Weather: Hot and little breeze Distance: 22km (13.7 miles)
Total Distance: 1517
miles
I caught the 7.50am bus from Kingsbridge
to Totnes, which was much more civilised than the Dartmouth bus I caught earlier in the week and got there
faster. Any time I saved however I lost
again getting out of Totnes because I got lost on a housing estate. I wished I
had invested in a local street map similar to the one I had used in
Plymouth. I asked a couple of people the
way and eventually found my way onto a country lane/path down to Fleet Mill.
The lady in the Tourist Information
Office in Totnes had told me the previous day that she had once driven down
this way to avoid a traffic jam. Unless she was driving a tank she was very
much mistaken; it was an overgrown path and not a farm track, but at least it
appeared to be a right of way. I had to keep moving because in the hot and
humid weather, the horse flies were everywhere and would settle on me if I had
stopped. The only sign that anything else had ever used this isolated path was a few horse prints in
the mud.
Just before I got to Fleet
Mill, the path became a mud bath and there was no way I could get through
unless Id been prepared to let the mud get well over my ankles. Instead I jumped
over the fence and into a stream for 10 yards, after which I came out at Fleet
Mills, which seemed to be a holiday cottage. The man exercising his dog in the
garden had a look of incredulity on his face when he saw me.
This days walk would have been much
nicer in slightly cooler and breezier conditions to keep off the horse flies.
The track back up to Ash was also
hemmed in by hedges but perfectly passable.
It was a shame that the hedgerows prevented me from seeing anything else
other than the path in front. A track from Ash then took me into the back streets of
Stoke Gabriel. On a second attempt, and
after seeing another family out walking, I found the path that led down and
along the estuary. This path had only been opened a month previously according
to a public notice I saw in Ash.
This led to a weir which formed a lake
inland. I asked the car park attendant
if there was a public right of way on the other side. He said not officially
but would be very surprised if I were challenged. I had a pot of tea and caramel slice in the
cafe next to the weir before crossing the slippery weir with caution and up
through the woods on a good track - the best part of the day. There than followed a road section before I
cut off down to Galmpton Creek.
I was
unsure from the map what I would find because it looked like a quarry but was
in fact a series of boat yards heavy on security to the extent of having a
gate-person. There was then a stroll
through some fields coming out on the road at a farm. I headed south thinking that I may be able to
cut through some tracks but it was a private estate house, so I headed back up
the hill towards the Youth Hostel entrance, and then up another hedged in path
up to the main road. What a pity there
is no public right of way along the estuary at this stage.
The walk along the main road, initially
up to Hillhead and than down again to the estuary to the main road, was the
most dangerous of the week and only some of the views made it at all
interesting. The last part was steep
down to one of the ferry points. I met a
backpacker heading up the hill for the Youth Hostel - pity help him if he
walked the way I had along the main road.
The last part of the days walk was
along beside the railway and just as I was coming into Kingswear I was passed
by the steam train and only just avoided getting a drenching when the train
released a sizable quantity of water next to my feet!
I had to wait a while in a queue for
the ferry to Dartmouth since it was jammed with people who had just got off the
train. Once over the river I bought an
ice cream and a paper and waited for the bus back to Kingsbridge. I got home to High House farm at 4.20, the
only time on the week where I did not join the family for afternoons
activities. There was no sign of the
farm manager where I thought my wife may have left the key, and just as I was
contemplating a hot wait in the sun I realised that the patio door had been
left open.
No comments:
Post a Comment