Day 7: Keld to Reeth

I woke up quite tired after not sleeping very well - I hadn't been able to get warm again after my toilet visit during the night. It turned out that I'd managed to get back into my sleeping bag inside out. That'd probably be why then. It had rained pretty hard for most of the night, but thankfully our tent had just about kept it at bay.

Dave's girlfriend, Naomi, and one of his mates, Adam, were coming to walk with us for a couple of days, and as we were meeting them in Reeth that evening, Dave was keen to have a prompt start. So after we'd eaten bacon sandwiches for breakfast, we quickly took the tent down, left the big rucksack for the sherpa van and set off. We soon passed a very friendly woman from Edinburgh called Alison who was doing the Coast to Coast on her own. Having been told by the campsite in Reeth that she wasn't allowed to book in advance, she was a bit worried that wasn't going to get in, so she asked us if we'd book her in if we got there first. We agreed, but within five minutes she'd caught up with us and ended up walking with us for the rest of the day.

As we were now in the Yorkshire Dales, the paths were a little less obvious than in the mountainous terrain on the Lake District. Combined with the fact that our map for this section of the walk was over 20 years old, this meant that we did a fair amount of off-roading today, firstly clambering up the side of a river called East Grain when there was a footpath about 10m above us, and secondly wading through masses of heather to get down to the crossing over Gunnerside Gill. The walk was pretty pleasant after that, and we just passed the time chatting with Alison. Topics included near-death experiences, rubbish co-workers and the RAC, to name but a few. Apparently David Davis was also doing the Coast to Coast at the time with his son. Dave managed to get a bit confused with the map-reading and so when the footpaths didn't seem to quite fit the map, we all checked and came to the conclusion that we weren't in fact heading towards Reeth, but Healaugh, the town before. We hadn't actually taken any wrong turnings though, so it didn't matter.

Reeth

Healaugh

We got into Reeth at an impressive 1.30pm and went straight to the Orchard Camping Site. The owner was a very friendly man, if a little odd, but he did let Alison camp there after winding her up for a couple of minutes: "You want to camp here? On a bank holiday? And you haven't booked?". As our camping pitch was quite a way from the entrance to the site, he gave us a lift down in his mini-truck, and then appeared again 5 minutes later with the rucksack that the sherpa van had just dropped off. Dave and I had lunch, pitched the tent, and then wondered into the village to find The King's Arms which Alison had had recommended to her. Alison was meeting another group there for dinner (the couple with the son we'd already met, in fact), so she said she'd see us later.

We found the pub with minimal problems and sat outside all afternoon, drinking and doing the big crossword in the paper. In the village square next to us, there was a brass band playing for the 'Annual Reeth Songs of Praise' (no, notthe Songs of Praise). It was all very pleasant, and in my slightly tipsy haze, I almost forgot I was in the middle of an 192 mile trek across England. Still no phone reception though.

We almost managed to finish the crossword, with only about 5 clues to go. Noxious (7), anyone? I went to the phone box across the square to ring home and update my parents on my feet status (fine, thanks). Before I put the phone down, I asked them if they knew a 7-letter word for Noxious. Noisome. They also gave me another answer I needed, and from those we finished the crossword. Huzzah!

It started to rain slightly, so Dave and I went inside and carried on reading the paper. There was an article on Sir Ranulph Fiennes in the Telegraph Magazine which I found rather inspiring. There were also some pretty dark adverts.

Alison arrived at 7pm and she and the other family all ended up sitting on the table next to us, so we had some good chat about the walking so far. Naomi and Adam arrived at about 8pm having been to set up another tent at the campsite. We ate dinner, drank some more, and then went back to the tents. As the other three sat in the tent chatting and drinking, the morning of walking and afternoon of drinking got the better of me and I fell asleep. Apparently it rained all night.

Day 7 Stats:
Distance: 11 miles
Total Ascent: 644m
Total Descent: 761m
Time taken: 5 hours
SMR (Stile-to-Mile Ratio): 1.82