Goodbye to big town Richmond.
The sewage treatment plant, one of the big sights on today's hike.
This day has no outstanding features, except that we said goodbye to Jonathan, who had to return to the U.S. There are no dramatic fells, no sudden sight of a wide, green dale, no bleak and imposing moor. What it does have is 14 miles of road. And hail, thunder, lightning, and incredible amounts of sticky, gooey mud.
This is the first day that we've had truly horrid weather. As we were standing around getting stoned by the pebble-sized hail, we had to laugh. Hail in May. We have been repeatedly told since we entered Yorkshire that the weather is unseasonable. No duh.
Since there are no great vistas or challenges -- except for the last mile -- we found ourselves walking down a country lane or a pasture, increasingly devoted to cows instead of sheep, with our minds wandering and thinking deep thoughts. For instance, almost every town has a distinctively brewed ale. It has a peculiar name, like "Old Peculiar." Maybe it's my surroundings, but I immediately thought that if I had an ale, it would be named "Big Muddy Boots." Then I'd have an ale that would change from a light to darker color as it sat there. I would name that "You Think Your Socks Are Clean, But They're Not." (This is actually what Mary said as she washed her muddy socks for the second time a few days ago.)
There's a note on the map in the guidebook that labeled a path as "muddy." We know from previous experience what that means: big time muddy. This time it surpassed even our expectations. There was not a single blade of grass, leaf of weed, or root of tree to break the monotony of mud. With my walking sticks, I felt as though I was skiing as I slipped and slid down the path.
This was the second outstanding sight of today's walk, far and away better than the sewage treatment plant. Although the mystery of why the sewage treatment plant did not smell is intriguing.
Today's view was either a pasture or a country lane. This is the typical country lane.
And this was the hands-down winner of outstanding sight of the day: sheep playing soccer. We think their rules might be different than ours, with players lying near the goalpost to distract the opposing side. It seems to be working, as the opposition has forgotten about scoring and has gone quietly to sleep.
The storm, having writ large, has moved on to frighten other sheep and hikers.
That's hail at the edge of the grass, still there about 20 minutes after the storm passed.
After negotiating the mud path, several pastures, many country lanes, more pastures, another country lane or two, the sky darkened. We saw sheep run to stand in the shelter of the hedgerows. The wind gusted and big drops started to fall. The drops turned to small hail, which rapidly turned to pebble-sized hail that really stung when it hit our bare skin. Then a humongous thunderclap sounded right over us. Okay, we're not supposed to be by a tree if there's lightning, but we'll be darned if we'll let hail punch holes in our head. We decided to head quickly down the path and pretend nothing was happening. The path ran down the side of one of the hedgerows where some sheep were cowering. It was a miserable battle in their pea-sized brains about which was worse: the hail/lightning or us. We won. The sheep stampeded back to the middle of the pasture and collected a fair amount of hail on their backs. As far as we know, no sheep or hikers were harmed in the making of this storm. But now we were soaked (no rain pants) and the water had run down our pant legs into our boots.
The other advantage to wandering down the road with nothing spectacular to look at, I find myself listening and looking at the ordinary more carefully. There are beautiful wildflowers scattered all over the place: bluebells, buttercups, a pink thing, another blue thing, and the white flowers of wild garlic. The birds are singing like crazy. There are nests on many of the trees. A heron pauses to let us almost take its picture. Six bunnies sit on a highly manicured lawn in front of a modern mansion.
But nature can be vicious. Besides "Mud Path," we wandered through "Prickly Lane." Within a short space (maybe 100 feet) there were nettles, thistles, holly, gorse, and hawthorne, all things that sting, jab, prick, and stab. It was a prickly convention. Ducking and dodging became a matter of survival.
The day mostly wasn't as miserable as I'm making it sound, it mostly was just ordinary. Until the last mile.
We actually are not staying in Danby Wiske, but about a mile and a half out of town at a place called "Lovesome Hill Farm." We were sent instructions on how to get to the B&B using a "shortcut." I put "shortcut" in quotations because that it was not. Supposedly there was a footpath across several fields leading straight to the farm. We managed to find the start of the path, but then it petered out in one of the many fields that were planted with some kind of crop.We extemporized and wound up slogging through heavy mud, the kind that clung to our boots and made each foot weigh 20 pounds. Then we found ourselves in a field with no exit. Tantalizingly, I could see the farm on the GPS and the right footpath one and a half pastures away. We clambered over a fence, trespassing on someone's field to get back to the path. The GPS said it was just one more field over, but there were horses in that field and it just didn't seem right. I wanted to go back, but Tom had had enough, so we walked through someone's backyard and exited through their driveway. I was sure I could hear the police sirens. As we walked by the house next door, the one whose backyard I wanted to go into, a HUGE dog came barking over and placed its massive paws on the fence. It was salivating and its eyes were on fire. Food, he said, come here. Eek, we said, and walked quickly away. Close call.
So there we were:on a path up the bank on the side of a busy street -- I mean those cars were really moving -- and no visible means of crossing over. We couldn't see how to get down the bank either. And there was Lovesome Hill Farm. Right across the street. Right there. The sign said so. We could almost touch it. If our arms had been fifty feet long.
We looked up and down the path we were on and saw nothing that could help us out of our dilemma. The only thing we saw was an old gentleman, slowly toddling along with the help of two canes. What could he do to help us? He saw us looking around, and immediately sussed out our problem. He pointed to right where Mary's foot was and said, "You go down that path to the highway. Careful crossing over." Sure enough there was a path hidden in the grass. We never would have found it. Never underestimate where your help may come from. And never underestimate how much 20 pounds of mud attached to your shoes will slow you down as you play "Frogger" over a highway.
Ree-bit. We made it across.
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