We woke about 6:30am
with the waterfall outside noticeably quieter than it was the previous evening,
a quick look out the window didn’t reveal sunshine however, it was still low
cloud and raining, albeit much lighter than last night.
We’d ordered a bacon
baguette for breakfast for 7:30am, which we were particularly looking forward
too, if it was anything like last night’s dinner it was going to arrive bang on
time and be really nice, it was both! On the dot at 7:30am, and really nice.
We had a nice
breakfast chatting to our friends we’d met, however sadly we said our goodbyes
to Ian and Charles that morning as our walk schedule meant we wouldn’t see them
again which was a shame, so after wishing each other good luck and getting some
details of Charles’s charity web page we were back on the trail for 9:15am.
We’d planned to take
the high route today, and given that the rain had now stopped that’s exactly
what we did. As we climbed the steep climb up towards the remains of crack pot
hall we quickly caught up with a huge group of walkers from the USA, taking
pictures, whooping, and laughing, it was quite noisy to be walking with such a
large group, we were quite glad when they halted at crack pot hall and returned
down to walk the low route for some reason, “ah, peace and quiet is resumed” we
said.
The walk across the
tops today was fantastic, we were rewarded with great views across Swaledale
and down the valley, we briefly met Astrix and Martin whom we’d met last night
whilst walking near the remains of old lead mines. As we descended to
Gunnerside beck and the ruins of Blakethwaite Smelt Mill we decided this was a
good place to stop for a brew and a flapjack, given it wasn’t raining for once.
After a nice and
extended stop for a morning brew and biscuit we headed off again, walking
through the old lead mining areas is a nice, but also weird place, you almost
feel like you’re walking on the moon, lead is toxic, and nature has still to
fully reclaim this land from the history of lead mining, no grass grows, no
trees exist, just a lunar landscape.
As we descended we
stopped for our lunch, we could tell from the map that we were not too far away
from Reeth already, we had a really good pace about us this year, which was
great on the long days but we needed to reel it in a little on the shorter
days. The skies began to darken as we descended from the moors to join the
Swaledale valley and follow the river, we met a local chap walking his dog that
stopped and asked “walking coast to coast eh??” “yeah, enjoying it, and finally
got a bit of dry weather” I said, well of course this was the kiss of death, as
we hit the village of Reeth the heavens opened once again.
We thought, “no way
are we putting out water proofs on today” and literally ran the last few
hundred yards in to the Village and the first pub we hit was the Buck Hotel,
and also our lodgings for the night.
Already sat in front
of the fire enjoying lunch was Astrix and Martin, we went to the bar and
ordered a pint of ale for me and a J20 for Sarah. As we sat enjoying our drink,
and chatting to our friends some other C2C walkers began to drift in soaked
through, I was feeling quite smug about having remained dry today, and pleased
with our decision to press on and miss the rain.
After our drinks we
headed up to get showered and changed, I had nothing to dry out for once which
was nice, so had time to relax, read my book and watch a little TV, again
searching the channels for weather forecast information.
Once refreshed we
headed in to the village to pick up some lunch for tomorrow and see what was
about. We picked up some really nice looking homemade butty’s in the village
shop, and then went for a coffee in the much talked about ice cream parlour and
coffee shop, Sarah had some ice cream which was really nice. As we had our
Coffee, Tea and Ice Cream we had a game of drafts on a board set out on the
table, whilst no expert, I thought the game looked fairly straight forward and
naturally would win convincingly, however Sarah cleaned up and won before I’d
even finished my coffee, “a fix” I thought......
After my nice
coffee, but slightly disappointing game of drafts we left the coffee shop
noticing a sign for an outdoors shop, my water proof map holder had split and
so took the opportunity to pick up another one, £18!! But in fairness it was a
good quality one, so I left happy enough.
We then headed over
to the Black Bull pub for a beer before returning to our accommodation at the Buck
Hotel for our evening meal. The Buck Hotel had a Pizza menu to Sarah’s delight,
I stuck with Steak and Ale pie, however I must admit the pizza looked really
good and I was a little jealous I’d missed out on perhaps my only chance of
Pizza on C2C! As we sat down we were joined by Wendy, we enjoyed a really nice
meal and good chat in front of the fire which was nice. We were also joined by
Tony and Peter, who we’d briefly met in the bar in Kirkby Stephen following
their walk from Orton. They were brothers walking C2C, and Peter now lived in
Canada and has travelled over to walk the route together with his brother, very
nice I thought.
After perhaps one
pint of Copper Dragon too many for me we headed for bed, once back at the room
we put the telly on and made a cup of tea, the weather reports still informed
us the forecast was improving, now imminently it seemed, from tomorrow in fact.
Well, I fell asleep thinking “I’ll believe it when I see it”, still, if there’s
one thing to guarantee warm sunny weather its investing £18 on a water proof
map holder.
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