be relocated to its eastern shores, but this had meant that very few people ever went there. The Haweswater area was also notable for its golden eagle, originally one of a pair, but its mate had died now. Caz’s partner Chris had seen the golden eagle whilst doing work for the RSPB, but we didn’t. We did see a kestrel hovering above the path, and a rare butterfly.

Caz told me about the history of Burnbanks, a village built for workers building the reservoir, long since abandoned, but recently rebuilt as homes for sale. She also explained that the Lowthers, a name I had seen on several occasions and the river twisting below Rosgill, were a family of note in these parts - large scale landowners, whose name had been attached to various rivers, roads and villages. Allegedly a disreputable family, most of their fortunes had been squandered by their present day incarnation, and feuding following a death in the family was eating up the rest of the legacy. What a shame.

Crossing the ancient Naddle Bridge, we were into different country, the rocky Lakeland paths replaced by rolling green countryside. Caz’s house across the valley came into view, and crossing a soggy ploughed field and turning off the C2C to cross Rosgill Bridge, we arrived there shortly after. Some view.

Wednesday 11th July – Rosgill (0 miles)

The problem with bed and breakfasts is that rest days are rest days whether you want one or not. It was great to see Caz and her family, but I spent the day itching to move on, not least because it was the sunniest day we had had so far, with a lousy forecast to come. Still it afforded me the opportunity to learn about birds (Caz is a bird person, and she took me through the great tits, blue tits, chaffinches, green finches and a woodpecker who graced her bird table); to finish my book on the Spanish Inquisition; and to read Wainwright’s C2C book.

Thursday 12th July - Rosgill to Orton (10 miles)

It was good to be back in harness the next day, but whilst there was some sunshine at first, it soon clouded over. I didn’t agree with my guidebook’s hyperbole that few walkers would have walked between Shap and Kirkby Stephen “without acquiring a sense of the ancient, a passage through time, extending over two, three, four, maybe four thousand years into the dawning of man’s time in Northern Britain”. I must have been one of the “soulless, blinkered persons who passed by with little thought for our pre-history”. With hindsight, I would have done the next two sections in one day.

Crossing Rosgill Bridge, I disturbed two herons, which lumbered across the fields at my approach. Before Parish Crag Bridge, the sun coming out meant I removed my trousers legs, only for the clouds to have won the sky by the time I reached Shap Abbey. I dawdled there, enjoying the stillness, and wondering how Henry VIII had found it to dissolute it, buried in its fold of the River Lowther.

Moving on, the storm clouds gathered over the Lakes, drawing stark patterns over the landscape. A train passing by in front of me heralded my entrance into Shap – a non-event of a town since the M6 opening, its shops graced by historic photos of trucks holed up there in snow flurries pre-M6. Treating myself to a cup of tea and a bacon sandwich in the café was the limit of my Shap encounter.

Crossing the main West Coast line and the M6, and passing Oddendale Quarry, where a black quarry truck driver pleasantly waved at me, I was into what my guidebook referred to as limestone country. It was made up of a stone circle, some distance from the path and not easy to find; a large granite boulder on Crosby Ravensworth Fell; the detour up to the cross on Beacon Hill, with a view of the Howgills which would have been pleasant in better weather; and disused maltkilns above Orton. None of it enough to compensate for the rain.

Orton was a pleasant enough village, stone bridges, houses, a common in the centre of the village that had been left as a wetland. But again the rain stole its charm, and I was happy to reach the welcoming Barn House bed and breakfast, where I was greeted with tea and scones, and where I used a bird book to wrongly identify a bird I had seen during the day as a Great Grey Shrike - a bird usually only found in Canada.

Orton was also notable for its whitewashed church, where the cleaner told me that her daughter was getting married the next day and she was concerned by the impending weather – a concern I shared.

Friday 13th July - Orton to Kirkby Stephen (11 miles)

In the morning a delicious Barn House fruit mixture greeted me, but also grey and foreboding clouds. And the weather forecast was for worse later on. So I set out early, for the first mile along a road, and then past another nondescript stone circle, to a pleasant path across fields to the delicate bird haven of Sunbiggin Tarn, although no birds were there when I got there. At some point I passed the muscle bound critter shown below. It could be a Doncombe Akhenaten (but could equally be something else).

Skirting Sunbiggin Tarn, the rain started to fall heavily, and the next mile across Ravenstonedale Moor became a bleak trudge, where it was not always easy to see the onward path. But the rain stopped as the path snaked along above Bents Farm. As I paused above the farm, the Australian couple I had last seen on day one at Nannycatch Beck appeared, and I walked with them across the ancient prehistoric Severals settlement. Nothing to see there. My guidebook raved on about having a quiet chat with your conscience to stop you walking across it. A well trodden path showed that few people agreed. The path then twisted down to Smardale Bridge and we paused above the wooded Smardale valley punctuated by its elegant viaduct.

Our walk over Smardale Fell marked our transition into the Pennines, with the gradual appearance of Nine Standard Riggs pinpricking into the sky ahead. It was an opportunity for an unresolved discussion about the differences between fells, moors and hills, and for the Australian man to enthusiastically remark on the health of English Cows. Their waste product punctuated our walk through Greenriggs Farm, and then shortly after that we were entering Kirkby Stephen by a back road. I had a comfortable room in an upstairs room at the Black Bull Inn in the centre of the town, and it was fortunate I had arrived there early. The rain came down in the afternoon in impenetrable sheets. Would the weather be kinder for the crossing of the Pennines tomorrow?

Saturday 14th July - Kirkby Stephen to Keld (10 miles)

This was a day of huge contrasts and significance for my C2C walk. It started with an extreme weather beaten ascent to Nine Standards Rigg. Tales of the difficulties of crossing from the Rigg to the top of Swaledale had presented a sense of foreboding, amplified in the hostile weather. This weather contrasted with the golden sunshine that greeted our approach into Keld. And then of course, the beautiful village of Keld, and encountering the widely renowned and redoubtable Doreen and Ernest Whitehead. But this was also the day I met up with Gwen, Chris, Jennie and Tully, wonderful companions with whom most of the rest of my C2C walk was spent at various stages over the next few days, and who remain my most enduring memory.

The day started out well enough. Beautiful sunshine brightening up Kirkby Stephen after the deluge of the previous day. This made for a brilliant walk across the River Eden at Franks Bridge, ducklings wobbling on its grass banks, and then to Hartley, where Hartley Beck ran red from the mud in the area. But looking up from Hartley, it was clear that the tops of the Pennines were shrouded in cloud which boded ill for the route up to Nine Standards Rigg.

As the path ran along a road skirting Hartley Quarry, looking back a brilliant rainbow framed Kirkby Stephen. As the path led off the road onto Hartley Fell, the clouds could be seen closing in above. The Rigg was nowhere to be seen.

I met one couple who chose to take an alternative route that went along the road towards Keld. I didn’t think it could be that bad and I headed on up. But the walk along the deep incision of Faraday Gill that led to the top was increasingly bleak, wet, windy, with very little vision ahead. The path was muddy and well trodden, with little chance that anyone could stray from it. The consequences of doing so in this maelstrom would not have been good. I couldn’t see anything. It was all sheeting rain blasting coldly into my face, and it was only the rising howling wind billowing my coat that announced the approach to Nine Standards Rigg.

The standards only loomed atmospherically out of the gloom a few yards in front of them. My guidebook said that no one knows why they’re there. Maybe their purpose was simply to be visible for miles around, which they had been the day before, but on a day like today, they would have just been a useful marker to help guide anyone stupid enough to walk this way from Kirkby Stephen to Keld in bad weather. My guidebook also remarked that the Rigg marked the Pennine watershed with water flowing either West or East from there. Today it didn’t seem like water was flowing anywhere. Somewhere in the whirlwind blowing all around me, I wondered how the standards had always remained there given that they are simply made of thin stones laid loosely on top of each other.

Some two months later, I came back to Nine Standards Rigg with Grumpus. The views from the Rigg were spectacular, right across to Cross Fell and to the Howgills. But today, as I paused at the Rigg, wondering whether I could sensibly remain there long enough to grant enough respect to the monument, two bright yellow tarpaulin coats appeared out of the gloom with Gwen and Chris striding along underneath them.

I couldn’t have hoped to have met anyone other than Gwen and Chris in this gloom. How rare to meet such generous people. Gwen, never fazed by anyone or anything, but always there, always supportive, always interested. Chris, always thinking through how to get the best out of people, with a bluff weather beaten sense of humour. The two of them together, working off and supporting each other, a pair of people uniquely brought together, self-sufficient, but open to anyone who deserved their generosity.

They immediately seemed friendly and so I asked them if they minded me walking along with them. I didn’t fancy picking a way across the Pennine bogs on my own in this weather. With Gwen and Chris this wasn’t the problem it might have been. Gwen in particular seemed to be particularly adept at charting a way through the mudpools. And shortly afterwards, as we descended below the cloudline, we caught up a large group of people, most of whom I was to meet up with at various points along the way. Firstly there was what we came to know as the United Nations party, in that they were a large guided party made up of people from all over the world. Then there was Richard, a youngish lad who was doing a long distance path for the first time, and had over-estimated his ability to carry a large pack, damaged his knee, and then had to get his luggage carried. And then there was Jennie and Tully from Seattle. Along with Gwen and Chris, they were to feature on many occasions of the onward walk.

At this time, it didn’t seem like I would know any of these people for long, because they set off before me, the belisha beacon coats of Gwen and Chris disappearing down the fellside. Following them, the path, marked by occasional jutting stonemen, meandered well trodden through bogs across the soggy expanse of North Yorkshire moorlands, now easy to see below the cloud level stretching across to Swaledale.

I caught up with all the people at a mountain hut half way down the descent, but they were just leaving, which was fortunate in that there wouldn’t have been room to shelter in the hut for lunch if they hadn’t moved on. Further down, the path aimlessly wandered over New Gill several times, a stream that was gradually growing, and with the abundant water at this time overflowing its banks at several points, requiring careful precision to not end up with a bootful of water. But then, as the sun finally decided to show its face, the path skirted round into the bottom of the more dale like scenary of Whitsun Dale at Ravenseat farmhouse.

Shortly after, I caught up with Gwen, Chris, Jennie and Tully, and walked with them down to Keld, and it was from this passage of sunshine walking down into the beautiful folds of the river Swale, that was to be with us over the next few days, that our friendship started. From my knowledge of previously walking the Pennine Way, I suggested that we take a slightly longer detour on the northern side of the Swale to visit Catrake Falls before entering Keld.

Catrake was as enchanting and welcoming as it had been the year before on the Pennine Way. Joining the Pennine Way at the farmhouse for the short stretch down to Catrake was like meeting an old friend, and after a brief stop at the falls, we climbed up to Keld. Keld is a tiny hamlet at the top of Swaledale that would be unknown to the outside world if it weren’t at the confluence of the Pennine Way and the C2C. Life would have been harsh and remote here once, but now Keld is a picture postcard village nestled into the folds of the dale, with attractively strewn stone cottages just about allowing the lonely road through. Competition is fierce for the few bedspaces available in Keld, and so I had booked my accommodation here first. In fact, I had particularly wanted to book into the famous Butt House, and had changed the date of my walk so that I could secure an overnight stay there.

Butt House is (or was) the home to Doreen and Ernest Whitehead. Doreen is famous for having written a book on bed and breakfasts on the C2C route, and is seen as being as much a part of C2C mythology as Wainwright. Whilst most people had said that staying at Butt House was a pleasant experience, Doreen also had a reputation as being a fearsome landlady, and so it was with some trepidation that we (Jennie and Tully were also booked into Butt House that night) approached the whitewashed building perched above Keld.

Doreen lived up to her reputation. If a typical north Yorkshire people exist, these were they. There was something of the League of Gentlemen about the Whiteheads – Doreen, the dominating personality that no one would dare refuse, least of all Ernest, scuttling around in the kitchen and dealing with the more mundane things.

But there was also a generosity of spirit that had earned Doreen her reputation as matriarch of the C2C and which seeped out occasionally from the craggy Yorkshire bluntness. And some sadness in that Doreen’s health was failing, making it difficult for her to move around. She had the look of someone who would stand up to anything, but advancing years were beginning to take their reckoning. And it also turned out that they had a son with terminal cancer. So they were planning to close the bed and breakfast and sell up in August. I felt honoured that I had managed to make my booking to join them for this one night.

Having checked in, and following a request to leave our muddy boots in the entrance hall which it would have been unwise to refuse, we were invited to join Doreen for afternoon tea. There followed a passage where time stood still, where Doreen, ensconced firmly in the doorway to prevent escape, regaled us with all things Yorkshire for perhaps an hour, whilst we nervously sipped tea and obediently ate giant slabs of delicious chocolate cake.

In this hour we briefly entered Doreen’s world – hearing tales of growing up in Keld. Was some of it a caricature of what Yorkshire people are supposed to be? Maybe so, but who cares? Maybe they invented the caricature. On asking about where they were intending to move to when they retired, Doreen bluntly stated that Ernest was born and bred in Swaledale, and he’s going to die in Swaledale – presumably meaning there would be few options available to them, particularly because she actually meant this little corner of Swaledale stretching from Keld around Kisdon Hill to Muker. They speak with a different accent further down Swaledale, and as for Wensleydale – a different language.

And if the photographs of Thatcher and Doreen meeting local MP William Hague made me slightly uncomfortable, the endless streams of invective against the current Government might have offended my socialist principles. On hearing about the supposedly ravaged health service, my meek defence of asking the Seattlers what it’s like to not have a national health service at all, seemed to go unnoticed, but the politics of the situation were not really important here.

She also made us a delicious evening meal, making us feel guilty because of her difficulties of getting around, and entertained us with further regalement after dinner. Later on, I found that another couple who were staying there that night had written a stinging story about Butt House on the internet, particularly unnecessary given that Doreen and Ernest were retiring in a month’s time. I wrote one back defending the Whiteheads. They were generous people who have worked hard over many years to make their guests comfortable and share them with a unique slice of life. Even if I didn’t agree with what she was saying, Doreen’s approach was a time honoured communication of life and values, and I respected that. Staying with Doreen and Ernest was a unique, colourful and memorable experience that brightened up my C2C trip. The C2C will miss them.

Sunday 15th July - Keld to Reeth (10 miles)

Decisions, decisions. Taking the path along the Swale – scenic and level? Or climbing Swinner Gill and going past all the old lead mine buildings – a sharp climb but stunning? Or a bit of both by dropping down to the Swale from Gunnerside? I opted for the Swinner Gill route – the old lead mine buildings sounded like something special and there was plenty of Swale walking later.

I departed Butt House in early morning sunshine past Catrake and the turn off to the Pennine Way. The path climbed gently up past the ruined Crackpot Hall, derelict since the 1950s due to subsidence caused by mining. Picture postcard views of Swaledale, with the Pennine Way path perched along the edge of Kisdon Hill across the valley. From there, I had remembered photographing the slash of Swinner Gill opposite, little anticipating that I would be walking up it a year later. If I had thought the path on Kisdon Hill precipitous, the path that edged into Swinner Gill was not a lot better! But the stark beauty of entering its cavernous mouth in the early morning sunshine distracted from the sharp drop.

Turning right over an arched stone bridge, built years ago to span Hind Hole Beck, the path started to climb up Swinner Gill. The old ramshackle and haphazard stone lead mine buildings stood sentinel to the chasm, silently inviting speculation as to the former working conditions. Not for their erstwhile occupants the meticulous ticking off of health and safety conditions I fear.

The path twisted steeply and languidly up the gill in the morning sunshine. Chris and Gwen appeared from below, catching up with me as I reached the top, from where views stretched over to Great Shunner Fell, another Pennine Way high point. Our meeting up was celebrated by seeing a frog cowering in the heather.

We walked on together over the moors at the top to the Lownathwaite lead mines overlooking Gunnerside Beck, pausing to reflect above the spectacular and painfully beautiful Bunton Hush scar splayed across the opposite side of the Gunnerside valley. On such a sunny day, it was difficult to appreciate the vast human machinations that had caused the blasted hillside.

As we sat reflecting, we were joined by Jennie, who was walking on her own. Last night at Butt House, Tully had scalded his foot in hot bath water. This was a serious injury, and they had had to call a doctor to treat his wound. Whilst he was now not able to take the more difficult route up Swinner Gill, he was not about to give up on the C2C, and he had taken the gentler route along the Swale.

The path descended steeply down to the top of Gunnerside Beck, where we were joined by Bob and Sue at more old lead mine buildings, two more people who became part of our team over the next few days. At this time, I wanted more solitude to enjoy the Romanesque desolate ruins, and so watched them all move off up the path zigzagging up through the fern cover on the other side of the valley. Shortly after, I started to edge up the same path, creeping along the side of the valley towards Bunton Hush, views emerging down towards Gunnerside.

At this point it might have been a good idea to have taken the path down the beck to Gunnerside and the Swale. On a later occasion, Grumpus and I walked up the same valley from Gunnerside, not quite making it as far as the hush, but it was a beautiful walk, and would have been more welcome than the desolate moonscape that waited at the top of Bunton Hush.

The path onwards over Melbecks Moor was as nondescript as the path over Swinner Gill and into Gunnerside had been stunning. It was punctuated occasionally by more sentinel towers of smelting mills, but their restless charm was beginning to wear. Eventually the path drizzled down the Old Gang Beck to Surrender Bridge. It seemed that my body was beginning to surrender as I stumbled over the final few miles across moors, and then an assault course of numerous stiles over a chequer board of green fields into Reeth. I was happy to reach the Buck Hotel for a quick pint just as the rain started to fall. After sharing a cup of tea in a little café with Gwen, Chris and Jennie, I found the small but welcoming bed and breakfast run by Mrs Ann Bain in a quiet little side street off the main square in Reeth. I made it up to the Buck again for an evening meal. There was a lot of rain that evening, and I was hoping it would end by tomorrow. There had been no particular reason why I should have been so tired in the latter part of the day, but I slept well that night.

Monday 16th July – Reeth to Richmond (9 miles)

Happily it wasn’t raining in the morning. Meeting the United Nations Party for the last time as I left Reeth, I veered off the official route to avoid the road, on a winding path alongside the Swale to Grinton where a sturdy stone bridge spanned the river. Rejoining the road, I found a comfortable path heading across the fields, only to be waved at furiously by the United Nations guide telling me I was going the wrong way. I persevered and reached Marrick Priory without touching tarmac. The Priory was a non-event, but I met up with Bob and Sue there, who were chatty and friendly. Shortly after they left, Gwen and Chris appeared, but I was just leaving. The path climbed up the slippery and polished Nun’s Causeway through the damp and dark Steps Wood.

Throughout the day, the scenery gradually changed again from the bleak windswept nature of the Pennine fells to rolling green fields and agriculture, a prelude to what was to come on the Vale of Mowbray. Today’s walk was in and out of the attractive villages of Marrick and Marske, up and over stiles, several diagonal paths across fields, the replacement of former industry scars from the previous day with current farming industry activities, with the ever widening Swale in its green and fertile valley somewhere close by.

And then there were the people. Firstly I walked between Marrick and Marske with Richard, who I had previously met briefly coming down from Nine Standards Rigg, who told me about his struggles with his bad knee. Then Gwen, Chris, Bob and Sue caught me up again at Marske, and I walked with Gwen and Chris along the beautiful Applegarth scar, Gwen as ever carefully navigating our route, and Chris regaling us with countless charming facts about farming, cheerfully fitting in with the meandering nature of the day’s walk.

Having climbed up onto the scar, together we lazily watched the bustling industry of a farmer on horseback on the other side of the valley corralling his sheep across several fields, and then we looked out for Willance’s Leap. My guidebook referred to Willance’s Leap as part of the Applegarth scar where in 1606 someone called Robert Willance accidentally rode his horse over the 200 foot cliff, surviving himself, albeit losing a leg, but killing the horse. We weren’t quite sure which part was Willance’s Leap but somewhere around there I stopped to have lunch as the sun came out, overlooking a beautiful bend in the Swale, flanked to the side by Whitcliffe Wood.

Jennie and Tully (who had now healed enough to walk the path) passed me as I enjoyed my lunch. I received a text message from Alison, the Aussie Nurse I had last seen on Kidsty Pike, saying she had had to abandon the C2C at Richmond due to a family crisis. Emerging from Whitcliffe Wood onto the road leading into Richmond, I caught up with Jennie and Tully sitting on a bench by the road, their heads bobbling above the Welcome to Richmond sign. Richmond Castle announced its presence at the edge of the Vale of Mowbray, stretched across interminably to the Cleveland Hills, our destination in a couple of days.

Not being partial to road walking, I chose to avoid the mile long road trudge my map gave as the C2C’s Richmond approach, and found a path that slipped quietly down the hill to the Swale, albeit slightly doubling back at one point.

I was rewarded firstly by some beautiful hedgerow flowers, which I have been subsequently told by Grumpus are Himalayan Balsam and a “terrible pest”. The walk along the Swale was delightful. As it finally twisted on its final approach to Richmond, I had to pick my way carefully across slippery stone boulders between the river and the twisted tree roots of ancient woodlands. Richmond Castle, with its solid walls, perched over my triumphal entrance over the Swale Bridge. My overnight accommodation was just on the other side of the bridge.

The amiably eccentric Alan Bennett, the proprietor of the Restaurant on the Green, mistitled in that it was only a bed and breakfast and not a restaurant, told me that it had once been an old 16th Century Inn and brewery in the salubrious quarter of Richmond. Bob and Sue were also staying there. Having arrived early into Richmond, I climbed the steep streets up into the town, exploring the numerous little obscure alleyways and posting finished maps and books back home to lighten the weight of my pack. During my exploration, I bumped into Chris and Gwen who were similarly exploring, and recommended a visit to Swale Falls below the town.

By a circuitous route, choosing not to explore the castle due to its admittance fee, I edged down to the Falls, which were spectacular, reminding me for some reason of the falls in Jajce in Bosnia, which Grumpus and I had visited some three years earlier. We had approached Jajce from the North, having stayed the previous night in the Bosnian Serb town of Banja Luka, where either we had not understood Serb congeniality or they genuinely weren’t pleased to see us. Jajce had been the first town we had come to back in the Muslim part of Bosnia, and people were much friendlier. Whilst there had been evidence of the town being rebuilt, particularly its mosque in the centre of the town, it had not yet returned to its historic tourist potential. The Jajce falls had been a poignant and stark reminder of the war, with abandoned and derelict attractions for visitors alongside them, but still spectacular. The Swale Falls bore no resemblance to the Jajce Falls, other than that they were below the main town, but our trip to Jajce came into my mind as I whiled away a pleasant and reflective half hour there as the sun occasionally dappled along the surface of the Swale.

Tuesday 17th July – Richmond to Danby Wiske (12 miles)

What to say about the 21 miles from Richmond to Ingleby Cross across the Vale of Mowbray, the painfully flat northern extension of the Vale of York? My guidebook did its best to convince me that “the low lying land, barley fields, quiet farms, and rural scenary of the vale are valuable diet balancing ingredients of the C2C feast, and should not be gobbled indecently”. Against that, many people on the C2C website recorded the Vale of Mowbray as dull, interminable and best done in one day. I’ll remain agnostic. It certainly wasn’t a high point. The first day was better than the second. But particularly in the sunshine that greeted both days, it had its moments of charm. Various encounters with members of our team probably also made it more enjoyable than it could have been.

Leaving Richmond I contrived to wander off the path twice, once carrying further on down the river, and once by the sewage farm. The path skirted high above the Swale on a muddy track through the Iron Banks wood, a beautiful interlude, and then headed across open country to Colburn Hall. After Colburn, the path headed into arable country, across two giant flat fields. I missed the path that turned to the left in the middle of them, which led me to some gymnastic crossings of hedges and barbed wire at St Giles. At the final approach to Catterick, I met up with Gwen and Chris having a break in the sunshine, and then walked on with them. They set a cracking pace, although it subsequently turned out that they thought it was me setting the pace, under the A1 thundering north, past Catterick race course, past the Catterick Bridge pub, over the bridge and along the Swale for the last time in hot sunshine.

As we left the Swale, we missed the path and walked along the road into Scorton – not a particularly pleasant detour. At Bolton on Swale, I paused in the churchyard, photographing the monument to Henry Jenkins, allegedly a man with a strong constitution who had died aged 169, having lived between 1500 & 1670, reputed to have swum in the Swale at the age of 100. He claimed to remember the battle of Flodden in 1512, the dissolution of the monasteries in 1536, and then is mentioned in court records in 1667. A pleasant enough tale.

The path from Bolton was a pleasant amble beside Bolton Beck, a verdant wetland area. I met up with Bob and Sue just as a heron blasted out of the undergrowth. I chose the field route for the rest of the way to Danby Wiske, which took me past Kiplin Hall and more farmland paths. A tale of two farms – Stanhow - a visitors book, carefully stored at the side of the path, inviting comments about the upkeep of the path; Moor House - the path diverted through a liquid manure field. The last two miles would have been pleasant - rough pasture, a wooded path, but a downpour was coming, and I picked up my pace.

I reached Danby Wiske as the lightning started to strike. Later, Tully told us how he and Jennie had taken appropriate precautions in the lightning – crouching down in the rain their walking poles in the ground at a distance from them – only to be passed by a farmer nonchalantly wondering what they were doing.

I had a pint in the White Swan, my ear bent by the person who tells every C2C walker about his Russian internet bride, probably because no one else will listen to him. I also paid a visit to the solid Danby Wiske church, where bell ringers practiced. Up close to the church, the sounds of the squeaking bell machinery added complex rhythms to the sounds of the bells, ever changing and intriguingly looping in and out of time as I walked back to the village.

The Old School House bed and breakfast, where Jennie, Tully, Bob and Sue were also staying, was run by the former White Swan landlord. Our full party, which now also included Lindsay and her son Simon, who beat me in a game of pool, collected at the pub for dinner. Perhaps having the four pints was a bit excessive, but it was a short day tomorrow.

Wednesday 18th July – Danby Wiske to Ingleby Cross (9 miles)

A short day and short of interest. Crossing over the main northern train line; a yellow bird flitting in the hedgerow alongside more interminable road walking; taking a detour across fields to escape the road to find the advertised path ploughed over; a quagmire section; encountering an overgrown River Wiske; coming across a strange sheep (and of course Chris knew its name); some charming calves – not much else to report from the day.

But after another seven miles of dull Mowbraying, I crossed the A19, not an easy task - the traffic was very heavy – and re-entered interesting walking at Ingleby Arncliffe, the prelude to the Cleveland Hills. I met up with Chris and Gwen again at the village’s ancient water tower, and then we removed to the Blue Boar Inn for a lunchtime pint, where we were joined by Bob and Sue and, despite a heavy deluge, we remained cowering under an ancient tree in the garden.

Park House, my overnight stop, where Bob, Sue, Jennie and Tully were also staying, was a short climb up into Arncliffe Woods. Climbing a hill again was most welcome. Park House was a beautiful overnight stop with dazzling views back over to the dales. Tully surprised our evening meal by telling us he had spent his young years in a Japanese prisoner of war camp.

Thursday 19th July – Ingleby Cross to Urra (13 miles)

This would be the last day that our team would be all together. I had opted for some longer days at the end and so from now on, I would be a day ahead. It was a bond built over six days and 70 miles that had been formed in an endurance moment on Nine Standards Rigg. It was to go out in style in warm sunshine on the stunning Cleveland Hills.

I felt fit and lively as I climbed through the ancient Arncliffe Woods. Low clouds clung to the dank woods, giving them a silent charm, and the radio masts at the top loomed out of the gloom. But the mist swirled and cleared as I headed out onto the moors, gradually opening up a view of crags and ridges ahead. A lot of quite enjoyable up and downs over the next few miles, in and out of a wood, and then up the steep Round Hill as the first test against India started. My notes record that I felt good at the top of the climb. Despite the up and down nature of the day, my body had responded well to the two weeks of walking so far.

The path then edged up Carlton Bank, past the abandoned gliding club, with the slopes beginning to come out with purple heather. Then a steep drop down to Lordstone’s Café, carved out of the rock in the valley, where Chris and Gwen were waiting. The rest of our team also arrived there shortly after, and we headed off up the steep climb to Cringle Moor, our last section on the route together, each taking our own pace to get there. At the top, we collared another walker to take a commemorative photograph, with the views across the chequerboard fields to industrial Teesside resplendent below.

Somewhere on Cringle Moor, Jennie took the photograph above of me reading a note that a C2C walker coming the other way had left under a rock on top of a small cairn. It advised ordering tea and scones at the Lion Inn at Blakey. By this time, the sun, which had been occasionally gracing the day previously, had come out big time, and walking along the jagged edge of the ridge, slashed by several valleys clawing into the North York Moors, was becoming a real treat.

Parting was such sweet sorrow. Not really, but as the team all disappeared off ahead of me, Chris and Gwen heading off through the ferns down Raisdale for their bed and breakfast, and Bob and Sue heading off north somewhere, it felt like a poignant moment. Only together over six days, but all those casual encounters and drifting conversations along the way had been colourful illustrations that had complemented the walking. It had felt like we were the C2C route as we passed through it, and everyone else circulated around us.

Another climb up Broughton Bank in beautiful sunshine brought me to the Wainstones, scattered rocks and crags strewn across the path. Up ahead I saw Jennie and Tully edge around their left hand side, above what appeared to be a sheer drop, and so I opted to take a path of sorts that struck straight through their middle. This involved some clambering, but a welcome interlude in the still heat of the afternoon.

Shortly afterwards, as I skirted White Hill before the final descent into the Urra valley, I caught up with Jennie enjoying the view over to the Cleveland ridge, and we made the sharp descent into the valley joining up with Tully at the bottom.

Was it the sunshine, the rolling and undulating crags along the Cleveland Hills, a feeling that the ten miles walked so far hadn’t been enough, or just a strange desire to make sure that no part of this exhilarating path was missed out? At this point, two bad decisions were made. I decided that I wanted to continue on along the path towards Round Hill, intending to take a path further on that descended down Urra Moor. Tully and Jennie decided that they’d join me.

So on we went. Unfortunate on two counts. Firstly, the scenery markedly changed. The rolling North York Moors, peppered by interesting crags and outcrops, changed into a featureless expanse – alright in itself, but it wasn’t the continuation I was looking for. Secondly, after a climb and a mile of walking along the moor, the path marked on the map heading down to Urra didn’t exist.

This led to us retracing our steps the best part of a mile, taking another path that traced the contour, before heading down an indistinct but attractive path that headed down through ferns to Urra, all of this now with Tully dragging some way behind with his bad foot. At several points, the path disappeared, and I was feeling increasingly concerned about whether the path would get through to our destination, albeit clear ahead of us, and guilty that I had dragged Tully on this excursion. Happily we did find our way through to Maltkiln House at about 7pm, to be told by the proprietors that the path we couldn’t find and the path below we had eventually taken had both been closed off due to the dangers of abandoned mine workings in the area. Hmmm.

Friday 20th July – Urra to Glaisdale (17 miles)

A challenge wanted and a challenge got. When booking the walk, I had remembered the twenty mile days I had done on the Pennine Way the year before and figured that by this point, I’d be wanting to strike out for longer distances. Unfortunately I hadn’t anticipated the bleak loneliness of the North York Moors, made starker by the loss of my companions of the previous days, and the cauldron of bubbling grey clouds overhead and the large amounts of road and stony track walking on this day.

Leaving at 7.30, the day started with a muddy climb through a wet forest back up to Urra Moor, and then a dull trudge up a long and featureless path over the moor. My guidebook referred to people getting lost on the moor and hence in 1711 a decision to install guide stones alongside the path, with one called the Handstone at the top of Round Hill. Behind it, a concrete trig point contrasted old and new markers. The path then splayed out across the moors, easy walking and I used it as an opportunity to gather some pace for the 17 mile day. The bleak moorland was interrupted by the Blowith Crossing, from where the Rosedale Ironstone Railway twisted its way along the top of Farndale valley.

The Rosedale railway had been built in 1861 to move iron ore, and had been abandoned in the 1920s. Initially conjuring up exciting images of trains lumbering along, the five mile stretch soon lost its charm, although its twist along the contours continued to allow fast walking. At the end of a long stretch leading to High Blakey Moor, I chiselled a greeting to my erstwhile companions in the sand on the path, although I subsequently heard that none of them saw it.

Finally, the path skirted High Blakey Moor, and the Lion Inn peaked out on the horizon, one final twist of abandoned railway away. It was still early, but I thought I’d heed the advice given on the previous day to have tea and scones at the Lion Inn. Its otherworldly charm was a welcome contrast to the bleak day outside (and the tea and scones went down a treat as well).

From Lion Inn began three miles of road walking that peppered the rest of the day, but I chose to take a short detour to see Ralph Cross at the head of Rosedale, which my guidebook told me had become a symbol of the North York Moors National Park Authority in 1974, so I felt I needed to pay my respects to it.

Eventually the path parted company with the road at Trough House, above the beautiful and heather strewn Great Fry Up Dale (I could find no explanation for the peculiar name) stretching down into Glaisdale.

At this highpoint, first views of the North Sea nestled on the horizon, but my enthusiasm to reach my final destination was mitigated by aching feet caused by the road walking. After a break at Trough House, I felt better, and enjoyed the twisting muddy path that snaked around the head of Great Fry Up Dale.

This wasn’t to last long enough, because the path rejoined another road shortly after, clinging to it and then another stony track over the next three miles down into Glaisdale. My feet hurt by the time I checked into the Arncliffe Arms in the Village, unfortunately sited as far from the centre of the village as it could be. My room was nothing special, but the food was excellent. I was pleased to have managed the extended distance, and now anticipated the final days C2C walk.

Saturday 21st July – Glaisdale to Robin Hood’s Bay (13 miles)

The final day dawned as overcast as most of the other days had been. There was a fine rain when I left, but this didn’t cause problems on the delightfully dank climb into East Arncliff Wood. Pillow stones and mud alternately guided me through the wood, until the path emerged back on to more road leading down to Egton Bridge. I opted for the sturdy road bridge across the River Esk, rather than the stepping stones further down, barely visible in the deluge, and then I paused briefly to look at the large Catholic Church, which my guide book told me had somehow been missed by the Reformation.

A pair of donkeys in the grounds of Egton Manor greeted me to the old toll path, dejected perhaps because of the don’t feed the donkeys sign. The old toll house announced 1948 prices, largely dependent on numbers of horses and wheels. It was good to see that hearses got a discount, but then maybe they should have been free. Would the sixpence have been passed on to the occupant’s estate?

The toll path twisted under the railway bridge, a bridge I was to come over in two days on the train going home, and then edged alongside the meandering Esk to join another road leading into Grosmont. Because it had started raining, I paused briefly at a café on the walk into Grosmont, before joining crowds of people enjoying the steam trains at Grosmont Station.

The climb out of Grosmont, the last major climb on the C2C, was long, savage, and all on a road, but my mind was taken off it by a tumble of Indian wickets. The views back to the North York Moors were stunning, and gradually emerging of Whitby, my final destination, to the north-east.

I welcomed the boggy path turning off the road, but not the busy A169 which I had to join briefly before descending to Littlebeck. I paused for lunch by the ford at Littlebeck, listening to Nicholas Parsons being interviewed in the cricket lunch break after India had been bowled out, and wryly observing the different approaches motorists took to driving through the ford – some just driving straight through, and some stopping and carefully assessing the ford’s depth – even with my helpful advice that they wouldn’t have a problem. Perhaps my wry observation made me look untrustworthy?

The Littlebeck valley is a delightful interlude before the end of the C2C. A muddy path that twists around tangled ancient woodland, firstly clinging to the waterfalls and rock pools of the bubbling Little Beck, and then heading up through the trees high above the stream until it reaches the spectacular Falling Foss. As I walked through this stretch of paradise, the sun came out, amplifying the splendour.

In the midst of the valley, someone called George Chubb had carved out a rock and had called it the Hermitage. No one is quite sure why, but the view out of it over the wooded valley would certainly have been fit for contemplation.

I felt I needed to take the short detour along the precipitous path to Falling Foss, which proved to be spectacular, and then I sat for a while in contemplation by the beck, liberally assaulted by midges.

I had decided I was going to head straight across land to Robin Hoods Bay, rather than take the official route through Hawkser. The road walking on the official route held little attraction, and I figured that I was planning to walk up the coast the next day, so I didn’t need the coastal approach to the town. And of course, I wasn’t keen on the additional three miles or so.

So, emerging into the sunshine, I jutted off up the fern covered slope at the end of the Littlebeck valley onto an indistinct path that meandered over the boggy and misleading Low Moor. Whilst the destination was never in doubt, announced by the busy A171 on the other side of the moor, in the end, the only way to track across this impenetrable barrier was to follow one of the many gullies criss crossing the moor. Crossing the main road, this led to a long stretch next to farmland, and finally to an overgrown path that had not been walked for years, from where I got my first views of the red roofs of Robin Hoods Bay below.

I still had to negotiate a steep and twisting road, a field full of aggressive cows (which required some equally aggressive stick waving to fend them off), a very muddy stretch into Fylingthorpe, and then the caravan site from hell to welcome me into Robin Hoods Bay. Discovering that my bed and breakfast was at the high point of the town, I relaxed into a couple of pints at the Bay Hotel with an Australian couple who had also just completed, and signed the hotel’s C2C book.

Sunday 22nd July – Robin Hood’s Bay to Whitby (6 miles)

Did this end section work? Intended as a triumphal epilogue to get to the train station in Whitby, I’m not sure that it was actually anything that special. And I don’t really like cliff walking! But first there was the ceremonial boot wetting, and the placing of the stone I had carried from Irish to North Sea, both of which I did in the early morning sunshine by the Bay Hotel, enjoying the town’s narrow alleyways and side roads whilst there were very few people around. It all seemed a long time and a different world since I had stood in the Irish Sea.

Leaving Robin Hoods Bay, I did come to appreciate the benefits of approaching the town from the coastal path. The view back to the town was inviting, strewn narrowly across the strip of land leading down to the sea. I was joined by a large guided group just starting out on the C2C going from east to west. It felt like I was an old pro now!

After I parted from this group as they turned inland to Hawkser, the walk to Whitby was largely uneventful. Many vertiginous cliffs, including one section where I had to climb over barbed wire to walk along a field. A lighthouse. Islands of jet appearing like submarines from the North Sea. A sprawling caravan park. Whitby Abbey looming out over the fields. All good stuff, but in my heart I had already finished.

The crowds at Whitby were not welcome. But, it being Sunday, finding a place to have a Sunday roast was. And then because I had to wait for my train, I found a pub to watch the dying embers of the test match – the final result leaving England 343 runs ahead, but with not enough time to bowl India out a second time. A shame because England went on to lose the series.

As my train pulled out of the ramshackle palm tree lined Whitby station, snaked its way through the beautiful Esk Valley (of course now in gorgeous sunshine), and then under the North York Moors, I had a chance to reminisce. There had been dazzling highpoints on the walk – the cliffs at St Bees; walking the Lakes with Grumpus; meeting up with Caz on Kidsty Pike; extreme weather on Nine Standards Rigg; Keld, Doreen Whitehouse, and the folds of Swaledale; the post industrial spectacle of Gunnersbury; the Swale Falls at Richmond; the North York Moor edge; and Littlebeck Valley. And above all, the bond that had formed between our party from Nine Standards Rigg to Urra – a journey into friendship that ran alongside the path.

But was it the lack of sunshine? Was it the short days, almost necessitated by the design of the walk? Was it the shorter overall distance? Was it the greater number of people encountered along the way? Was it the lack of bleak moorland sections? Were there just too many attractions? Or was it just that nothing could have competed with the Pennine Way? Somehow overall, as I sped back to Birmingham, trying to spot where the train zipped past Danby Wiske, I knew that the C2C had not been the challenge and life altering experience that the Pennine Way had been. But it had been a light hearted, relaxing and friendly holiday nonetheless.