Coast to Coast England · 2023
London · St. Bees · 190 miles on the Coast to Coast Trail · Robin Hood's Bay · London
October 1, 2023
Bogs, Rain, purple Heather and the Sea - Coast to Coast Trail II.
My face feels like an eel that has been in the freezer overnight, my feet are sponges and I don't really know which way we are walking anymore. Fog, there's fog everywhere. And bogs. We're on England's Coast to Coast Trail - three weeks of long-distance walking, 190 miles on foot from the Irish Sea to the North Sea. At least I hope so, because the rain is sweeping horizontally into our eyes, the ground is full of knee- and waist-high bogs, and visibility is zero. Are we perhaps walking in circles already?
How we got out of it again, overcame five days of tedious cornfields and continuous rain and were surprised at the end with purple heather carpets and glamping by the sea—now here.
September 15, 2023
Strikes, Head Wounds and Mountains - Coast to Coast 1.
"Haha, first day and it's already raining big time - how very British!", I shout cheerfully as I put on my rain pants at the guesthouse in the village of St. Bees, right on the coast of the Irish Sea. We want to hike the Wainwright Coast to Coast Trail - 190 miles across England in three weeks. It was my boyfriend’s idea. He always wanted to do a long-distance hike. I love the idea, but maybe we could have found a place where it's not freezing cold and pissing rain all the time. Oh well.
At least the hike should be pretty easy. Just a couple of English meadows and hills, we can do that blindfolded. It will certainly be more like a walk than a real hike. After all, we hiked the mountains of Norway last month.
After the first three miles, my boyfriend is nursing a bleeding head wound, and I am considering just jumping into the sea in near panic. I am no longer so sure this will be a just a walk. And we have no clue yet about the steep mountains or bacteria that are ahead of us.