Part 2 begins! And I must say, it felt very good to be back walking once more. Today saw three important milestones. First of all, we were to cross over England’s watershed once we had reached Nine Standards Rigg. Before this point, all the rivers run back into the Irish Sea. From this point on, all the rivers we pass will be running into the North Sea. Secondly, by the end of the day, we had reached the walk’s half way mark at the wee village of Keld! One hundred miles done, 100 to go. We were also going to pass from Cumbria into Yorkshire. Very exciting.
We left Kirby Stephen around 09:00 for a steepish climb up to the Nine Standards. These huge stone cairns have been around for at least a couple of hundred of years. No one knows exactly when or why they were built. There are different theories, one of which was to scare the Scottish into thinking that there was a huge army camped up on the hill. Do they really think the Scottish would be that dopey? Anyway….it’s at this point that your literary mind changes from thoughts of the light and airy Austen novel to those of the brooding Brontes. The Yorkshire Moors are empty, vast and today were so foggy that you could not see 5 foot in front of you. Even though we were now tackling the walk alone, it’s times like these when you are grateful to have fellow walkers. Three separate groups turned into one group of 10 as we decided to tackle the Red Route together. Safety in numbers against the fog and the bogs, so to speak. There are three routes to take from the Standards and the best one depends on the time of year. To be fair, I think they are all as boggy as each other. And they really are very boggy. It was soon realised that initial attempts of trying to jump over the boggy bits were futile as we gave up and just marched straight through, praying that we would only sink to our ankles and not our knees. The wind also thought it would join in, the freezing cold adding to our joy. :-/ To be honest though, the walk was quite fun although you really had to concentrate and focus to find the few and far between track markers. We finally reached dry ground as the skies brightened up, just in time for lunch in front of the grouse butts. This is where certain folk come in August to get their thrills by pumping lead into the birdlife. Nice.
Our first sign of civilisation since Kirby Stephen was soon in sight in the form of Ravenseat Farm. Shepherdess Amanda, who lives here with her husband and five kiddies has become somewhat of a celebrity in recent times. She has appeared on Julia Bradbury’s BBC series of The Coast To Coast Walk and is now staring in her own reality tv show about the day to day runnings of the farm. She wasn’t home when we first arrived, much to our disappointment, but as we hung around talking to other walkers and also her young son Reuben (the proud owner of a crate of hay and expert fixer of toy sit on tractors), she arrived home and tea was served. She’s as sweet as pie and it was lovely to meet her. Though if they want the business to keep coming in, perhaps taking the dead and rotting moles off the fence may help. They stink!!
Next it was just a short walk along the road to Keld where we waited for a ride to the evening’s accommodation. 14.5 miles over 7hrs was covered today. This is starting to feel way too easy!!
Dinner was at the local pub. No surprises there. We’re actually getting a little over pub meals. Having said that, we were thrilled to find an entry form for the local agricultural show. Going through the events, we thought we might enter the best bale of hay class. With £3 up for grabs as prize money, it was very tempting. I also cursed myself for not picking up a certain book I spotted in a Kirby Stephen bookshop,”The Leek Book. Growing And Showing Exhibition Leeks”. I’m sure I would have sailed through the Open Vegetable Classes with that one.
