Weather: Fine, cloudy, breezy.
Distance:
20.5 km (12.7 miles) Total Distance: 3115 miles
This
was to be a much better day, if only because it was more eventful and the
scenery more varied. It started with
Irene in the B&B telling me the traumas of having one of their guest houses
filled with single men on a seven week 7-day a week contract at the nearby
Alcan works, and how they tend to get a bit raucous.
I
parked in Walkworth and walked down the same track again to the sea. This time
though at the bottom of the track where it turned left for the golf course and
right for a caravan park was a brand new BMW that had gone straight on and come
to rest straddling a concrete block.
There was no sign of it having been stolen so I concluded, may be wrongly, that it was a golfer trying to catch last orders the previous evening at the
golf club house!
After
a mile walk north along the beach it was necessary to get up onto the cliff top
so I cut inland through the golf course, on a public right of way might I add, and then on the cliff top path for a mile.
I didn’t see a hung over sad BMW owner though. On to the beach again and north onto
Alnmouth. I had half hoped that the
river was small enough to wade. There was after all a footpath marked on the
map across it but there was no chance. It was pretty deep and wide. This meant an hours walk around, first up a hill to a cross and then down to
the ruins of an ancient but very small church then over marshland and up onto
the main road where I walked along a new Millennium footpath / cycle way that
went parallel to the A-road – very nice too.
I met an elderly walker – backpacking his way to Newbiggin and was
impressed he had been walking for over a fortnight!
I
hunted for a café in Alnmouth and was pleased when I found one open. Unfortunately it was very disappointing. I had the carrot cake and a cup of coffee –
both were incredibly small. I should
have said I didn’t want it when I saw the meagre size of the portion but as
usual we Brits don’t get cross until after we have left the place. Instead I seethed and headed north again through the
car park and onto the beach.
At Seaton
House I got up onto the cliff tops – well cliffs are a bit of an
exaggeration. The path went through a
very weird caravan park – they were all run down and grass was knee high. It
was also difficult to find a way through.
Eventually I got back onto the beach and north to Bolmer.
It was good to get back on some coastal path
walking proper. I walked quickly past a
pair of walkers near Howick and then came to an abrupt halt when I realised I
had dropped my map – I had rather stupidly been carrying it in the small of my
back and it must have slipped out. I
only had to retrace my steps about half a mile when I saw a mum and daughter
out for a hike and asked them. She
admitted rather embarrassingly that she had bagged it – better that than leave
it there we both agreed!
Just
short of Craster I came upon a walking group stopped and pointing out to sea at
a school of dolphins – a great spectacle.
They were heading south diving in and out of the water. When they had gone the party set off only to
come to a standstill again. I barged past them only for me to be embarrassed
this time because they had stopped because one of them had a nose bleed – I
think they were over-reacting a bit because one of them was trying to find the
whistle!
When I
waited for a bus in Craster a wide cockney lad called over to me and asked
where I was going and offered me a lift.
He was a real Harry Enfield character.
We walked up to his 4X4 and started our hair-raising journey with him
grabbing the map off me from time to time.
It was fortunate because a man in a car stopped us and told us the road
ahead was blocked – that’s why my bus was late and would probably have never
come! Harry (I’ll call him that even
though it probably wasn't his nane!) – was a diver, plumber and virtually everything else I think.
He
dropped me at Walkworth, asked I mention him in any book I wrote, and I drove
to friends in Brigg where Pam made tea and we then went out for a beer.
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