England Coast to Coast: Day 2

And the word of the day is: Ouch! And the theme of the day is: Rocks! And finally the lesson of the day is: The world is incredibly small! Let me elaborate….

I woke up this morning to a cloudy day and the six of us who stayed overnight at the Stork were mainly fixated on the weather forecast as we ate breakfast. One report indicated rain in the morning and clearing later and another promised no rain. Easy to guess which report we were rooting for! The innkeeper, Paul, and in England, it is definitely an “innkeeper” and not a hotel manager, dropped us off at the starting point of the trek where he had picked us up the day before. The previous day I had met a lovely couple with whom I shared the “get lost in the rain” experience, who ended up also staying at the Stork, and they graciously invited me to walk with them today, so I did.

Getting started on the morning of Day 2. All rain gear minus the poncho.

The plan for the day was to walk 14.5 miles over to Raithwaite, which was the evening stop. There were several options to consider planning the day that fell into two categories; the high route and the low route. Paul recommended that we take the low route given all of the rain that fell on Sunday (it rained all night!). It was pretty much a unanimous decision by the six of us- if the locals give you advice it is smart to listen. I was more than willing to settle on the low route and had planned to take that one anyway since my body was not quite up to the toil of climbing up and down and up and down steep hills. (Remember the word of the day is: ouch!). As expected I was a bit sore in the hamstrings and glutes when I woke up and that is even with multiple stretching sessions the night before and in the morning.

We got started at 8;30 still not knowing if it was going to rain, but in the interests of being cautious and not wanting to experience the drenching I lived through yesterday, I donned full rain gear with my poncho standing by as a hot backup. The first eight miles of the route were pretty straightforward, a walk along the northern edge of Ennerdale Lake. The second phase of the walk was going to be more challenging, consisting of 2000’ climb up and then down again on the other side of the ridge into the valley where Rosthwaite, the evening stop, is located (“low route” is relative- the “high route” had several such climbs). We headed off full of expectations for a great day despite the overcast clouds. The terrain we walked along started off as a surface road and then changed to a gravel path so footing was not an issue during the early part of the day. The day’s theme of “rocks” was only slowly starting to sink into our consciousness.

How the path started: narrow, smooth, asphalt lane.

The trail starts to turn into loose packed rock and small gravel.

Finally the path turns into a rocky stream bed (more or less) with lose bit river rocks. Watch your ankles!

It became more obvious that “rocks” was appropriate as the path became wider and more and more river rocks made an appearance, raising the bar on footing and energy required for forward progress..

The weather was extremely changeable; it was overcast, it started misting, it drizzled steadily, it misted, the sun peaked out for a second, it was overcast. I gave in pretty quickly and rather than trying to keep up with the quickly changing weather put on my poncho to keep my backpack relatively dry and just left it on, even though it got a bit warm in all of that rain gear. And thus it went for the first 3-4 hours, the amount of time it took us to amble around the lake to a youth hostel on the other side at the foothills leading to the day’s climb. The lake was set in a valley and fed by various streams that descended out of the surrounding hills. Because of the healthy rain the day before the water flowing down the slopes was very plentiful and glittered brightly when the sun chose to grace us with its presence. When the sun did pop out from behind the clouds that drifted by the colors in the valley lit up in a rainbow of greens- it was beautiful and lush.

After stopping briefly at the youth hostel to use the facilities and rest we consulted our maps and forged ahead. Paul and I had two different maps and we found that by comparing them we could get a fairly confident understanding of our direction. Both maps warned that the path up the hill and over down into the valley we were targeting was not clear and that it was important to follow the cairns some thoughtful souls had placed along the way as well as take compass readings occasionally. Both books started with “look for the thin, barely discernible path to the left of the obvious trail and take that to start the climb up the steep slope”. And thus our afternoon began and that is the point that it became obvious to me that “rocks” was going to be the theme of the day.

A view looking back at the lake we had just walked around.

As we followed the rocky, thin trail we came to a stream crossing. Normally it looked quite manageable but due to the rain it was tricky to figure out where and how to cross. We eyed the area where the cairns were laid out but it did not look safe so we went up stream on the hill a bit and found another potential crossing. Of course I fell into the stream- that is why backpacks are so wonderful, they carry lots of stuff and also cushion your fall when you happen to fall (if you land right!). Luckily since I was wearing all my rain gear I did not really get wet and thankfully did not hurt myself either. On the other side of the stream we made a left turn and headed up a rocky, stone path, almost a staircase, and climbed almost straight up. The pain moved from my hamstrings and glutes to my feet, which even in boots, got tired of pounding on the constantly uneven surface. We went slowly and paid careful attention to where we were placing our feet as we ascended to the top. Luckily as we hit the ridge the sun came out, the clouds thinned out and we could look back west to the coast and see across the Irish Sea all the way to Scotland. The view was totally worth the effort of getting up there, the sore feet, the wet backpack and the wind that was biting but manageable.

We climbed up a steep slope using a set of “rock stairs”. It reminded me of the Inca trail.

The path was much more crowded today and we ran across several people going up the hill, even more slowly than we were, and at various points along the ridge on top. In each case we would stop and compare notes on maps and directions in order for everyone to gain reassurance that collectively we were on the right track. Thank goodness for the many cairns along the way. (And yes I added a rock to a baby cairn to help out in my own small way).

Coming down the hill we used as much caution as going up since the path remained strewn with boulders, loose rocks and in some areas scree, so the footing was treacherous and painful. Generally, I think going down is harder anyway since your knees take a beating- even with the use of a pole which I had deployed for the climb up and had ready to assist on the way down too. At the bottom there was another youth hostel so we had a rest before pushing along for the last two miles to our destination. The route down into the village was lovely; we continued to walk along the stream we had picked up coming down the hill and there was a stand of trees that the path wound through. Eventually we came to the village, and no kidding, village is the right word to describe the small collection of building- maybe two dozen in total, clustered at the intersection of two roads. I found my evening’s accommodations with no problem. Now I am sitting in the village pub, the only place to eat and grab a beer and with me are the day’s hikers all with the same goal in mind. (We are also waiting for the soccer game- England is playing tonight.)

View at the top was spectacular and totally worth the climb. It was a clear day!

About today’s lesson regarding it is a small world. During the day, while we walked Paul, Miriam, and I talked about a little bit of this and that and in the course of those conversations we discovered that we had a mutual acquaintance. Both Paul and Miriam are doctors in northern England and I had met a colleague and good friend of Paul’s at an event in London in December of 2011. I had spent quite a bit of time talking with him since he was an extraordinary person- had climbed all of the highest peaks on all of the continents and ran multiple marathons etc.. Incredible. Looking forward to what tomorrow will bring!