Very much a day of two halves. Apologies for what might be stating the obvious – all days are composed of two halves, unless you go by the twenty-four hour clock. I digress.
We left Hawes with my laundry still smelling of feet (backstory to which I’ll return to if I have time). Almost immediately we came upon a pub that appeared to be open, so decided to take advantage. Or rather, attempted to take advantage. It seemed that although they were serving residents breakfast, they wouldn’t be serving the hoi polloi for another three quarters of an hour. So, we donned our backpacks and trudged on… for another twenty yards or so, where we found a tea shop that was open. I know, I know, you’re going to be terribly concerned that we might get embroiled in another debacle a la Gargrave. But no, they had a drinks fridge, and they had a picnic table with an umbrella. Sorted.
On with the hike though. We started our way up towards Great Shunner Fell. The whole day was to revolve around climbing it, then descending it, or so we thought. It was a long climb, but evenly graded as a result.
So we arrived at the summit in reasonable time, to be able to sit at the four-way shelter that had been built (and was there twenty years ago). The shelter has benches facing in four directions (eight if you want to be pedantic – imagine a cross with a bench on each side of each plane), so as to provide a walker with the option of sheltering from the wind wherever it might be coming from. As we ate lunch (first proper lunch we’ve had, due to the temperatures we’ve been “enjoying”), we met one chap out for a circular walk, and another chap in his twenties who seemed to be attempting to complete the Pennine Way in a few days with just a small daysack and an irritating amount of youthful energy.
The descent of Great Shunner Fell was almost textbook. A little rocky in places, a few ups and downs, but on the whole, we reached Thwaite (village at the foot of the fell) without too many issues. We discovered there was a tea room attached to the hotel / restaurant, so, as we only had a couple of miles to go, we popped in for a cool drink. This is where the second half of the hike started.
It may well have only been a couple of miles, but it may as well have been ten times that. After dropping from Great Shunner, we knew there was a bit of a climb back out of Thwaite. But we didn’t quite realise how much of a climb. We also thought, looking at the map, that it would be fields of grass, and not rocky outcroppings, followed by fly infested fern. The path just wound round a hill, such that we couldn’t see the village of Keld for an hour or more, during which we just kept our heads down and walked, sweating in the last efforts of the sun.
We got to our B&B just in time to be told that dinner would be available at Keld Lodge, over the road, but that they would stop serving food in half an hour. So we hurried up here, and had a delightful veggie lasagne. Coincidentally, this building (Keld Lodge) is that which used to house the youth hostel we stayed at twenty years ago.
Laundry – smelling like feet – I had engaged the services of Hawes youth hostel in washing my laundry (as it seems this is the way it was done, as opposed to members using the washing machine themselves). But when I received my laundry back again, it was damp, as if some form of liquid had been in contact with it, but it still smelled exactly the same…
Tomorrow – on to Bowes, and the halfway point.
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