Dales diary

We drive to Orton to start the next leg, via Kirkby Stephen to drop off my car. It's still quite muddy. Time for the putting-on-the-gaiters show – though 'mankles' might be a better word for Mick and Pad's petite little numbers.




Our German travel researcher friend Hauke appears out of the hotel while we're prepping and we set off together.
Today's walk is either 12 or 16 miles (depending on whether you go by the book or Hauke's GPS) of gentle ups and downs. The first point of interest, worth a little detour, is a stone circle, which we make a circuit of in suitably reverential fashion. A Coast to Coaster is just emerging from a tent pitched alongside – making his experience a little more spiritual, perhaps.
We follow dry stone walls across grazing pastures, over bleak moorland, along isolated single-lane roads and past lone barely alive Hawthorn trees.


Oh, and sheep. A lot of sheep.

If you feel yourself going wrong, you just have to look for the ubiquitous Coast to Coast footprints in the mud.

We get into banter with Hauke, who lives in Dublin and has the most incredible Irish-German accent. Mick tells a joke about a leprechaun. It's a sign that the enjoyment is beginning to overtake the endurance aspect of our endeavours. Mick tells us Margaret's expression for being hungry: 'I could eat the arse off a low-flying duck.'
Cue lunch, and we join fellow Coast to Coasters David and Maggie by an old stone bridge, and some of us enjoy a foot-reviving paddle in the ice-cold stream.


Says Pad, as he undoes his laces, 'Well, it's no more ridiculous than anything else I'm doing.'

After lunch it clouds over but it's perfect walking weather – no rain and a cool breeze. Mick puts on his beanie and strides off over the horizon, looking like the Milk Tray man on a mission.

At one point – and yes, I've already expressed my terror of cows in fields – Mick blazes a trail through a scary herd of frisky bullocks, shouting, 'Follow me.' Into the gates of cow hell? I don't think so.

We finally come down off the fells into Kirkby Stephen. Kicking over a style, I spot this little wonder of nature. A message from the stones – they seem to be smiling on us.

Trust the sheep to lower the tone: 'Get the flock out of my way.'
We have a quick Wainwright beer with Hauke in the King's Arms and say goodbye. He's having a rest day tomorrow so we probably won't see him again. Back in Hawes, we head out on the town again. The Crown for dinner and wifi and, by the way, they do a mean Tomato, Mozarella & Basil salad. Without basil. Only in Yorkshire...