Jerry´s World: May 2007

In The Beginning

Though its nice to see friends and family after being away for a year, it can quickly get depressing to be home and back to work. A cure I have found to work is to immediatley take some more time off. So after a weekend in Ramsgate, old travel buddy Peter Breivik and I hook up in Carlisle for a new adventure.

On Hadrians Wall

First off, we're so close to Hadrians Wall and Scotland, we make fleeting visits to both. Gretna Green was the border town, where we try Haggis, down a shot of local whisky and of course: get married. (Only joking).

Our real reason for being in Cumbria was to fulfill a promise we had made to each other 4 or so years ago. To embark on a journey which would take us from the Irish Sea to the North Sea. All on foot. The route is commonly known as Wainright's Coast to Coast; stretching for 192 miles through 3 National Parks, across the Pennines and takes most people more than two weeks to complete.

Whitehaven Sunset

Both of us keen snooker players, we had some tickets to World Snooker Semi-finals in Sheffield, which was in 15 days. We would have to get a serious move on. Well..... on day 1 we decided that the journey would be well fitted to begin and end with a game of snooker. Consequently we didnt leave the sunset town of Whitehaven until 4pm.

We officially begin by getting our boots wet

Our first 10 miles ended feeling tired and hungry. Who am I kidding! We were knackered and starving. Three of those miles were spent getting lost. Were we really capable of doing this? Some locals were kind enough to let us set up tent in their garden, afterall, this whole thing was on a tight budget. Each night was to be spent wild camping, eating from our gas stoves which we carried along with many other self-sufficient essentials. 20Kg on each of our backs. Certain luxuries included i-pod (though striclty to be used in the tent and not to spoil the nature walking experience). A few days later I found hair gel buried in Peters bag. "Only the essentials", I thought we'd agreed.

Day 2 saw us entering the Lake District. We took our first shower in the freezing waters of Lake Ennerdale. Nearby day hikers saw what they must have thought were two Naturalists through their binoculaurs.

Peter getting ready for a BIG bath

Arriving at Blacksail youth hostel in the middle of nowhere we meet a guy who tells us the way towards Rostwaithe. We ignore his advice and climb the mountain next to the path thinking we knew a shortcut. We did 4 extra miles that day mostly on our hands and knees it got so scarily steep, up in dense fog, trying to navigate EAST with a compass that kept losing its bubble (like those on spirit levels). Did I mention that neither of us have any mountainering skills whatsoever.

Peter buys Hats so we wont get burnt again

That night the rain came in. It didnt stop for 3 whole days. We had some degree of weather protection, but nothing could have prepared us for this onslaught. Everything we wore and carried was soaked through. One day we awoke to pack the tent away, in the rain, having to put on wet clothes, in the rain; before endeavouring on a 15 mile hike mostly uphill, in the strongest winds imaginable.

Peter cooks lunch in the rain

The rain drops hid our tears, and the howling winds drowned out our pleas to each other to just give up and go home. Of course we got lost each of those three days, once so badly, we climbed up and down a whole mountain for nothing. We had just ascended what we thought would be the hardest and highest of the afternoon and were about to jump for joy; when two lone hikers appeared through the clouds, perched beside a Cairns marking the summit; and using their GPS pointed on our map that we were miles off course.

We finally climb the CORRECT mountain - Kirdsty Pike (Our highest)

Wild camping is scary enough, we simply couln't resit the luscious grass of a graveyard in Orton. Peter pokes his head out of the tent to see that the heavens have finally closed. The sun, which we last saw setting over the Irish Sea in Whitehaven, was finally back with us.

Thriller Night

Over tea and jam, cream and butter Scones (a rare luxury I can assure you), we both realise that having survived the last 5 days: not even a fractured leg would stop us from finishing this thing. I honestly believe that had it been raining when we woke up THAT day, this story would end here.

Checking the forecast over Scones and Tea

Onwards we went. Crossing the Pennines we also enterd our second National Park: The Yorkshire Dales. Here we came across a local farmer who told us they have no control over the public footpaths even though at times they went through the front gardens of their farm houses. We thanked him, explaining we weren't REAL ramblers just a couple of guys out getting some fresh air.

Local Farmers speak their mind

This is how to keep clean in the wild

By the middle of the walk, so many people had asked us if this was for charity, that we finally became ashamed of saying no. Of course this is for charity!!! That night through SMS we raised over 130 pounds from close family and friends for the Paul Hunter Charity (a snooker player who died of cancer last year).Now the walk was entirely in the name of snooker. Often we timed it to arrive in a village at night to watch some of the games in the only pub. Sometimes they didn't have televisions, or closed before the 23:20 highlights. At other times we would go entire days without seeing a piece of civilization, camping miles away from a village, but always with spectacular views of valleys and rivers.

We camp at run down farm ruin: Crackpot Lodge

The biggest village we went through was Richmond, still too small to have anything bigger than Spar or a corner Co-Op. Most daily transactions happened in the village Post Office. From banking to buying cheese and milk to first class stamps and birthday cards.

Peter cooks us rice and salmon

The next piece of English Beauty was our third and final National Park: The North york Moors. This went all the way to the Coast - A place we had been dreaming about for the last few days.

The North York Moors

Up on the Moors, we sometimes had views that would stretch for as far as from an aeroplane window. There were lots of animals in the Moors. We had to combat snakes, pheasants, and even considered boiling and eating a rabbit we caught. It was too cute though.

I have aeroplane view

Jerry saves Peter's life by killing poisonous Adder Snake

After a 20 mile hike, our second longest yet, we arrived at the village pub in Glaisdale.Though exhausted, we were filled with joy knowing that the next day would be our last. Peter bought two double shots of whiskey. A day early for celebrations I thought, then catching a crazy glimpse in his eyes.

A whisly for the road

"Jerry", he said. "You've always been on about doing a night walk. Now is the time".
Surely he didn't mean it. With 15 miles left to go, surely no man could handle a 35 mile day. Then the bar owner told us that the S.A.S. do their training on the C2C route in 52 hours. He bought us a shot of whiskey, then we put our backs back onto our already aching backs. If they can do it. So can we!

This was a night-walk

Of course we already felt hardcore by this stage, besides, we had loads of spare batteris for our headlamps. One piece of advice we did heed from two local lads who thought we were crazy, was that we would DEFINITELY die if we went through the bogs. It's like sinking sand they told us, and hard enough to negotiate during day light.We stuck to the main road. We giggled most of the way in pure ecstasy. The sun not yet risen and we were due to arrive in Dracula's Whitby around 5am. Just in time for a sunrise. We rechristened the name of our walk: PnJ's Sunset to Sunrise Walk.
We stepped down the cliff, the cold English sea breeze welcoming in our faces, the shrieks of seagulls more melodic than the classical music I had on my MP3. We had made it.

We joyously arrive at the other coast and take a boat ride out of Whitby Harbour