Hedge Funds To Hedgerows

“To walkers whose liking is for high places and rough terrain, this will seem the dullest part of the whole walk; those who believe that the earth is flat will be mightily encouraged on this section. The scenery is 100% rural, and all is tidily and pleasantly arranged, but the views are restricted to the road and the fields adjoining: there is no distance to attract the eye, no stimulating prospect apart from the faraway outline of the Cleveland Hills, too remote yet to excite. You have heard of Yorkshire’s broad acres: here they are in person, interminable, neatly patterned by clipped thorn hedges or wooden fences, but never, never a stone wall: a foreign land indeed.”

“….tedium grows apace and one plods onwards mechanically, head down, thinking nostalgically of places left behind: Lakeland, limestone country, the Dales…..(there is) nothing of interest to anyone but farmers”

-Alfred Wainright

Today was to be an easy day….and the most boring, according to AW himself, as you can read above. The latter proved to be correct, the former debatable. We left our beloved Swale River early in the walk as it left us to travel south, as we continued east. A confusing start (four signs pointing in four different directions) saw us plod along flat fields, with not a stone wall in sight. Today’s views were to be mainly of wheat fields and lane ways and most of our swaledale sheep companions had grown into cows, and even those were few and far on the ground. One of the towns passed through was Catterick. There’s nothing much but a racecourse here, but it has a somewhat interesting past. An old Roman fort town since about 80AD, it has been inhabited for about 5000 years. Its name comes from its Roman name of Cattaractonium, in honour of the swirling Swale waters that run through it. Bolton-On-Swale also had to be visited. It’s at the local 14th century church that you can find a monument to one Henry Jenkins. Henry lived a few hundred years ago and did nothing too special in his time. His fame comes from the fact that he lived for 169 years. So they say. No one really knows, and there is no start or finish date on his monument. Oh well, you have to take a photo, don’t you?!

We then wandered off track for about a mile to find Joan’s tea rooms in Scorton. There had little signs along the track, but we think Joan must have gone out of business as we found not sight nor sound of her and settled instead on the local pub which was actually quite posh. We felt a bit skanky to be going in, but it wasn’t wasn’t going to stop us. Just perhaps a second of contemplation. No more.

Soon we were back on track to tackle the longest road section of the whole walk. Joints were already aching, but with Jon’s (our leader on part one of the walk) words in our head, “You’ve got to keep peddling”, we trudged on. I have no idea why I was falling apart today. Perhaps lack of dinner, or perhaps it was just the fact that the whole walk was dead flat. I find that really tough on the joints as your body is in the same position the whole time, the same muscles being pounded. It may also have something to do with where the mind is. So, with a metaphoric slap about the face, off we went.

Lunch was basically on the side of a narrow lane before the final pull into Danby Wiske. We (well I did, anyway) dragged our foot sore, leg sore and hip sore sorry bodies into town and collapsed at the freshly painted pub. After a quarter (yes, you read that correctly!) pint of cider, I was as good as under the table.

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Today was fairly straightforward and uneventful. A lot of pretty and gentle meadow walking mostly. Our old friend and guide for the past couple of days, The Swale River was to lead us out of Reeth and then rejoin us to guide us into Richmond, the day’s goal.

The first job of the day was to save a dying lamb. I went and told the farmer who didn’t seem to perturbed and to be honest, the little creature was probably just resting, though it looked close to death to my “expert” eye. Well…I felt better about telling someone about it, anyway. Next we were to look out for Marrick Priory. The old abbey was yet another victim of Henry VIII’s reformation. It’s a private centre today so has to be admired from the road. Marrick is mentioned in the Doomsday Book and I rather think not much has changed in the village since then. We then experienced a steep climb up some steps. Well, they’re called steps but was more like a steep, stoney cliff. Nuns built them. That could explain the craftsmanship. Though it probably has more to do with the age of them. I’d say they were around 500 years old. Hay meadows then took us to Elaine’s Country Kitchen. This was just a farm where teas are served to hikers, but such institutions are always a welcome site and a haven of familiar faces. Everyone discusses how they are progressing and seeing that most days have standard start and end points, friends are easy to find.

Although we crossed cow filled fields today, the beasts proved kind and my “like” of cows is slowly returning. Lets not be too hasty and call it love quite yet.

The country roads are lovely to walk this time of year as the wild berries are beginning to fruit so walking was slowed somewhat by lunch on the run. On today’s menu was raspberries. There really is nothing better than wild fruit and somehow you don’t need as much. It baffles me how natural, wild fruit can taste like this, but then we go and domesticate it. Make it bigger and brighter….and much more tasteless. We then create chemicals that taste like the real thing. Why do we complicate things so much? The original is always the best. You really can’t improve on nature.

A gentle climb got us to a lone white cairn which was a perfect rest spot before heading off for the final push. On the way, calves and farmers had to be talked to (everyone is so friendly on this walk!). I kind of liked the Miss Dolittle title given to me by the old man.

After about 6 hours, The Swale River was again in view. As was Richmond with its welcoming castle. After 13 miles, the tea shop had to be found. Tea and chocolate has become somewhat of a ritual.

We liked our B&B tonight, the views over Richmond being quite fabulous. Dinner was at the old station which has been revamped into a restaurant/art gallery/cinema. Ok, well Mum had dinner. I felt ill. It had nothing to do with the block of Thornton’s coconut and lime chocolate I ate!

After dinner we wandered across to Easby Abbey (seeing we hadn’t walked enough today!). It was a gorgeous stroll along the river with quite a few pretty little spots. There was also a lovely little church next to the ruins, complete with beautiful, simple frescoes. Next it was off to bed. Why are we always put on the top floor with a stair climb equivalent to Everest?!?!?!

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If yesterday felt a tad easy, today felt like a walk in the park. And to be honest, it basically was. I even got the shoes off and walked barefoot in a few parts. Nice to get some air on your feet and some soft grass under them. It was an easy route to follow as well for having taken the low route, all we had to do was follow the river all the way to Reeth. We could have taken the high route to see old disused lead mines, but the hay meadows with their sheep were so much more delightful. Basically all the Swaledale sheep here are used just for breeding purposes. Their wool is of very poor quality, but they are sold and bred to other sheep in different areas and a couple of mixes down the line, you get a good meat animal like the Suffolk. Just a bit of trivia for your next dinner party.

The route was also littered with rabbit holes and at one stage, according to the map, we passed a “rabbit metropolis”. Thought that was kind of cute, and it seemed the cliffside “properties” even had little rabbit roads leading up to them. The stiles on this section of walk are also to be considered. Most are just narrow holes through dry stone walls, so if you’re a bit of a chubby, you may have a problem. Think about the high route. Besides, the extra exercise will probably do you good.

The leisurely 11.5 mile stroll to Reeth took us till about 16:00, but that included a visit to the tea house at Gunnerside. Yes…this is oh such a tough walk!

We liked Reeth immediately, the old village in the past having being a bustling hub for the lead mining industry. Today tourists are the trade of choice. Mum and I both got very excited at dinner time having headed to The Buck Hotel. There on the wall, shining like a golden, beckonning beacon were the trophy shields for the local quoits league. Oh blessed dream come true!!! An actual quoits league!! Too funny.

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Part 2 begins! And I must say, it felt very good to be back walking once more. Today saw three important milestones. First of all, we were to cross over England’s watershed once we had reached Nine Standards Rigg. Before this point, all the rivers run back into the Irish Sea. From this point on, all the rivers we pass will be running into the North Sea. Secondly, by the end of the day, we had reached the walk’s half way mark at the wee village of Keld! One hundred miles done, 100 to go. We were also going to pass from Cumbria into Yorkshire. Very exciting.

We left Kirby Stephen around 09:00 for a steepish climb up to the Nine Standards. These huge stone cairns have been around for at least a couple of hundred of years. No one knows exactly when or why they were built. There are different theories, one of which was to scare the Scottish into thinking that there was a huge army camped up on the hill. Do they really think the Scottish would be that dopey? Anyway….it’s at this point that your literary mind changes from thoughts of the light and airy Austen novel to those of the brooding Brontes. The Yorkshire Moors are empty, vast and today were so foggy that you could not see 5 foot in front of you. Even though we were now tackling the walk alone, it’s times like these when you are grateful to have fellow walkers. Three separate groups turned into one group of 10 as we decided to tackle the Red Route together. Safety in numbers against the fog and the bogs, so to speak. There are three routes to take from the Standards and the best one depends on the time of year. To be fair, I think they are all as boggy as each other. And they really are very boggy. It was soon realised that initial attempts of trying to jump over the boggy bits were futile as we gave up and just marched straight through, praying that we would only sink to our ankles and not our knees. The wind also thought it would join in, the freezing cold adding to our joy. :-/ To be honest though, the walk was quite fun although you really had to concentrate and focus to find the few and far between track markers. We finally reached dry ground as the skies brightened up, just in time for lunch in front of the grouse butts. This is where certain folk come in August to get their thrills by pumping lead into the birdlife. Nice.

Our first sign of civilisation since Kirby Stephen was soon in sight in the form of Ravenseat Farm. Shepherdess Amanda, who lives here with her husband and five kiddies has become somewhat of a celebrity in recent times. She has appeared on Julia Bradbury’s BBC series of The Coast To Coast Walk and is now staring in her own reality tv show about the day to day runnings of the farm. She wasn’t home when we first arrived, much to our disappointment, but as we hung around talking to other walkers and also her young son Reuben (the proud owner of a crate of hay and expert fixer of toy sit on tractors), she arrived home and tea was served. She’s as sweet as pie and it was lovely to meet her. Though if they want the business to keep coming in, perhaps taking the dead and rotting moles off the fence may help. They stink!!

Next it was just a short walk along the road to Keld where we waited for a ride to the evening’s accommodation. 14.5 miles over 7hrs was covered today. This is starting to feel way too easy!!

Dinner was at the local pub. No surprises there. We’re actually getting a little over pub meals. Having said that, we were thrilled to find an entry form for the local agricultural show. Going through the events, we thought we might enter the best bale of hay class. With £3 up for grabs as prize money, it was very tempting. I also cursed myself for not picking up a certain book I spotted in a Kirby Stephen bookshop,”The Leek Book. Growing And Showing Exhibition Leeks”. I’m sure I would have sailed through the Open Vegetable Classes with that one.

We were picked up at 07:30 today so that we could leave the car in Richmond and return to Kirby Stephen to begin Part 2 of the Coast to Coast. Not only have we now been to Kirby Stephen twice before, but let’s be honest, there’s nothing there. So, what does one do for 10 hours waiting to be let into your B&B? We don’t know. We struggled ourselves! But this was our attempt…

Walk the high street up and down twice.

Find the sheep auction yards

Drink tea at a cafe and then work out ways you can stay longer by alternating your ordering of round two (Mum’s cup then mine 10mins later) so it doesn’t look like you’re hogging the table when they get busy)

Pick up boots that were being repaired by the old cobbler and spend 10mins talking to his dog, Shep.

Visit the outdoor shop and get some ideas from Mark the shop assistant

Go and visit the local church as suggested by Mark the shop assistant

Get to know a bit about the word Kirby (Scandinavian…..places where they built a church!) from signs in the church. Admire 8th century bits of stone also in the church

Sit in a pew and sing old school hymns that you remember (where’s Yoli when you need her to do some harmonising??!)

Get a hymn book and sing some more hymns as Mum continues doing her crossword. I’d forgotten how much fun school hymns could be!

Text Mr Marchant to get crossword answers.

Run out of hymns to sing and start on show tunes and goddess chants, ending with a bit of Pie Jesu and Phantom of the Opera.

Vist the OTHER food co-op.

Sit on a street bench and contemplate Nine Standards

Have a massage that turns into a feldenkrais session. Actually very interesting!

Have dinner at 16:00pm.

I know..…we were yawning by this stage too!

XXX

With another rest day, it was of to visit York, just an hour south down the A1. No matter how many time you visit York, it never disappoints. A pleasant coincidence saw us in York on the same day as Mr Mongolia himself, Richard Dunwoody. Though today the title of Marathon Man may be more fitting as he was there to run a charity 10kms. It was great to catch up (and thank you Richard for the backpack fitting. I love it!) and we wish his back a speedy recovery. Rest Richard. You really must learn the meaning of the word. 😉

The rest of our time in York was spent wandering the streets and admiring the Minster. The Minster is just so impressive, though I think £8 to light a tealight is perhaps a little steep (cost of admission). The Shambles are still cute and the ghosts are still everywhere. Ok…so we didn’t actually see any, but surely they’re there with all those ghost walks running.

On the way back to Richmond it was time to reminisce and we decided to go off track a little and pay a visit to Yorkshire Riding Centre. Unfortunately Christopher was out and I’m sure he would have been as disappointed as us not to catch up and relive the past a bit. See you in Aus soon, Christopher!

Back to Richmond for dinner and a sleep.

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A couple of hours to wander around Richmond turned into an all day event. Most of the time was spent at the castle. It was built by Alan The Red in the 11th century. There really isn’t a lot left of it now, but it’s had an interesting history which includes being a military base not that long ago. It was an event day today, that event being “Swinging ’60s”. A bit strange for a medieval castle. We did run into Mr Gamesman himself, Don. Don and his wife Kathryn do talks and displays all around the country. Today the duo had old games galore. Only two Ashton women could be so aggressively competitive over a game of quoits. I’m proud to say I took out the Quoits. No problem. I think I can safely say that the skittles crown and bagatelle title were also mine for the taking. The ring board proved a tad more challenging and I unfortunately choked during match point. Aunt Sally was good to vent the frustration after the loss though. This is where you have to bash a doll off a stand with a wooden stick. Nice. Mum tried to cheat a win but, let’s face it, we were both rubbish at that one. Mum easily walked away with the shuffle board and boulles title. I wasn’t even in the running. How to kill 2.5hrs. Small things you might say but hey, we were happy.

We were next off through the winding wynds to explore the rest of the town. Prince Charles has compared the market square to Siena. Has he actually ever been to Siena?? The answer is either no or he has one amazing imagination. Yes it’s lovely, but Siena???? We visited the Georgian theatre, newly restored in 2003, and it truly was a highlight. It remains a working theatre and the tour left us disappointed that we couldn’t see a performance. It was simply charming and the most intimate little theatre imaginable. Really must come back.

I shall leave you with a lovely little verse about Richmond written by Mr M Wise in the 1800s: “Up above a castle! Down below a stream!

Up above a ruin! Down below a dream!

Man made the castle, rude, forbidding, bare.

God made the river, swift, eternal, fair.”

XXX

Today was a day of chores. Washing had to be done, massages had and cracked windscreens fixed. With all jobs done, we headed off to Richmond. We had no idea how long it would take as distance signs in Kirby Stephen are all in furlongs. Fine if you’re on a racehorse. We have enough problems with miles let alone eighth of miles! Sad as we are, we decided to take the back roads and get a feel for the next part of the walk and check out our upcoming accommodation. Why? Why not. This is desolate country and you wonder how the people who originally farmed the land coped in their cold, stone barn houses during those long, long Winters. It was bad enough today in the height of Summer..…grey and drizzly. We did find a brilliant cafe though in Thwaite. You drive through nothingness and then wonder where a place like this came from. It was positively 5 star.

It’s a bit disheartening arriving in Richmond after about an hour’s drive knowing that it’s going to take you about three days to walk. Why does it take so long?? I just can’t work it out! Richmond is a medieval market town with the ruins of a super little castle perched on the hilltop overlooking the Swale River, complete with lovely little waterfalls. Word of advice though….when someone recommends The Turf Hotel for a meal, don’t listen. Go to The Kings Arms instead. The food is better and it’s good for a laugh. After much observation, we decided that it was the place in town for either internet dating first dates or affair central. Nothing like a bit of people watching.

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By comparison to the last few days, today was gentle, short and sweet. The views were never going to be as brilliant as the last few in The Lakes, but there were lots of sheep. And lots of cows. Sheep I can handle. Cows. Well after the run in with THAT heard in Cornwall, I have been left with a mild phobia.Ok…maybe not so mild. Therapy is imminent.

Today’s walk was “only” 12 miles and would only take us 6hrs, so we had the luxury of taking it easy and enjoy the surrounds. The first part of the trail took us to Shap. On the way we passed the ruins of Shap Abbey. The Abbey, erected in 1199, was the last built in England. It was also the last to be dissolved by Henry VIII in 1540. Shap is often the overnight stop of those who push themselves through for an uber long day from Glenridding the day before. With a supermarket and tea shop, it’s positively pumping. We stopped for a tea. Very civilised and in a way made you feel like you were cheating a tad. Next it was time to cross the M6 motorway, another piece of engineering that makes you feel like you’re not on the coast to coast, strolling through the English countryside. The rest of the day was, to be honest a little mundane compared to what we’d been used to. Lots of moors and lots of sheep, with the odd bolder left over from the times when glaciers ran through the area. We were reminded for the last time of our previous few days with Kidsty Pike in the distance and Howgill Fells flanking our passage to Orton, our overnight stop.

Orton is a delightful little village and with its own little chocolate factory, what’s not to like?! It seems to be the sort of village where Londoners come to make their sea change after making their fortune in the big smoke. There’s a bit of money about considering the size and location of the village and talking to the locals, the theme seems to be a common one. It’s definitely a place to come back to.

The following day saw us head off to Kirby Stephen and hence end part one of the walk. Even though the end is in Kirby Stephen , you can’t officially call it half way. That honour belongs to Keld, a few days down the track. Mum and I were the “official guides” on today’s leg, our leader assigning us the title to give us some practice before letting us loose on our own in Part Two. I think we did ok, although we did get in trouble for going too fast at times. But when you have the end in sight, it’s hard not to leg it a little. We passed old railway routes, pretty streams, disused lime kilms and also Severals Village. This is an archaeological site said to be the most important prehistoric site in Britain. It’s completely unexcavated though so unfortunately there’s not much to look at.

All that was left to do now was make it past a few more cows and a barn yard full of sheep before treading the pavements of Kirby Stephen. Seven days of walking and 85 miles later, it was time for a couple of days of r & r.

XXX

Today is known as the most difficult leg of the walk. It’s tough and it’s long….just how I like it! We had to to hike from Glenridding to Bampton Grange. There’s no warming up on this leg. Straight into it and up Boredale Hause. The views at the top of Angle Tarn are your reward. It really is a special little spot, complete with its own mini private islands. The second climb up to The Knot comes quickly, but again there is a reward. You get to experience the High Street, an old Roman road that ran north south. Why on earth did they build it up here though, was all I could think. The answer is that it was built to link the Roman forts at Ambleside and Penrith. It’s one of those paths that just draws you in with a “come hither” stare, but alas we had to turn left, not right to reach our final Lakeland summit of Kidsty Pike….the highest point on the Coast to Coast. From here it was a steep decent down to Haweswater reservoir and if your legs weren’t feeling like jelly before, they were by now!

Haweswater was once a small, unassuming lake but is now Cumbria’s largest body of water, its valley being flooded and dammed. Unfortunately it saw some villages being swallowed up by the inundation, the largest being Mardale, whose walls and building can still eerily be seen if the water level is low enough. Finally our destination of the day, Bampton Grange was happily in view, with its gorgeous little church built in 1726. Just try to stop me imagining I’m in a Jane Austen novel! It was time to say a sad farewell to The Lakes District. We were now in The Eden Valley.

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