Coast to Coast: The end

It’s been a month since we completed the walk. I’ve had plenty of time to reflect on our adventure and consider the big questions: would I do it again? Was it a life changing event? Will my feet ever return to normal?

But first, Wednesday 23rd June: the day after the end of the walk.

I awoke quite late, with a bit of a hangover, not surprisingly considering the amount we’d had to drink the night before.

After breakfast we drove Spike and Emma to Scarborough railway station, in time for their 10:47 train back to Nottingham. Lots of emotional hugs and kisses ensued, but eventually Emma and Lia prised Spike & I apart and we said our farewells.

Our own drive back to Hertfordshire was quiet, mainly due to Lia and Sally both being spark out asleep in the car for almost the entire journey. I had a little doze as well, but it was perfectly safe because I was driving an Audi.

We unpacked, had a cup of tea and remarked how small the house now seemed. After about an hour I was outside again, walking Sally around the fields for an hour or so. We had an early night; and that was that.

Looking back, was it a life changing experience for me?

Well, it was certainly a foot changing experience. Luckily I’ve not increased a shoe size, which is a relief, but I still can’t feel the tips of some of my toes. I eventually lost the nail on one of them, but happily a brand new nail had been growing underneath all along.

From a culinary point of view, it’ll be a long long time before I’ll be able to face Steak & Ale Pie, Fish & Chips, Lasagne (meat or veg), Cumberland Sausage & Mash, or indeed any other pub grub.

What will stay in our memories?

Dent Fell, the first tough climb of the walk, just before Ennerdale Bridge; eating the equivalent of my own body weight in chips at the White Lion in Patterdale; Spike getting food poisoning in Shap; being smothered in matronly care by the Landlady at Jolly Farmers Guest House; watching helplessly as an expensive bottle of champagne exploded across the bar of Weatherspoon’s in Richmond; my five second down-in-one pint at the Lion Inn on Blakey Ridge; feeling like an extra in Fawlty Towers at Grosmont House; our first glimpse of the North Sea; the moment we walked into the sea at Robin Hood’s Bay. Plus great scenery, excellent companionship and many other experiences that words can’t describe.

Would I do it again? My original response when people asked me this, was “No.” It was hard work and now I’ve done it, so why bother doing it again?

Four weeks on and I’m giving a different answer. The pain has faded, the toenails have grown back and I’m pretty certain I would do it again, but with some important changes, thanks to the benefit of hindsight.

I wouldn’t walk forty five miles in two days, for a start.

I wouldn’t do the spirit sapping forest trudge from Ennerdale Bridge to the Black Sail hut, for another (I’d climb up over the top, via Hay Stacks and Buttermere Fell, whatever the weather conditions) and I’d vary some of the route. We faithfully followed Wainwright’s walk, but there’s a million variations, and the Old Man himself would have encouraged everyone to find their own way to Robin Hood’s Bay.

I certainly wouldn’t do it in reverse. The climax of the walk, along the cliffs towards Robin Hoods Bay and the Bay itself, is so much better than the anticlimax that would occur if the end point was St Bees. The whole place would probably be closed, like it was when we arrived there.

I think we might be doing some of it again anyway, as I’m sure Spike will decide to complete the twenty three mile section from Orton to Keld that he missed. I don’t think we’d be staying at the Greyhound pub in Shap, though.

Before I finally draw a line beneath the adventure, a few thanks are in order.

First and most importantly, to my wife Lia, for putting up with my grumpy morning moods (morning being defined as from me waking up until just before that first post perambulatory pint); for editing this blog, in particular by removing all the bad language and taking out the more libellous comments pertaining to Julia Bradbury; for adding in the pictures at the right points in the story, and finally for begging various landlords to divulge their broadband passwords, connecting up to the internet to post the blog and for generally making all that technical stuff just “happen”

I’d also like to thank my other fellow travellers, Spike, Emma and Amanda, for being the most entertaining of companions and for contributing much of the material for this blog (not the funniest bits, obviously).

Thanks also to Sally Dog, for shepherding us relentlessly along the way, for overcoming the most difficult and malicious stiles that some of the farmers had constructed in an attempt to block our path and for probably covering nearer three hundred miles altogether, without a single complaint.

I’d also like to thank:

Captain Beaky and his long suffering wife, Striding Man and his forgotten family, the American Ladies (Yanks #1 & #2), Yellow T-Shirt man, and the many other minor characters who failed to make it into the blog, for providing unintentional comic relief;

The Sherpa Van Company, who successfully transferred our bags from one lodging house to the next without losing a single one, and who generally helped us to organise the whole adventure;

Crookes Healthcare Ltd, manufacturers of Neurofen pain killer tablets, which I was popping like Smarties throughout most of the holiday;

Larry at Ekulibrium for kicking me into some semblance of shape in the months leading up to June;

and finally the great man himself, Alfred Wainwright, for showing us the way.

So that’s it! Hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Chris P

PS keep checking the blog every now and then, as I will be posting regularly. At least, that’s my intention.