Vole Explosion

ONE FOOT IN FRONT OF THE OTHER

Tuesday 20^th September 2022

Lamb Hill Refuge Hut to Kirk Yetholm

   After an uncomfortable night I get up at 6.30am. I’m feeling unbearably grotty now, having not showered since the camping barn in Greenhead – that’s 72 hours ago, and it will be another 10 to 12 hours before I get another chance. My daily concessions to personal hygiene have been brushing my teeth twice a day and putting on fresh socks every morning. As I said yesterday: little more than a wild animal!

   I leave the hut at 7.30am. Surely I will reach the end today. Like the final day of the Tour de France, today will be a mere procession to the finish line, with no dramas. I’m in the maillot jaune and Kirk Yethom is my Champs Elysees.

   All I can do now is walk – just keep putting one foot in front of the other. That’s all it’s really been about since the start: first one foot, then the other. Repeat for 253 miles. Drink water, eat when you’re hungry, sleep when it gets dark, get up when it gets light, start walking again. Everything else is secondary.

   From the hut I head straight up and over Lamb Hill, then over Beefstand Hill and Mozie Low, all in less than an hour. Along the way I find a large raptor pellet, filled with small animal bones, coughed up on a fence post. I’m guessing Buzzard judging by the size of it.

   I also come across a couple of herds of the feral goats that inhabit these hills. Shaggy and characterful, I think they look magnificent.

   A light drizzle blows in from the east, the first for a few days.

   The harder climb to the summit of Windy Gyle (620m) takes a further hour. Someone has placed a Union Flag on the giant rock pile at the trig point and like Scott at the Antarctic, I’ve clearly been beaten to this spot. I stop for breakfast – cereal bars of course. I’ll be glad if I never see another cereal bar for a while. The drizzle has now passed, and the views are spectacular again. These smooth, rounded, grassy hills remind me of parts of rural New Zealand. I set off again at 10am – 4.5 miles done, another 12.5 miles to go.

   Easy slab walking until I reach King’s Seat and I’m now less than ten miles from the end.

   Slabs, slabs and more slabs, then a steep kick up to the turn-off for The Cheviot. Climbing this hill is an optional extra and not part of the official PW. I had already decided I wasn’t going to use up time and energy climbing it, so I move on. It doesn’t look that special anyway.

   A few more slabs and I am soon at Auchope Cairn, followed by an extremely tedious steep descent to Auchope Mountain Refuge Hut, almost identical to the one where I slept last night. With ten miles under my boots now, and only seven left to go, this is a perfect place for lunch and a long rest. The sun comes out and the scenery here is the best of The Cheviots so far. Six Ravens flying around together is the largest group I’ve seen on the whole trail. I eat almost all of my remaining snacks – I’ve judged my food needs pretty much perfectly, although I don’t have much water left.

   I continue at 1.15pm and reach the summit of The Schil at 2pm. Nothing up here except more amazing views.

   For most of today I have been following a fence along the England-Scotland border. At 2.25pm I follow the trail over the fence via a wooden style and enter Scotland for the final time. Next time I go back into England it will be on a bus.

   Not long after, I reach the point where the PW divides into a high route and an easier low route. The former (4.5 miles) is the official path, the latter (4 miles) is an alternative route for when visibility is poor. Or for wimps. Visibility is excellent today and, much as I would like to wimp out and take the low route straight into town, my inner masochist and inner purist have already teamed up and out-voted me two to one, so I take the high route.

   This route mostly consists of some fairly sharp downhill gradients and it’s here that, after a few days absence, the pain in my left leg decides to make an unwelcome return.

   The last significant climb of the day is up Whitelaw Nick, leaving two and a half miles to go. There then follows one and a half miles of tedious, leg-jarring descent to a road where the two routes meet again and continue into Kirk Yetholm. I need to rest my feet here in preparation for the final mile – a steep uphill road walk followed by a long hobble into town. The PW certainly isn’t going down without a fight.

   In the end I arrive in Kirk Yetholm at 4.50pm. And just like that, it’s all over! There is no feeling of elation, but a huge relief and a quiet satisfaction in another small ambition achieved. I go into the Border Hotel where I’m congratulated by a guy who finished an hour ago. I return his congratulations. The barman gives me a free half pint and writes out a certificate for me, as is traditional here for PW finishers. I also comment in their PW logbook, where I see a comment by The Dutch Guy, as well as by the other two Dutch guys (who are still here, as I notice later tonight). It’s a low-key ending to the hike, but that suits me just fine – I just want to relax now.

   I phone the number of a nearby hostel to book a bed but it tells me to book online, which their website doesn’t allow me to do. As the place is just across the village green, I walk over and claim a bed. It is called the Friends of Nature House, which sounds a bit like it might be a naturist establishment, which it isn’t. In fact, they insist I put my trousers and pants back on before letting me in. I go back to the pub to collect my pack and then I can finally have a gorgeous shower in which Angels spray me with warm holy water, while I am serenaded by heavenly choirs. At least that’s how it feels, having not had a shower now for a whopping 83 hours.

   Now feeling fresh and fragrant in clean clothes, I head back to the pub where I book a train for tomorrow and then have a three-course meal as a modest celebration: haggis croquettes, followed by lamb shank with mash, veg., redcurrant gravy and mint sauce. Triple chocolate brownie with lemon meringue ice-cream for pudding.

   Now, which way’s south from here?

17 miles; 27.5 km; 9.5 hours

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   For the past seventeen days (one less than originally scheduled) I have wandered through some of England’s finest landscapes and experienced Northern hospitality at its best, the accents changing from county to county but the friendliness and warmth always remaining constant.

   I’ve been storm-lashed and sunburned, but over-all I was very fortunate with the weather and trail conditions.

   I have enjoyed the constant companionship of Red Grouse and Ravens, Kestrels, Skylarks and Meadow Pipits (so, so, so many Mipits!), with a supporting cast of Buzzards, Stonechats, Dippers, Goosanders, and many more. Black Grouse, Red Squirrels and Adders proved more elusive.

   Despite a diet of full English breakfasts, convenience store snacks, the stodgiest of comfort food, and more beer than is strictly good for me, I still somehow managed to lose weight.

   I saw enough sheep, styles and awkward farm gates to last me a lifetime.

   I made temporary new best friends, shared accommodation with strangers, visited Manchester due to a clerical error, and had my fetlocks examined by a vet.

   Although I hadn’t left the country, I had opted out for a few days. Hiking can create an atavistic state of mind in which all our usual concerns are stripped away, and we are left with the daily imperatives of finding food, water and shelter, as well as navigating our way through the landscape.

   When I return to normal life it’s to a changed country – not only with a different Prime Minister from when I left, but with a different Monarch on the throne.

   The question is, have I also changed? No, of course not. Don’t be silly. I’ve just been out for a walk, that’s all.

That’s all.