Day 26 - Kirkby Lonsdale to Tebay (20 miles)

I just lied. It's not 20 miles, more like 19 IF I'd taken the easy route. I'm on a 1000 mile walk, why would I take the easy route? Maybe to save my legs from exploding? Yes, well I should have taken the quick easy route but I tried to be clever and attempted one of my awesome shortcuts!

Everything looked great, I'd planned a route that would take me off of the main road again and see me at a PC stop at roughly half way (what does PC stand for? It's the two most important letters on an Ordnance Survey map - Public Convenience). The route was also only a slightly longer distance. Perfect.

I'd bought a Landranger map yesterday for today's route. I'm not being geeky here by using it's correct name, I've used it's name because "Landranger" maps are a different scale to Explorer maps (the maps up until yesterday were all Explorer's). Landranger = 1:50,000 scale; Explorer = 1:25,000 scale. This was crucial in today's gaff. At my halfway stop point the footpath on my Landranger map dotted itself merrily across a little stream. Had I had an Explorer map I would have seen the little stream was in fact a 30 meter wide river and the map would have also shown a termination to one footpath and a start to another on the opposite bank.

I tried to cross the river. Shoes off, socks off, in I went. We don't live in the Bahamas and that means our waters run slightly cooler than theirs does. My feet nearly froze right there. It's the fastest I've moved for the last 3 weeks as I left that water. Nothing for it, I had to go round.

Consulting the map (more carefully this time!) I could see the next crossing point was an old disused railway line only half a mile or so away. I set off cursing the fact I was back tracking. Only a little way back I saw another public footpath leading off in the general direction of the way I wanted to go. This time I wasn't tempted! I stuck to my plan and headed for the old railway line. This was easy to find as you can imagine and with a fresh spring in my step, due to the fact I was once again heading forwards, I whistled my way down the tracks as if I were doing a screen test for Stand By Me.

My happy mood suddenly evaporated. In front of me stood a giant metal fence complete with heavy metal door, with no way round it, blocking the bridge I'd travelled to use. This was a disaster! I looked at the map. The next crossing was so far away it would be quicker for me to turn back and go the original way. I would lose at least 2 hours walking time. I was gutted. I slumped to the ground with a heavy heart. My "easy" day had turned into a nightmare. I put my hat over my eyes and tried to collect myself. My feet were already throbbing... Nightmare.

"Alright mate? Lost?"

What the deuce?!? I looked up and a lumberjack (I kid you not) was standing at the big metal door. The door was open! He'd opened it! I'm not sure how much tree work goes on around these old bridges but I'm guessing not a lot. The chances of this guy working in this area on this day at this time must be pretty minuscule. Rushing as best as I could to my feet I explained my plight and this gate keeper from God said "you're not supposed to use this but I can't see why not. I didn't say it was okay if you get caught though!" and he waved me through. Unbelievable.

When I was in Holme in The Fleece Inn a few days ago, a couple of women came and sat with me. We chatted and they explained they had done a pilgrimage type walk in Spain. They said when they were on their Camino they had been told that what you need, the Camino will provide. Since they told me this I have had very strange things happen on my own Camino. I'm not knocking it but it is very strange... and reassuring.

My walk led me into a huge valley with armies of Goliath's standing either side of me. I was 220 meters up and the mountains were 400 meters above me. I felt very humble. It was like they were the sentinels of The Dales. Monitoring every inch of it's border. Only the brave should enter. My path wound through the valley, not daring to breach 250 meters.

The rest of the day went without incident. RAF jets both old and new were on training runs and they use the canyon type surroundings for their manoeuvres. This was a treat as every now and then these noise machines would rush by and send the pulse racing. It was almost like you could reach up and touch them because they were so low. For a while I was a little boy again imagining myself in the cockpit 'pulling G's' and fighting off the enemy. Being scrambled to save the day. Life was and is good.

I finally arrived in Tebay and my feet are throbbing, I'm feeling shattered and weak, but I am happy.

Tomorrow I'll be stuck to the A roads until I find a map shop! I'm guessing that means no fighter planes and no strange happenings but we will see!