pw day 13: now this is more like it!

the steep ups and downs of last night's and this morning's (are those apostrophes correct?) wall walking were much more up my street.

i don't think it's just the familiarity with the fond memories of the coast path either.

i've said, more than once so far i think, that i'm finding this a bit more of a struggle. i think it's starting to really sink in why that is.

every day of last year's walk brought a massive variety. terrains, views, places. there were very few days that seemed like hard work because it was always changing. even the gradients of the hills.

this walk seems to be made up of many mindless slogs. 5 miles up a hill. 7 miles down one. 4 miles on forestry track. 6 miles through bogs.

far too much head down, staring at the feet to make sure they find firm ground, not being able to take in views due to afford mentioned feet watching or being in cloud for my liking.

i can certainly see why it has a reputation for being the toughest and most miserable of the national trails.

still, 2 more days and it'll be over.

jin x

217.5

pw day 12: the ~200 miles so far...justified.

this photo in no way does the sunset over hadrians wall justice.

the sunset did, however, do the nearly 200 miles walked so far justice.

it had me in raptures.

well worth the extra few miles we added on from greenhead to pitch wild in a visitor centre carpark. (complete with toilet facilities, win!)

other notable events of the day included following the official route, rather than the often used south tyne trail which follows the flat path of a disused railway line.

the official route included this section:

can you spot the path? no? we weren't sure we could either.

jin x

199.5 miles down...

pw day 11: mother nature is a tease...

so it turns out that some combination of ibruprofen, a knee support, and it's being a gradual ascent meant that my knee behaved itself today.

what didn't behave itself was the weather. we woke early and got packed up and then the rain started. it didn't really stop so packing down tents we set off into the cloud that was enveloping cross fell. from it's summit you can see both coasts. except in the cloud. in the cloud you see this...

every now and then mother nature would tease us by revealing a snippet of blue sky and giving us shadows!

then it would rain a bit more.

we did get a little sun in the end though. 21 miles later as we headed into alston to pitch up.

jin x

180.5 miles down...

pw day 10: it was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

today was great for many reasons:

it was also rubbish though because we were waking into a ridiculous headwind all day.

also, one of the ligaments in the back of my knee has started playing up. i thought it'd snapped at one point, but the fact that it made the same pain a few minutes later suggested i was ok in the grand scheme of things. it just made me cry a little. turns out i'm not so great at dealing with pain.

the upside is it only seems really bad on the uphills. the downside is we have 1100m of ascent tomorrow to get onto cross fell. oh well.

jin x

159.5 miles down...

pw day 9: not a lot to say...

today was alright by me, no so much by emma. turns out she's not a fan of agricultural tracks, and that's what we had all round the bowes loop detour that i insisted on taking. when em doesn't like a path she doesn't say much.

i'm writing this on day 10 because i couldn't find the energy to say much yesterday after our 22.5 miles. to be honest, i'm struggling tonight. this walk is hard. very hard.

on the plus side we have wayfarer friends who we're camping with now, and will be waking with at times too. I like making walking friends.

i'll leave you with one of the sources of emma's frustration with agricultural tracks:

because sheep can climb stiles?

(we also had a bull do its feet stomping thing at us. not fun.)

jin x

141 miles down...

pw day 8: picking up the pace

em and i are definately getting into our stride now, we had a speedy walk over great shunner fell in the cloud and pouring rain this morning. spirits weren't dampened, despite every part of us being soaked through.

we stopped for a few hours to dry out in thwaite, hoping for cloud to clear enough for us to see the foretold paradise of swaledale.

we were in luck and after a quick chat with four other pennine walkers, two that left friday, two that left saturday(!), we set off for tan hill in great conditions for an afternoon walk:

pictures just don't do it justice.

a short time later and the highest pub in the country, tan hill inn, popped into view:

(it's there in the distance, and felt much pleasanter than it looked in the photo.)

we'll hopefully be chatting with the other wayfarers when they get in so i'm posting early so as not to be rude.

i'll leave you with my favourite picture of today, the moody light over hardraw as we set off. I really love clouds!

jin x

118.5 miles down...

pw day 7: ain't northerners brilliant!

so today we walked from horton to hardraw. 15.5 miles in clouds. less views than yesterday if that's possible. as a result we had an absolute stonker. we got to hawes for lunch and did a bit of shopping and touristing. we saw some rope being made which is cooler than it sounds.

then we wandered the extra mile and a half to where we were planning on camping. pitched up. and headed to the pub.

that's when today really started. i've lost count of the number of people we've chatted with. people like jerry who've walked the way three times to those who are walking at about the same rate as us, some walking it in circular loops, some locals, some scout leaders. in short, a good afternoon/evening in good company. probably the best day so far and i'm gonna stop beig rude now
and get back to it. excuse the poor quality pic of the wonderful pub that we're in:

jin x

103.5 miles down...