Glaisdale to Robin Hood's Bay - August 16th

Final leg of our Coast to Coast walk and the weather today was the best we've encountered during the entire trek. The scenery was also the most diversified, from the tranquility of Little Beck Wood and Falling Foss waterfall to the miles of featureless and boggy moors to the majestic cliff top sea views, it was a perfect, albeit tiring, day.

Ready to tackle the last 19.5 miles to Robin Hood's Bay

We left Glaisdale @ 7:00 am as we wanted to get an early start, thinking it would take us @ 9 hours of walking to complete this 19.5 mile "very challenging" day. Our first 4 miles to Grosmont were on country roads and dirt paths. We stopped in Grosmont for breakfast (brought with us) before beginning what was to be our steepest and longest climb of the day, @ 2 miles of straight uphill, at times with a grade of 33%. Whew! 

While climbing the Grosmont hill, we spotted this
herd of deer in a fenced field

As the saying goes "what goes up must come down" and the descent from the Grosmont hill was just as steep. Of course, once reaching the bottom we started climbing again, this time more gradually through lovely Litte Beck Wood past the Hermitage (a cave carved out of stone in 1790) and on to Falling Foss waterfall and the tearoom there. 

The Hermitage










Beautiful views through Little Beck Wood

Falling Foss waterfall


Shortly after leaving Little Beck Wood, we were tromping through the uneven ground, mud and bogs of the moors. Thankfully, the path was fairly easy to follow, but it did seem to go on forever. To add insult to injury, after exiting the moors we had a VERY muddy, downhill path to negotiate before coming out on a quiet country road near the village of Hawkser, @ 5 miles from Robin Hood's Bay. I don't think our shoes will ever be the same!

At this point we started climbing again to the cliff tops above the North Sea. The climb was well worth the effort, however, given the spectacular views we had of the coastline. Shortly thereafter we began our descent into Robin Hood's Bay which is a charming, but popular, seaside destination. The last order of C2C business was a celebratory toast under the C2C finish line plaque and tossing our rocks into the North Sea. We had safely finished the trek we began 15 days before, glad we did it, but also very glad to be done. Now on to other adventures!

Easy clifftop stroll toward the sea










View of clifftops to the north

Our first view of Robin Hood's Bay









Toasting our successful finish








Tossing our rocks into the sea

Rich's more sedate rock toss




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chipping Campden Walk - August 24th

Image
Today we decided to visit the Cotswold villages of Chipping Campden, Broad Campden and Blockley by bussing it to Chipping Campden (@ 10 miles from Stow) and then walking to the other two villages. This is a very rural area of England and bus service here is limited, to say the least. Our bus trip had to be carefully planned out or we could have ended up stranded in one of the towns. We first took a bus to the train station at Moreton-in-Marsh (via one bus company), waited @ 30 minutes and then caught a bus to Chipping Campden (via a very circuitous route with another bus company). This 10 mile trip took 1.5 hours! Chipping Campden is one of the larger villages in the Cotswolds, but not any less charming or picturesque than others we have visited. We spent a good hour and a half walking through the town, seeing the historic sites: the market hall and nearby WWI monument, an old silk mill, a 14th century wool merchant’s mansion, the estate of an influential silk merchant whose manor hous...
Read more

Bath - August 21st

Image
We spent the day immersed in Bath’s history, starting with its 1st century Roman Baths moving on to the 15th century Bath Abbey and concluding with Bath’s 17th and 18th century Georgian architecture and society. Our tour of the Roman Baths and adjacent museum was enhanced not only by the excellent audio guide provided, but also by the depiction of ancient Romans as they went about their daily life, including their use of the baths, how they worshipped and their societal structure. We were able to walk through the ruins of the temple courtyard, smelling the sulfur of the mineral water as we approached the great bath itself. We came away awestruck by the scale and grandeur of these ancient baths. Bird's eye view of the ancient Roman baths Pediment fragments from the temple Walking through the temple courtyard outside the baths We then visited Bath Abbey, an important medieval church and monastery, looted by Henry VIII during his dissolution of the monasteries when he sold off its val...
Read more

Patterdale to Shap - August 6th

Image
Today’s official route from Patterdale to Shap was 15.6 miles with 3,651 feet of elevation gain over the highest peak in the Lake District, Kidsty Pike. We opted for a shorter, easier route that our innkeeper suggested last night: take a boat ride on Ulswater Lake to Pooley Bridge and then walk 10 miles via roads and footpaths to the village of Shap. The boat dock on Ulswater Lake was in the village of Glenridding, a quick 20 minute walk. We left our lodging at 9:00 am and were able to catch the first boat of the day at 9:45 am. The ride itself took @ an hour, which went by quickly as it was a nice morning to be on the water. We met a couple from The Netherlands on the boat who were also walking to Shap and, once the boat docked, we all set out together.  Enjoying our boat ride on Ulswater Lake It was pleasant and warm enough the majority of the day that I was in a short sleeve shirt. After @ 2 hours of walking, we were able to find a grassy spot on the side of the road to have lun...
Read more