Thank you!

Now that the walk is over I'd like to thank you, the reader, for your many supporting emails and text. At the last count they totaled 2 ( including that text from my mum reminding me that I owed her 34 euro for the window cleaning man). Your support was very much appreciated and without it I wouldn't have been able to pull through. And the final word must go to my walking partner, Vic. 

Vic, I'm sorry about reading your personal journal; that was very wrong of me. No excuses. And be assured your fantasies about sleeping with a half woman, half beast  will remain private. I'd implore you to make contact with me again. I enclose one last photo for old times sake. I drank both of the pints below in your absence ( and with a heavy heart). 

Done (tbtf)

Yorkshire Dales National Park

Day 8: to Reeth (12 miles, 130m, 5.5 hrs, 3, 9)

Day 9: to Richmond (10 miles, 335m, 4 hrs, 4,8)

Day 10: to Danbe Wiske (14 miles, 70m, 6.5 hrs) 

North York Moors National Park

Day 11: to Clay Bank top (20 miles, 840m, 8.5hrs) 

Day 12: to Glaisdale (17 miles, 310m, 8 hrs)

Day 13: to Robin Hoods Bay (18 miles, 500m, 9 hrs)

From the worst photoprapher ever, I actually got the bus across and met yer man there. 

And then there was one.....

Vic and myself have 'mutually' decided to part company for the last day's walking and into the future. At dinner last night he declared that he was 'done with me' and that I can go 'fxxx myself'. And that I was 'unworthy of his friendship' especially as I did not know the meaning of the word "bucolic" and that I was "no better than an Neanderthal". My argument was that in their day the neands were great but that their time had passed. And that he had taken their place, along with the other indolents from North America. I was just joking.

Anyway, it all happened rather quickly. I took the opportunity of his rejection to cancel his room in Robin Hood's Bay. I told the hotel that he was being treated for 'delusions'. The woman said no worries and that it was quite common in these parts after the walk.  So it looks like we won't be getting the perfunctory closing photo. The one below will have to do. You never know what is inside someone's head.  Vic is an angry man I guess...

Bucolic versus bubonic

In fairness to Vic he taught me a new word. 'Bucolic' which an ideal countryside environment many people yearn for. 

When he asked me to put it in a sentence I suggested the folowing:

"Following a period of life in a bucolic village the rats got bored and the resulting bubonic plague killed 25 million people in 1347". I firmly believe, as indeed do many distinguished scholar, that something got lost or switched in translation. 

Perhaps it's me.....

But does this key ring look a tad large versus the key size. I think I'll say it to Steve ( the proprietor of The White Swan) for his take on it. It just about fits in my rucksack. I stole it just to annoy him and for overcharging us by around £100, bastard. 

A beer garden with a view of Richmond castle

We feel the pub is stretching this slightly.....the Bishops Blaize would have been a better choice but Vic seemed insistent. 

All creatures great and small

We are walking through James Herriot country at the moment. It brings me back to my childhood TV of watching James with his arm half way up some cow in most episodes. 

Not to mention the antics of young Mr. Tristan and Sigfried (played by the great Robert Hardy) and James' wife ( "oh, I do love you James"). If you recall she spent her time cooking in the kitchen. She (Carol Drinkwater) went on to write a really successful book about olive farming in the south of  France. 

It was a nice show but would I want to live in the Yorkshire Dales? They were actually showing the original movie in Reeth where Anthony Hopkins played Sugfried but the timing didn't suit. 

Einstein was a bluffer, and dazzled by God

We were walking along this ancient ten foot wall that the sign said was older than time itself. That to me suggests that Einstein (and that other mob of theoretical physicists who have theories that can never be proved etc) are incorrect about time warping. I prefer this notice we spotted outside the local church. 

And aren't the Brutish so polite...

Half Way (tbtg)

Coast

Day 1: St Bees to Ennerdale (14 miles, 470 metres, 6.5 hrs, difficulty out of 10, 5, views out of 10, 5)

Lake District

Day 2: to Stonethwaite (14 miles, 595 m, 8 hours, 6, 7

Day 3: to Patterdale (14 miles 1035 m, 10 hours, 8,9)

Day 4: to Shap (15 Miles, 762 m, 8 hrs, 7,9)

Limestone Country

Day 5: to Orton (8 miles, 107 m, 3 hours, 2,6)

Day 6: to Kirkby Stephen (13 miles, 0 m, 4.5 hrs, 4, 7) 

Yorkshire Dales National Park

Day 7: to Keld (11 miles, 515 m, 5 hours, 7, 4)

Thou shalt not covet the B&B owner's daughter

It is traditional on hikes such as these for the rules of 'omertà' to apply. What happens on tour stays on tour. However there are times when fundamental principles of decency and good behaviour supersede those rules. I will let you, the reader, be the judge. 

I came home early  last night leaving Vic behind me in the pub talking to some locals. Regaling them with tales of past triumphs. I felt they were a little young and I left.  In any event I had to do the normal 'night before' preparation checks  ( navigation, confirmation, the gear etc) and I went to bed early. A few hours later I am woken by this crashing noise followed by someone singing the theme of Hawaii Five O.  I look out my window and let's just say things were not as they should be.......

Relaxing in Orton on Day 5

Finally, we have an easy day. Our first ever, only three hours hiking. And no hills either. We arrived at our B&B to be greeted with the lady heading off shopping for 4 hours, come back later. How welcoming! We hid her body in a local slurry pit. 

Not that I am complaining but Vic has landed us in a place with just one pub and this is our rest day!  We plan an afternoon on the high stool debating such topics as the difference between hiking and walking ( see the picture below) and whether it is possible to domesticate sheep. 

After a feed of beer we are still in disagreement about walk or hike. I think the presence of hiking boots is revealing while Vic thinks the hint is in the title. 

All sorts

One meets all sorts on a hike like this. On the very first day Vic's b&b lady accused him of taking her glasses while she fumble with the knobs (radiator that is). 

Coming down Hells Crag yesterday this demento guy (with subservient woman in tow) first words to me were "is there a cairn on top", so much for 'hello, how are you.'

The American at the dinner table yesterday named two of her guests and identified the fourth only as 'her partner'. Lesbians may be cool but they can be as moronic as rest of us. 

One of the Canadian women who arrived late in was practically in tears having got lost in Ravens Gully apparently following Wainwrights alternative route. Most likely she never heard of Alfred Wainwright till recently and now he is making her life miserable, a good achievement for a dead guy. 

Some administration, sorry

All, apologies if you have been having difficulties connecting. Such has been the interest in the hike that the server crashed. I have fixed that now using a shadow server in an Ethernet farm connecting via VoIP in India. 

As you know we are doing this walk for my charitable foundation ( the SFC Foundation) which provides technological aids to traveller kids born without ear lobes. "Hear, hear" I hear you say but, sadly, not for the children. They hear sounds best described as a cat fighting a parrot, but with the cat losing. Please send all funds to the usual account and we will send you the appropriate 'happy children with bandages in recovery' photographs plus a monthly thank you note written in crayon. Replacement ear lobes are usually grafted from pigs with great success and very few side effects that I won't get into here. Thank you again. 

Goodfellas

I asked the guy at the Black Sail hostel to point out the general direction through the pass, picture below. 

He goes" ya see those two fellas there, go through there after you cross de lofty beck". I said that I didn't see anyone. He says "do you not see the two fellas?" . I said no. He shook his head sadly and said that they were over there and good luck on my journey. Even Vic seemed perplexed, well, more so than usual. It turns out that 'fells' are hills and that 'becks' are streams and suddenly it all made sense. And Tarns are small mountain lakes. It's a whole new world over here in the Lake District. 

Tensions run high!

Mike told Vic about the blog and Vic then took exception to the reference about 'Russian Fuck' and challenged me on it. I said that given his last name was 'Levashoff' I saw no issue. This riled him even further. Vic then accused me of mis- organising the whole trip. I thought this was a tad harsh. Sure, we ended up walking 10 hours today but I was acting under Vic's instructions. He told me the places to book. I had no say. In fact, it was really I that should have had the grievance but generously dropped the matter. 

In terms of the hike it seems we are in the 2% of hikers who carry their own bags on this coast to coast walk and that we are the first hikers to come from Stonewaithe this year. Which makes us super heroes in a way. Or complete idiots. If it had rained we'd have been in real trouble and I would have had to kill Vic with a sharpened pencil and eat him. And, by the by, we are in Patterdale which is where St. Patrick is reported to have come back after bringing Christianity to Ireland. A lot of the locals think this is a bunch of crap and that he never set foot in the place. Who knows?  Maybe we will never know... This is Vic scaling new heights.

And then there were two......

The day was going swimmingly. The rain had stayed away and Vic had stopped crying. Then, out of the blue, Mike said to Vic that he was a Russian so and so and what's more, a lazy one at that, and that everyone knows what the Russians are like. Vic was shocked and countered that Mike was a a fxxxing degenerate Irish git and no better than the dirt we were walking on at present. A bit awkward. Mind you,  I could see both points of view. 

The row escalated further despite my attempts to calm things down. Eventually Mike said either he goes or Vic goes and that I would have to choose. I think Mike thought that us irish would stick together. But given that I owed Vic money I felt obliged to go with him and also the fact that Mike had no gear with him made the choice a bit easier. So Mike headed home after some more foul language which shocked even Vic, and he's Russian. 

Here is Mike heading back to St. Bees. Two years of planning and twenty years of friendship gone up in smoke. All because of that Russian fuck. Shame. 

Day 1: St. Bees to Ennerdale

An inauspicious start. St Bees is nothing to write home about and despite our promises we gorged at the trough of the 'full English' breakfast.  Vic is smiling like a Cheshire because he had a great nights sleep. Very annoying.  Mike says that he didn't sleep at all and seems to be blaming me for it. He seemed to be on edge. Still, we are all great friends and heading out on a spectacular hike across the neck of England.  Life is good.  

Although, did I mention the forecast was poor and the wind chill factor is pretty nasty. The sister had another good score yesterday so I reluctantly had to send her one of those congratulation texts. Sigh.  Still, at least we are finally expending calories. The last three days we have been putting them on. Here's the perfunctory 'start of hike' shot.

 

The search for food

It's difficult to find good food in a strange city. However, if you ask a deli lama they are sure to know (@mb) : 

The font of all knowledge and diehard Dutch football fans. 

Thumbs up for Manchester

I wanted to go to a pub, drink ale, watch football etc., you know, the normal manly activities. Vic wanted to 'see the sites', you know, culture and stuff. So I was asked to organise a hop on hop off bus thing. Anyway, that was a challenge - it wasn't my fault, the web site hadn't been updated- so Vic yells at me, somewhat harshly I felt, that he would take of it himself. This is him taking care of it: 

So he did and we ended up taking my bus in the end. And 'twas a bloody great tour to be fair. Manchester must be the expert in regeneration as Salford Docks in the West and East Manchester (where all the old cotton factories were) has been transformed. In fact the docks even has a UFO landing site, fair play. And there is a Smiths disco for five pounds every month. 

Surprisingly the city barely makes it into the top ten of most populated.

Some of Manchester's finest

I have nothing against the people of Manchester but let me just say this: When I spot someone who is attractive I will let ye all know. It's been 12 hours now and the nearest thing so far has been two American tourists who quickly made their excuses and left after I asked could I photograph them to to illustrate the contrast in the interests of good reporting. Speaking of good reporting here is a prime example: 

You'll recall the days before rapists were vile.  And spare a thought for the victim prior to the tasering. 

Why is it so difficult

The above shows the intended 

route, and the lone star indicates York which is where Mike thought we were meeting. I dunno....

Far be for me to judge but York is the post hike venue so I don't how he managed to confuse things. To add insult to injury Vic told me yesterday that he actually thought we were hiking in the Lake District ( Windermere, fair Daffodils etc) for half the trek. I dunno, as I said to him, the clue is in the title. Anyway no one is talking to anyone at the minute which kind of suits everyone I suspect. 

Alfred and little Ari

They say those that can, do, and those that can't, teach (or become politicians). This isn't really relevant to the UK Coast to Coast walk but I like the sound of it. So who are these Alfred and Ari characters?  

Let's just say Alfred Wainwright was a guy who had a lot of time on his hands. (The wikipedia entry is located at  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Wainwright ) but I wanted to get behind the public image, and tell you about Alfred the man, the father and the hill walking pioneer. I may get to that some other time. In the meantime let me give you some background about myself. I'll keep it brief in so far as that is possible. 

My early charity work was riddled with adventure, and some dodgy diseases. I was young, handsome and willing to please. I lived a life of far flung places, and many faces. Modesty prevents me saying how many awards I have received (you can look it up on www.nexttogawd.com) but I will say this: Every time I receive an award I always think of little Ari Rastapali, a young Indian boy out of Mumbai I helped back in the day. Poor Ari was born with no legs and no arms which made getting around slightly tricky. Not to mention the danger of daily ablutions. There was one thing he was good at however. And that was rolling. He was the best roller I ever saw. He was a demon on a see-saw. Up and down , down and up, a real dinger. And the answer to his mobility problems was instantly obvious to me. I roped him up using his ears to a horse carriage,  and tied the harness up using a nose clip, put on the blinkers and he has been tied to that carriage ever since. Interestingly enough he learnt to speak horse and is now best friends with a sturdy black steed known as 'Beauty'. They make a living doing tricks and singing songs for tourists ("no nay never no more" is a big favourite) and doing wheelbarrow nixers in the off season. I gave Ari back his life. More importantly I gave him back a reason for living. Sure, those growth stunting drugs are uncomfortable, but considering the alternatives, I felt he had little choice. And little Ari is happy to donate 50% of all income earned to my charity foundation. So that I may help other little Aris fulfil their dreams. Sorry, I digress slightly. Back to the C2C.

In summary, myself as group leader, Vic and Mike intend heading off across the neck of England starting May 18th, 2015. Many adventures I'm sure will occur and be assured that these will all paint me in a heroic light while depicting my travelling companions as being, how shall I say, somewhat limited. I am happy to share these adventures with you, my false friends whom I'm sure through boredom will peruse this blog and feedback with the usual platitudes and insincere encouragement. But that is your choice and my burden.