Travelling North (to Scotland)

Durham

Durham cathedral and graduands

Hexham abbey

Gooseberries and strawberries at the Hexham Farmers' market

Sue at Hadrian's Wall

Caerlaverock Castle

Kitty at Caerlaverock Castle

Alison is now on the way home to Melbourne, Judy and John are sweltering in 35 degree heat in Madrid, and Stephen is in York but soon going to Norway. That leaves Kitty, Graeme and Sue, plus Liz (who joined us in Robin Hood's Bay) travelling up to Scotland for about a week.

Half of Friday was taken up with returning one rental car and collecting another much larger one, and driving about 5 times around the same section of Middlesborough in the process of trying to find the rental car place, getting petrol, and finding the rental car place again! Finally we were off in our roomy but economical diesel car.

First stop was Durham and a visit to its magnificent cathedral. It was one of 3 days per year when graduation ceremonies occur at the cathedral so we could only have a quick look at the main cathedral, although other sections such as the cloisters, treasury, library were open for free due to the graduation. Then we drove on to spend the night in Corbridge.

Saturday we started with Hexham which has an interesting abbey, and today had a farmers' market. After a stop at Hadrian's Wall and Chester's Walled (Herb) garden we finally entered Scotland at Gretna Green. We stopped at Caerlaverock Castle and ended up another 100 km away at Ayr – south west of Glasgow.

C2C day 14 - Grosmont to Robin Hood's Bay via Whitby

Whitby - abbey in background

Walking the Cleveland way from Whitby to Robin Hood's bay

dipping my boot (shoe) into the Irish Sea

Opening a birthday present at the bay Hotel Robin Hood's bay

Rather than do 25 km with quite a few hills we took the train/car to Whitby which we all wanted to see and then walked the Cleveland Way (10 km) into Robin Hood's Bay to finish our walk. Whitby was interesting and needed more than the few hours we could afford to spend there. We did find time to visit the Captain Cook museum, try the fish and chips (supposedly the best in Britain), and have a quick look at the abbey.

Halfway to RHB the rain came down and we arrived a bit damp with very muddy boots. We had dinner at the Bay Hotel where we added our names to the C2C visitor book. We also walked down to the beach and ceremoniously threw our pebbles (picked up from the Irish Sea at St Bees and carried across England) into the North Sea. Then it was time to farewell Judy and John who went to Leeds tonight as they are catching an early plane to Madrid tomorrow.

C2C Day 13 - Blakey to Grosmont - 22 km

more and more moors

some early blooming heather

soup for lunch at Glaisdale pub

a change of scenery with a forest

Grosmont Station

An easy day today as it was mostly flat on good even paths, so we averaged about 5 kph. The weather was kind also with lots of sunny breaks and only 10 minutes of rain. It's hard to believe we have only one more walking day.

Tonight we are in Grosmont. It's station and steam trains were used in the Harry Potter movies - we looked hard for platform 8 and 3 quarters but we couldn't find it!! A few miles south is the village of Goathland where the TV police series "Heartbeat" is filmed.

York

Don't walk the walk (I did one day and it rained all day - talk the talk instead - the talk about history. The history of Britain is largely written here in the North. And it is mostly about invasions, wars, oppression and destruction - the stuff of life. In York you can see the impact of the Norse invaders at the Yorvik museum - and see all you want to see about their village life in 876 a.d. presented in a very rough Disneyland-type way (with stunning exhibits such as a highly constipated man straining to relieve himself in the street.


This top end of England is strewn with ancient castles and abbeys - most associated with Shakespearean characters like Richard III, John of Gaunt, the Lancaster, Gloucester, Hadrian, Bonnie Prince Charlie, Robert the Bruce and Braveheart (refer the lost books of Shakespeare).

Of course most of the castles, walls and abbeys have been destroyed by the winners of the wars who tore down the old structures to rebuild their own residences. They were very much into recycling until the dreaded English Heritage organisation banned this essential practice.

York Minster (cathedral) is the grandest structure to survive even though it has almost burnt down several times (the latest in 1984) and almost collapsed (in the 60s). Millions of dollars are spent annually trying to keep it in its original state. But it is worth seeing.

Two days of the walk to go. We arrive in Whitby then - where Cook sailed from - to Australia, and Dracula sailed to - from Transylvania. Being Kittys birthday I hope to get her to meet one of these Whitby illuminaries.

C2C day 12 - Clay Bank Top to Blakey Ridge - 14 km

The Lion Inn, Blakey Moor

Judy went off with Graeme in the car to get her "Captain Cook" fix (see below). The rest of us took just over 3 hours to reach the Lion Inn at Blakey - it is the only building for miles around, surrounded by moors. It has a huge dining area and appears to be very busy all the time. Similar to Tan Hill Inn we stayed in on day 7, as far as remoteness and popularity go.

The walk was very easy and some would say boring, but the expanse of moors and the desolateness of it all is interesting in itself.

Judy with a statue of a young James Cook

Graveyard of St Cuthberts where James Cook's mother is buried

Judy's comments on today:
Meanwhile ... after the tempting sight of Roseberry Topping yesterday (a hill that James Cook used to climb as a boy - there is a view that this gave him the idea of climbing to high points to get his bearings whenever he landed at a new place), today Graeme and I went off for a James Cook experience. First the James Cook Birthplace museum and St Cuthbert's church at the village of Marton - where James Cook spent his first 8 years. Then the James Cook School House museum and 12C church at Great Ayton - where he lived from the age of 8 to 17. We are becoming James Cook aficionados and are looking forward to Whitby to fill in the rest of the story.

C2C day 11 – Ingleby Cross to Great Broughton – about 21 km

Judy sniffing Elder Flower - we've tried the Elder Flower wine

Reading the sign at the start of the moor

On one of the moors

Sue (John in background)

Rest time

At last we reached Lord Stone's cafe for a late lunch

Part of the garden at Ingle Hill B&B

Part of the garden at Ingle Hill B&B

The day dawned bright and sunny and windless (hooray!). It was a lovely day's walking with quite a bit of up and down and walking on the moors. It's too early for the heather to be flowering but one can imagine how stunning it would look. We had great views towards the farming plains and some large towns (Teeside, Middlesborough,etc) to the north. Our B&B tonight is 4 km off the C2C route in Great Broughton, so when we saw a turn off to Great Broughton we took that rather than go up and down another 2 hills to Clay Bank top and then phone for a lift – we knew our hosts were over 80 and didn't want to put them out too much. The walk to GB proved to be further than we thought but it was worth it – we arrived to a reception of tea and homemade scones and cake, served in the courtyard outside the sunroom. The garden is magnificent – full of flowers all in bloom – see photo.

C2C day 10 – Richmond to Ingleby Cross – 40 km by car

View of Richmond Market Place from the castle keep

Turner painted this scene from next to Richmond Castle

Today we had a rest day in Richmond. Just as well as the wind was gusting at up to 100kph. It was NOT warm. Three of us went in the car to Barnard Castle and surrounds, about 26 km away, while the others visited Richmond castle and walked to Easby Abbey. After lunch we met at the visitor centre for the free one-hour guided walking tour of Richmond. We were the only ones mad enough to be doing a walking tour in that wind. We felt a bit sorry for the 75 year old lady who led the tour, but she didn't seem at all fazed by the bad weather.

Later in the afternoon I did 2 trips to and from Ingleby Cross to ferry us all there. On the first trip we had to do a detour as a large tree was down over the road. It was certainly a wild day. Tomorrow the weather forecast is for sunshine with no wind – here's hoping they are right (they are often wrong apparently).

C2C day 9 – Reeth to Richmond – 17 km

Toby (whom we met on Tour of Mont Blanc 2 years ago) drove up from near London to join us today. This enabled us to do a car shuffle so Graeme could also walk with us also. Unfortunately the rain set in early and lasted all day so there wasn't much in the way of views. It was a good test of wet weather gear though. Richmond is the largest town on the C2C route so we were able to have dinner at a great Indian restaurant – a nice change from pub dinners.

C2C day 8 – Keld to Reeth – 18 km

rest at ruins of mining industry - a peat store

Reeth

The weather was good with long sunny breaks. We had up and down, but not too much, exactly what you'd expect in the Yorkshire Dales, and there were lots of ruins from the lead mining industry. We thought we had a good grip on the English terminogy (see glossary below) when we read this in the track notes:

“The path becomes indistinct among the rough stones of the hush” - what on earth is a “hush”??

Glossary

beck or gill - stream

thwaite – clearing

force – waterfall

mere – a small lake

tarn – a small mere usually at high altitude

pike – a peak

C2C day 7 - Kirkby Stephen to Keld - 19 km

Nine Standards Rigg

A welcome shelter to have lunch in

Fields of buttercups

A sheep having a baa'd hair day

Inside the Tan Hill Inn

The weather could have been better today - a lot better! Nearing Nine Standards Rigg (the highest point today) it was sleeting and blowing a cold gale. We had all our wet weather gear on but it wasn't very pleasant. The rain stopped after a while, leaving the cold wind. The way down was through lots of open grassland which was very muddy and boggy. Four of us were happy with our waterproof boots - the other two discovered their boots were NOT waterproof.

The upside was no hard stones to walk on - the grass was lovely and soft. Eventually we got out of the cold wind and had lovely fields full of buttercups. Tonight we are staying 4 miles off route at Tan Hill in the highest pub in Great Britain - they collected us from Keld and will drop us back there tomorrow. The pub is amazing - inside in the eating area are 2 sheep, baby ducklings, a cat and a dog. Other customers bring their dogs in too.

C2C day 6 – Bampton Grange to Kirkby Stephen – 30 km by car

Shap Abbey

Kirkby Stephen railway station

Redmayne House - our B&B

Sitting room at Redmayne House

Today was our first rest day – it rained lightly on and off all day. The car can only hold 3 people with all the luggage so I drove Stephen and Graeme to KS visiting Shap Abbey and Orton on the way. They then went on a sight-seeing trip on the Settle-Carlisle railway, an engineering marvel with many bridges and tunnels – 200 men died in its construction. Meanwhile I drove back to Orton to fetch the others who had walked to Shap and then taken the bus. We had a fairly lazy afternoon. Our accommodation is at Redmayne House – a 3 storey old stone building with lovely rooms - parts of it are Georgian, Victorian and Edwardian. We have use of a huge sitting room with extremely ornate ceiling/cornices. The garden is magnificent also.

The rest has been good for sore muscles and Stephen's feet – he now has gel insoles plus various Dr Scholl products from the pharmacy. Hopefully they will have him walking pain free tomorrow.

C2C day 5 – Patterdale to Bampton Grange – 19 km

Sheltering from the fierce wind

View of Haweswater

The long walk alongside Haweswater - fairly flat

Bampton Grange - our home for the night

Well it had to happen. The weather changed! We set off in rain dressed in full wet weather gear. It was another long slog uphill to the high point Kidsty Pike. Fortunately the rain stopped after an hour which only left the fierce biting cold wind to contend with. Once we descended to Haweswater the wind abated and we intermittently had clear spells and light rainy spells. After about 6 km walking the length of Haweswater we detoured from the C2C route to reach Bampton Grange, a very pretty little village – we are staying at the Crown and Mitre Inn. Tomorrow is our first rest day (hooray) – we travel mainly by car to Kirkby Stephen. At some point today we left the Lakes District National Park; in 2 days we will enter the Yorkshire Dales National Park.