the grind – 22 sep, 2018
Day 44 Land’s End to John O’Groats – near Corrie Common to Moffat
Distance: 29km
Cumulative distance: 1124km
Across the Atlantic Ocean running roughly south to north up the eastern side of the USA is a (very) long-distance hike called the Appalachian Trail. It’s the most popular of America’s so called ‘Triple Crown of long-distance walks (alongside the Pacific Crest Trail and the Continental Divide Trail), and traverses 14 of the lower 48 states. At about 2190 miles or 3500km long, it’s twice as long as the path I have mapped out from Land’s End to John O’Groats. A few months ago I heard someone hiking the AT say the trail can be split into thirds. The first third is physical, the second is mental, and the final stretch is nutritional.
I could apply a similar template to my walk, although I figured it was probably a bit too short and not remote enough for nutrition to become a serious problem. I’d eaten heartily if not exactly healthily along the way, and been taking vitamins with breakfast whenever I remembered, just to help supplement whatever I wasn’t taking in otherwise. I’d also seemingly overcome the physical challenges – the blisters were a thing of the past, my knee troubles subsided two weeks ago, and I’d adjusted to all of the other aches and pains that come with regularly punching out 30km in a day. The next major challenge it seemed was going to be mental. I’d done well over 1000km by this stage, but was still not quite even two thirds of the way through. The Lake District had been beautiful and thoroughly enjoyable walking, but I was starting to settle into the grind of southern Scotland. Yesterday was slightly bizarre – the wind turbines had provided an unsightly final few hours – and today I faced endless miles of road walking as I headed for Moffat. Don’t get me wrong, I was still enjoying the adventure and keenly looking forward to catching up with a few mates in Glasgow, but there was plenty of ground still to cover before I could get there. And the south of Scotland was a lot more barren and sparsely populated than anywhere I’d walked so far. This was one disadvantage of walking on my own – there wasn’t a partner who could offer the motivation and encouragement required to help you across 12 miles of unbroken road walking. The mental battle was starting to crank up a notch or two.
As always seems to be the case, it rained just before dawn ensuring I would once again be carrying a wet tent with me today. I’d slept on and off for almost 12 hours last night despite the incessant noise from the nearby wind turbine, and didn’t have too much trouble with the punctured sleeping mat on the relatively soft ground. It was noticeably colder though – I had to sleep in my sleeping bag inner and a thermal long-sleeved singlet, and that just about did the job. Once I’d packed up I resumed on the path beside the burn which took me across farmland, away from the towering wind turbines and finally back to a road and a smattering of civilisation. The map suggested I walk down the road for a little while and then cross a farm, so that’s exactly what I attempted. That plan started off reasonably well as I followed a dirt track up a small hill to a few fields, but the path soon petered out and once again I was left to blindly navigating across the farm. Off in the distance I could see a farmhouse and a fella on a quad bike rounding up a few cows. In the other direction was a herd of about 20 cows with a burly bull standing guard. I aimed at neither, jumping over a fence instead and heading back down a hill which I soon discovered led only to another burn slicing its way between a few fields. Dead end. I came back up the hill, jumped the fence once more and marched towards the cattle which had gathered in front of a gate I figured might lead me somewhere productive. The big bull eyed me off from afar, but as I marched closer to the herd they conveniently eased backwards a fraction, giving me enough room to scale the gate. I looked back and they were back where they started watching me carefully and wondering what the hell I was doing, just like the farmer off in the distance on his quad bike.
I walked along for a little while and up ahead spied a dry stone wall and what looked like a road on the other side. The problem was there was about 200m of unavoidable boggy ground between me and the road. Every step through the long grass produced a disconcerting squelch and I concentrated intently looking for the harder mounds of mossy ground which would support me. Incredibly I mis-stepped only once, sinking into the ground enough to soak my boot all the way through. Once I was across the bog land I followed the dry stone wall to a gate, and escaped the farm at long last.
I stopped briefly for morning tea at Corrie Common (there was no cafe in the village as I’d forlornly hoped), then walked four miles along the road down to the particularly well named Boreland. There was no cafe here either, and not even a shop which surprised me. I filled up my water bottle in a cemetery then went and sat outside the village hall for a spot of lunch, which was exactly the same as morning tea – nutella wraps. I’m tipping they don’t get many tourists coming through here, it had a real middle-of-nowhere type feel to it. There was a school and one or two BnBs and that was about it. I suspect I won’t be back any time soon.
Just out of town there was a sign telling me I had 12 miles to Moffat. That was a fairly daunting assignment, but on the bright side it was sunny and the views from this road of Scotland’s southern hills were absolutely delightful. The road was also fairly quiet so I didn’t have to worry too much about dodging traffic. I lapped up the miles at a fairly decent pace, and went past countless farms through a tiny little village called Wamphraygate (what a great name). I went past a dead badger and saw an aerial bird fight that had about 100 participants, then passed more farmland and pretty houses before finally crossing a river and entering Moffat. Finally, a proper town! Moffat has about 2500 people but it felt like a capital city. There were pubs here (including the narrowest hotel in the world), cafes, grocery stores, a rugby team and even a fudge shop. I fronted up to the campsite and indicated I was interested in pitching my tent at their establishment for the evening. The lady in charge took my name, before the laborious process of extracting my address began.
“Can I just get your house number?”, she began, and I obliged wondering why she was keen on such a precise piece of information.
“And your street name?”
Then it was “And just your postcode please?” They love a postcode in the UK, and I was only too happy to part with mine.
“Whereabouts do you live?”
“And what state is that in?”
“Ahh that’s in Australia.”
Clearly the word address had never been injected into her vocabulary.
I pitched up my wet tent at a fairly large campsite, took the opportunity to have a shower then went and checked out the Star Hotel which is just 6m wide. After watching Spurs beat Brighton, one of the locals told me of a place up the road which did a cracking feed so I took myself along and ordered two main courses in preparation for tomorrow where I would be walking a section of the daunting Southern Upland Way.
