We're back!
Most literature that I read about the Coast to Coast walk in England stated 2 salient points that I blithely disregarded... 1. It is long. At 309K (roughly 200 miles), the C2C in no way resembles a brisk walk to the store. If a return trip to the store measures 3K, it is 103 brisk walks to the store. 2. It is tough. We undertook the walk in 12 days, which means slightly more than 25K per day. At a brisk walk, that would translate into an average of 5 hours walking per day. The main aspect of what I blithely ignored is that the terrain does not include much dead flat paved road. In fact, during the first 4 days, picture many many mountains and a healthy does of ankle deep bogs. Instead of a brisk 5 hour walk, some days were over 9 hours.
Let me state that the walk was definitely worth undertaking. The views and walking-pace exposure to some of England's finest parks and town alone was worth the effort. You cannot get the same experience by driving by moors in an automobile. At times, we were out of sight of anything man-made, excluding the odd post or marker. However, consider adding a few judicious rest days to your trip. Give your legs, feet and blisters a chance to recover.
For those not fully cognisant of the definition of judicious, here is what it does NOT mean: Do not climb Helvellyn mountain on your rest day. The English probably pride themselves on both understatement and their ability to tough it out. So, Helvellyn is considered a walk. Here in Canada, we call such terrain by its correct definition, namely a cliff. With rain threatening, Lee Anne and I cautiously navigated England's masochistic concept of a walk called "Striding Edge". This is a fully exposed narrow rock face that is part of the "path" to Helvellyn's summit. The day after we inched across Striding Edge, a person fell 600 feet to his death. Another person (on the same day) also fell 600 feet WITH HIS DOG and had to be airlifted to the hospital. Walk, my ass! Seriously, who would take their dog on such an exposed cliff?
Okay, so you now know what not to do on your day off. What was the walk like? Lee Anne and I walked with our friends Russell and Jeanette, also from Creemore. Russell and Jeanette might have been a tad apprehensive as 300+K is longer than they would normally hike, and they would be undertaking the adventure with 2 ultrarunners. We assured them that we were slow hikers and by the second day they must have realized that this was so. Mostly, it was Russell waiting for us during the walk.
To say there was some rain would be an understatement, by Ontario standards, but we were quite lucky and only experienced pouring rain on one day. Most days we were treated to a sprinkling of rain, but we saw our fair share of sun. Trekking through the bogs and moors was another story. Bogs defy the laws of gravity. Water seemed to run uphill in bogs. If you are traversing a slope, the high side was always wet, whereas the low side was less wet. The deepest bogs were at the top of the mountain passes (saddles) and while off course at one point, we walked through 10 inches of saturated peat for about a kilometer, in order to crest a ridge. Keeping your feet dry was not an option! I was the only member of our 4 person team to wear trail running shoes (as opposed to hiking boots) and coincidentally, I was the only person who did not develop blisters during the walk. This was due to my running shoes drying out soon after leaving a wet section.
We took advantage of Macs Adventures, a self-guided walking tour company, to plan the trip. Macs provides maps and literature on the walk. They also book the hotels and B&B's; something that can be difficult if you are not familiar with where to stay in places such as Keld or St. Bees. Most important is they arrange luggage transfer from hotel to hotel each day. This is likely not easy, bordering on a logistic nightmare, but it allows us to walk with only a day pack, instead of 40 pounds of luggage! Macs charges a bit for arranging the trip, but I don't feel it is overly pricey; great value for the cost.
It is hard to describe all that we saw and experienced during 12 days of walking. At one point I laughed, because the guide book mentioned "turn right at the church". The Church was massive and built circa 1500! It would be a tourist attraction on its own in Canada, but in England, it barely deserves a mention. We stayed in a hotel that was built in 1691. I think the patroness was from the same era... Some of the "old roads" showed evidence of having been built by the Romans.
Was it worth the cost and effort? Definitely. I recommend it highly. Would I changes things? Definitely. We had to pass by the ruins of an incredible castle in Richmond, as we didn't have time to stay and investigate. I think that being from Canada, I cannot grasp how much history there is in "rural" England. We could have easily added 3-4 extra days to explore what England has to offer.
Cheers!
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