Saturday, 11th August.
In order of importance, United won 2-1, my steak and ale pie at the Crown was very good and the beer was ok. The pub was packed, until 9:30 anyway, so I was glad that for the only time during the walk I’d booked ahead by phone. I was watching the match on my iPad with wireless earphones; there’s always room for the technical essentials in my pack! I was conscious throughout of people watching over my shoulder and two of the staff members kept tapping me on the arm for updates. It was a good atmosphere that gradually shifted from holidaying families to post-watershed profane locals. One punter was consistently told to stop swearing, hopefully not for my benefit!
Breakfast was in the tearoom with lashings of coffee before I set off on another route that deviated wildly from the original. This time I had pre-planned it out of necessity rather than choice as there was no accommodation available on the actual Bay 2 Bay route. It didn’t take long before I’d changed this route as well. This time I decided that I’d planned too much walking in forest, which on the map looked like plantations, especially for a sunny day. What I didn’t want to do though was make it any longer as Jen was meeting me in Goathland to complete the walk with me (for a day and a half).
In the end I skirted the early stages of the forest on lanes, which were pleasant enough and helped me to top up my farmer’s tan in glorious sunshine (possibly the last looking at the forecast). I noticed on the map a place nearby called Cawthorn Roman Camp so, having decided not to do any detours today, did one.
If you ever want to waste an hour of your life (and two miles walking in my case) go to Cawthorn Roman Camp. A signposted path guides you in an anti-clockwise direction through a wood, across some scrubland and back into the wood. As soon as I re-entered the wood I realised that the scrubland was the camp. I went back for another look, it was definitely scrubland. Nearby I saw a sign for a viewing platform so followed that. The platform didn’t even look out over the Roman camp, but over the valley in the opposite direction!
How are you supposed to camp on that?
From the viewing platform - not scrubland.
Relieved to be back on track my pointless detour was followed by a pretty woodland path but the sheer size of the conifer plantation made it impossible to avoid passing through at some point. I kept it down to just 2 miles, along a very wide track which made it much more bearable, though this stretch ended in bizarre fashion.
Pretty.
Not as pretty.
I was about to pass between two forest corners which didn’t quite meet, leaving a gap of about 20 yards. Straddling the gap was a fence with a gate in the middle. As I approached I became aware of thousands upon thousands of ‘things’ flying through the gap, all from right to left (with the breeze). They were bees, and 50 yards to my left were their hives. I wasn’t sure what to do to be honest. I suppose I could have clambered through the edge of the forest or over the end of the barbed wire fence, but my final decision was to leg it. That meant legging it to the gate, getting through it and legging it back to the forest edge on the other side of the fence. I kept my head down and a few did land on me but only for a second.
I walked a fair distance before the gap had widened enough for the bees to be spread out into less of a plague, and half a mile later reached open moorland at last. I now realised why the hives were positioned where they were. The heather on the moor was filled with the sound of buzzing - bee heaven! A mile of blissful walking later brought me to a proper summit with an impressive cairn and standing stones nearby. It was a beautiful spot for a late lunch at 2:30pm with only two miles to go (I’d done 15!).
Bee heaven!
While I was sitting there a couple appeared out of nowhere. They were, shall we say, of a different era and were very reluctant to walk to the actual summit because I was there. They chose instead to look down, mumble something (possibly disapproval) to each other, walk a wide 180 degree arc around me and set off along the path I had walked up. I swear to God it was Keith and Candice Marie (and I suppose you either know who they are or you don’t)!
Keith and Candice Marie keeping a low profile just out of shot.
The wander down to Goathland was equally blissful and I arrived at the Mallyan Spout Hotel mere minutes after Jen. We checked in and went for a wander. It’s a peculiar village with the houses spread out amongst common land, whose claim to fame is being the set of the well known TV drama ‘Heartbeat’ starring Nick Berry, which I didn’t watch. Every single shop was decked out in a 60s style, and I’m pretty sure it said that this was Nick’s police car...
He’s not going to catch anybody in that.
So with Jen for company and rain forecast for the penultimate day tomorrow when we will reach the coast (we’ve now got as much walking to do to get to the coast as we’ve got to do along the coast afterwards), it seems like a good idea to pre-celebrate with beer and wine.
Stats Zone:
Note 2 miles of scrubland pissing about in the middle.
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