Day 1: Land's End
Saturday
Full of pre-walk zeal I leave the B&B without taking a shower or having breakfast and walk along the Penzance promenade to the bus station. It's 06:20. I drop my pack and kill a few minutes photographing St. Michael's Mount on the camera I borrowed from my girlfriend's daughter but after only a few shots the device instructs me that's it's already reached capacity. I assumed it would be the battery that would give out, not the memory card. I pull it out, push it back in, turn the camera off and on, line up St Michael's Mount for a shot and - memory card full. I'm about to start a 900 mile walk with only a wide angle GoPro which is totally unsuitable for landscape shots, I need a point-and-shoot with a zoom; the camera is obviously broken or on a setting I don't know how to fix because I only used it for the first time the day before yesterday. I should have taken my own camera...now I'll have to spend thirty quid on a new memory card or carry the extra-dead weight and post it home which will cost me time and postage and the inconvenience of having to arrange for my back-up camera to be sent to the re-supply point at Tiverton which is five days away. Damn it! I turn the memory card over in frustration and accidentally find the problem: it says 64 MB, not 64 GB! It's way too small. Idiot! Hurriedly I unpack my yellow electronics drybag and replace the memory card with the 8 GB spare which is already half-full with West Highland Way photos but will have to do.
While I'm problem solving a female walker arrives at the bus stop, a tall slim Germanic type in waterproofs with a small day pack who appears to critically examine me and my bulky gear spread over the seat and floor. She's obviously not going out for more than a few hours. I know I shouldn't feel self-aware but I can't help it. I need to look organised, to look like I know what I'm doing. A toilet roll peeks mischievously from the top of my open pack; hurriedly I jam the yellow drybag on top of it and force it out of sight; naked toilet roll doesn't inspire confidence. Keep it together, Sam. Keep it together.
I pack everything away, cinch it tight and look out across the bay. As I'm calming myself I feel both gel toe protectors slide off my little toes and come to rest under my front feet where I mash them uncomfortably on every step. I heeded my girlfriend's advice and decided to use toe protectors for my blister-prone little toes. She's been using these for ages but stupidly I didn't bother to field test them before Day 1 or even ask her how she fitted them, instead relying on my own initiative to figure it out on the trail. The sensation of loose lumpy gel sleeves swimming around under my feet is unbearable so I have to remove my boots and socks at the bus station while under close observation from the other walker, re-fit the toe protectors, put on my socks and boots and hope everything stays in place while accepting that without tape, it won't. So I pretend I've fixed the problem. I'll take my boots off when I've got off the bus and no one's looking.
I'm so wrapped up in my problems when the bus arrives I realise I've forgotten to bring any spare change. The fare is £5.20, not £5 as I'd assumed. I rummage around in my pockets looking for 20p which I know isn't there while the walker waits behind me thumbing her travel card. I have to part with two £5 notes. The driver gives me a £4.80 credit voucher instead of usable money. So the £5.20 fare costs me a tenner. Ouch.
But the slow bouncing ride out of Penzance silences those problems as the A1 revs its way towards Land's End. I start to recognise the landscape, place names, roads and lanes from photographs, other LEJOG journals, my travels through this area in Google's Street View and from features on the map. It feels exciting. I smile.
The bus noses over the first or last hill in the country and reveals the famous headland and the low, flat-looking Land's End tourist centre. One sees this from about two miles away and it captures my attention as we approach and individual features on the building become identifiable. What makes it special is that the land gets narrower and more peninsular-like until it rounds off and gives way to the sea. The land obviously ends here - or begins.
The bus stops at a pebble car park about a hundred yards from the entrance. I thank the driver and alight into the muggy overcast morning.
The place is deserted. I start taking photographs outside the Land's End tourist complex and walk through the entrance to explore the piazza of tourist buildings, chip kiosks, tack shops and doughnut cabins. I discover a blown-up picture of Brian Blessed dressed as a pirate near a retired red rescue helicopter mounted on a pole. I'm looking for the sign. It's not immediately obvious where it is. I walk beyond the shopping village and round a corner between the hotel and a cafe where the path broadens out onto a patio above the cliffs. There's a small round booth here with a pointed roof - this is the official signpost operator. It's 07:25 and there's no one home.
There are two signs. The signpost operated by the booth owner is dismantled when the official photographer is not in residence and is merely a white post mounted on a stone block. There is a backup sign next to the official sign - a simple white post with two finger markers; one points to New York at 3,147 miles and the other to John O'Groats at 874 miles. Atop the post is a white circle saying Land's End 2017. I take six photographs of the Land's End sign, three with myself in front of it. I try three different expressions - what I actually look like (stern and terrible), a forced smile which doesn't qualify and a better attempt at smiling that satisfies the minimum requirements of quality control.
Because I'm at the LE part of LEJOG and it's early I have a nose around the deserted booth. There's a cart secured inside the door displaying photographs of past LEJOGers - there's a lady with a bed which I believe she pushed all the way to the end, a chap sitting on a penny farthing bicycle, a Dalek from Dr. Who...it makes my attempt feel rather tame in comparision.
I make a few comments into my dictaphone although my voice log is cut short when two cyclists arrive and ask me to take their photograph with the sign - I'm happy to oblige. They're about to start a long distance ride back to Leeds. They ask me if I was going all the way on foot - the first time I've been asked that question while on the trail. Nervously I say yes. They ask me how long it's likely to take and I reply 'About 5 weeks.' We wish each other good luck. I didn't get their names.
Before I set off I remove my boots and socks and stuff the toe protectors into a back pocket. I will need to tape them onto my feet so they won't slide off but I judge that rummaging through the medical kit for tape, applying tape and going through the boot fitting process again will be too inconvenient to do right now so I push that task back to the next sit down stop, whenever that might be. So I risk blisters that have crippled me in the past and which could at least slow me down and make the first few days of my LEJOG unnecessarily painful, hard and slow going, and I push off.
I start my LEJOG attempt at 07:30. As soon as I start walking back up the A30 away from Land's End a wave of satisfaction and uplifting joy washes over me. I thought I would be daunted by the challenge. It feels wonderful. It feels like I've let go of something heavy and I am finally free. I wasn't expecting that - I do not feel daunted by the challenge at all. Maybe it's because the challenge is too big to comprehend, like the universe or an unseeable number like one hundred billion, and because I can't imagine it, it doesn't affect me. Perhaps it's because I have now begun and every step is shortening the distance between me and the end. Or it could be the post hangover euphoria playing up. I don't know. All I know is, it feels good to start the walk.
When I planned today I decided to walk up the A30 as far as Crows-an-Wra, a roadside hamlet about four miles from Land's End, and join the local footpath network for a less dangerous hike back to Penzance. The pavement continues for about a mile and a half into Sennen where I find a Cost Cutter open at 08:00. I buy two litres of water and a breakfast sandwich. I would normally consider this to be junk food and avoid it, however, different rules apply for LEJOG and convenience food quickly replaces organic whole food as the primary source of nutrition [I'm sorry, body].
Further on the pavement stops abruptly and leaves me walking on the roadside just as traffic picks up. There isn't much of it but it is fast. This is an A road. I need to pay attention, ignore the plane landing at the airport nearby, ignore the brightly painted open top tractors being driven to what I presume is an agricultural show, ignore the smoking hedgerow where hot embers have been dumped randomly on the roadside and have smouldered their way into the bushes for an unknown reason, ignore all the first splashes of rain and concentrate. Most of the traffic is heading away from Land's End and it mostly looks like tourists. I get debris in my boots becuase I fail to wrap my walking socks over the tops of my boots and curse myself for this oversight which I am forced to ignore. Traffic gets heavier. I make sure I dodge it. The road is dry but the verge is wet. I'm glad I chose boots instead of running shoes which would get soaked after a few steps through long wet verge grass. I criss-cross the road to negotiate blind bends, thumbing cars and caravans by me when I can see the road ahead is clear, trying to do my bit as a responsibe road user.
The forecast for today is heavy rain and the first shower begins in earnest on the outskirts of Crows-an-Wra. It falls vertically, not sideways - there is no breeze. It's too mild and muggy for a rain coat so I walk under the umbrella for ten minutes until I find a bus shelter in Crows' where it's dry and off the road. I pull my rain cover over my pack and examine the map to orientate myself for the first footpath section. I've heard all the warnings from LEJOGers past and present about impassable Cornish footpaths, how many walkers prefer tackling the A30 all the way to Penzance instead of hacking their way through undergrowth or sludging through bogs and puddles of cow shit. I know all about that. I also know I'm afraid of road walking. It's dangerous. People die on roads. I'd rather beat my way through thorns and nettles than face the firing line of oncoming traffic.
The footpath entrance is a few yards further up the road. It's waymarked. The grass is worn into a trail where people have walked before. I feel confidant this is a right of way so I turn north. Five yards into the field I hear a noisy 4x4 drive past - I don't look back but I can hear the driver take his foot off the gas as he passes the field entrance and my heart sinks at the screech of tires. The vehicle, a black Jeep, reverses back along the A30, mounts the track and drives aggressively into the field beeping furiously to attract my attention. A shaven headed farmer with a tan stretching back through the years pulls up alongside me, leaning out the window. I prepare to return fire.
He smiles and says 'Hi there, you look a bit lost!'
I say, 'I think this is a public footpath, I saw a sign back there.'
He says 'Yes it is only not many people come up here.'
'I don't fancy walking along the road any further,' I say and nod at the A30.
'Where are you heading to?'
'I'm heading towards Brane,' I say, pointing at the map.
'Ah yes,' he says.
I then realise he's just trying to be helpful so I dismount from my defensive position. While I'm doing that I'm busily ignoring the directions he's giving me which probably would have been very useful, catching only 'That's Carn Euny up there, see the farmhouse?' I look out from under my umbrella and see a building partially hidden by trees on a slope in front of me. I nod. 'You'll get to Cardinney through the fields all right but I'm warning you the path from Cardinney Farm is gonna be a bit overgrown.'
I brush that warning off with a shrug and a smirk. 'No problem,' I say, 'I've got walking poles, they're good nettle bashers.'
He nods. 'Okay then, good luck!' and drives back towards the A30.
I walk on, thinking 'What a nice man' and promptly head the wrong direction across the overgrown muddy field and walk in a large horse shoe shape around the side of a farm house where I dearly hope no one is watching me the stupid umbrella holding tourist perform crappy navigation in the mud and rain until I find a gate without any waymarks and a vehicle track which I join that dumps me at the farm house back gate. The farmer is loading a pick up truck with furniture from an out building and not sure if I'm trespassing or not I ask if it's okay to walk through. He says 'Yeah, come through.' So I walk through the yard, sheepishly, referring again and again to map and compass to keep my bearings, and sure enough, on the other side, I find the entrance to the footpath, which is waymarked. The entrance is a giant muddy puddle squashed between two massively overgrown thorny hedges that disappears into a nettle bed. Sighing, I remove my pack and hunt around for the gaiters while trying to hold and stay under the umbrella which I eventually drop on the ground; the gaiters take a long time to put on because I do it wrong and spend ages doubled over with my hands in the mud trying to thread each strap through the buckles at my heel and eventually I manage it at the expense of being covered in mud and cow shit. I peer into the overgrown path and realise I have a serious task in front of me - bashing a way through. I deploy one of my walking poles and begin beating the nettles and thorns, slowly working my way into the path which I can only fit into while bent double. Once inside the green tunnel I'm able to push my way past the Cardinney caravan park to the end which opens out into a grassy field. I walk along the side of the field in a north easterly direction thinking I'm following the path, looking all the time for a style or gate or other means of getting through the impenetrable hedge and ditch to the field on the other side. There is no way through.
I end up walking around most of the edge of the field until I'm nearing the A30 again which is totally the wrong direction and...and I'm in the wrong field. I'm not lost but I am confused. Where the hell is the footpath? I have to back track a few hundred meters to the edge of the caravan site where I follow the course of the overgrown path on the map with the compass bearing and re-orientate myself with what's in front of me: a giant and completely impassable wall of thorns, brambles, nettles and trees. The path just disappears into fantasy. There's nothing for it but to beat my way back into the overgrown path and break my way through the thinnest part of the thorny hedgerow until I burst out into the adjacent field where I am able to walk along the other side of the hedge. Unless there's a way out here I'm stuffed and will have to retrace my steps all the way back to the road. Most fortunately there is a bridge over the ditch and a gateway through the hedge exactly where the map suggests there should be. Next to the gate I find an almost rotted away waymarker laying on its side and I'm able to work out that the overgrown area between the two hedges is actually my path, so I follow it uphill for a short distance until I come out on the lane I was looking for.
My relief reaches the point of ecstasy. I have successfully negotiated my first Cornish footpath. It dimly occurs to me that if the rest of my journey will be like this, Day 1, Section 1 and LEJOG as a whole will take considerably longer than I'd planned, but I brush this inconvenience aside, confidant that I've simply lucked out, that this particular choice of path has been unfortunate, that the warnings from other LEJOGers about overgrown and unusable mid-summer Cornish footpaths were warnings that apply to others and will not apply to me. And I carry on.
I carry on a short distance before becoming disorientated when I meet a couple driving up a farm track and stopping to sort out rubbish into wheelie bins. I don't want to appear lost or stupid so I check the map which says I should be joining another footpath near here and I decide it must be either the farm track itself or a badly way-marked path behind the car. So I greet the couple, enquire about the path - they happily confirm there is indeed a path in the field between the lane and the track - and I decide it must be the right one. There is a skinny timber kissing gate, badly overgrown. I head straight for it. I can't fit through without removing my backpack so I have to climb over the top. In order to not look fat and stupid I re-deploy my walking pole while balancing on the gate and start to beat back the unruly plants, one of which is a giant and very beautiful fuchsia in full bloom. During this manoeuvre the gentleman remarks, 'Ah, it looks like you've done this before' by way of a compliment and it is true, I look like an experienced hiker, and because the lower planks of the fence have rotted through the timbers snap and a second later I crash through the nettles and thorns and hit my arse on a rock. I wince in pain. I pull myself up unsteadily trying to make it look as though it had all been planned, leant on my walking pole and felt it give way underneath me. It's bent in two. The car doors slam shut. The couple drive away. They must have seen my fall. They might have sped off to avoid causing me any further humiliation. I'm glad they went because I immediately see that I have gone the wrong direction and must climb back over the rotten fence. I'm so damn angry I rip off the rotten planks with my bare hands and smash them repeatedly against the fence posts before throwing them into the hedge. I pick up my broken walking pole and break it in two, and toss the bits over the hedge. How could I have made such an elementary mistake? I don't know but it's really pissing me off. What's more I've fallen on the expensive camera in my back pocket and injured my butt - it feels like I have literally kicked my own arse. An apple-sized bruise swells up on my left butt cheek. Blood flows from a cut somewhere on my leg, I don't see where.
The only travel companion I can complain to is my dictaphone. I vent into this innocent electronic device with much enthusiasm and the air around me turns blue for a while. When the haze clears I reflect on my first navigational challenge. I did good work tackling the obstruction and bringing myself out onto this lane where I want to be. Then I fucked up by taking the wrong route which cost me a walking pole and falling on my arse possibly injuring myself, so that takes a couple of points away. I think I'm about even, points-wise. I give myself a pass.
My reward is on top of the hill where I can see down into Penzance Bay. Rain clouds are rolling over St. Michael's Mount which is smudged in grey. There are patches of clear weather ahead but they are outnumbered. The last forecast check was yesterday at 2 PM in Basingstoke. It said I'd have a clear day broken by a mid-afternoon rain storm that will last until dark. Already there's been more rain than expected.
I look at my watch: it's 10 o'clock. It was 08:45 when I left Crows-an-Wra. Since then I've only come as far as a little bit after Brane which isn't very far at all - hardly a mile and a half. That's how long it took to get through those obstacles. Not good. I'm paying the price for taking a much safer route than the A30. Those paths would be impassable without walking poles, gaiters and four season boots. Are all the local footpaths going to be like this, I wonder?
Originally I planned to avoid central Penzance and the thick orange line highlighted on my map has me marching straight through the eastern edge of town. However, in light of recent events, I need to buy replacement gear so I modify my route. The walk into Penzance is straightforward using country lanes. I stop at a bus shelter about a mile out to swap my boots for running shoes to give my toes a break. I've never swapped footwear on a walk before, I've always just relied on a solid pair of walking boots. This is the first time I've used running shoes for long distance walking; I have no idea how they'll hold up or how my feet will adjust to them, having only ever worn them for an hour at a time in my pre-LEJOG life. They're also brand new, out of the box, haven't been broken in. I'm breaking a lot of basic rules on Day 1: don't try anything new (toe protectors, camera, buying water en route instead of carrying, running shoes) and don't wear new shoes. How this all works out, I'll soon see.
I'd familiarised myself with the layout of the town last night and it's easy to re-locate the Wetherspoons, a pub called the Tremenheere which is well known by LEJOGers and the most westerly of all the Wetherspoons pubs. It's taken me a shade over four hours to walk 11 miles. Slow going. Before lunch I visit Millets and buy a replacement pair of telescopic poles and give the chap behind the counter my redundant walking pole as a gift. They are red and unintentionally match my backpack and the laces on my running shoes. Then to the pub for an all day brunch and a single pint of Thatchers Gold. I don't want to drink alcohol this early but I can't persuade myself to do otherwise. I call Sarah to let her know I've reached my first objective. I then spend a moment reflecting on my first bite of LEJOG. To be perfectly honest, I could spend the rest of the day in the pub drinking cider contentedly and avoiding the rain. But the distance walker in me can't do that. I'm not even half way towards where I need to be; if I don't push off I won't stand a chance of reaching the Severn Bridge in 10 days.
I re-join the promenade from this morning, walk through the bus station and head east through Longrock industrial estate which is not pleasing on the eye but is a quick route. Anyone who has walked here before will know there are two routes, the pretty traffic-free one along the beach and the crappy roadside route that I've chosen - although it does offer a generous view into the open end of Penzance train station.
 |
| Penzance bus station is next to the train station (off camera to the left) |
I stop at the nearby Morrisons to buy 3 litres of water adding an additional 3 KG to my pack which feels very heavy now and leads me again to question the logic of buying water en route instead of carrying 3 litres in my reservoir and have done with it.
I did my homework before walking this section; I wanted to use the quickest most direct route which is the A30 but I didn't want to risk my life so I checked this route for pavements using Google's Street View and luckily there is indeed a pavement all the way to Crowlas and St Erth. This involves walking by the side of the busy A-road up a great big hill which is loud and clouded by exhaust fumes and keeps going up and up for what seems like hours. I follow the road through Crowlas and Cannon's Town and eventually down the other side to Rose an Grouse and St. Erth where my train stopped briefly yesterday. I can see Carn Brae, the most significant hill in the area, with its ruined castle and stony monument. I got a good view of Carn Brae yesterday when my train was standing at Redruth station. Its austere castle perched upon the barren rock shrouded in mist, looming imposingly above the town. Here, the pavement ends. At St. Erth station I leave the A30 and re-join the lanes.
While passing through St. Erth village I chance upon a public convenience which proved to be excellent timing because the rain began in earnest. Off with the shoes, on with the boots and waterproofs. I've walked about 18 miles. There are 7 to go before my rough camp site at Killivose woods, a couple of miles south west of Camborne.
Walking the country lanes in the pouring rain is uneventful until Gwinear at about 21 miles. I take another caffeine gel in the shelter of a lych gate at Gwinear church. I've walked across map 1 of 46. I un-pack and get the other map ready, take a few photos and push on.
I walk through the wonderfully named Barripper - one doesn't tangle with the Bar Ripper - and because my attention lapses for a few moments I head in the wrong direction but mercifully I notice this by referring to my compass and avoid a significant back track. I've done that several times today. It's not a massive problem but all these slight extensions to my journey add up to unnecessary time on my feet.
After Barripper I reach the wonderfully names Knave-go-by and after that, my lush green soaking woodland. There is an equestrian centre and a well used road very close to my rough camping spot however the advantage of camping in a rain storm at 7 PM is that no one else is outside, nor will they emerge until tomorrow morning. Rain is a rough camper's friend, as is darkness. I find a comfortable spot between rhododendrons and tree trunks and set up my tarp. I'm out of practice and it takes a while to remember knots and angles and cordage lengths and so on, but eventually I'm snug as a bug in my bivvi. Being a single skin the tarp will wet anything that touches it on the inside so I set it up high and because it's raining hard I stand the umbrella next to me to shield me from any splashbacks and to offer an additional dry space to stow my gear. It's been a while since I've tarped. I haven't done a fantastic job of setting it up and a puddle forms in the middle. These are potentially dangerous because they will over time expand to a point where the tarp cannot support their weight and will suddenly collapse and disgorge the water upon whatever is beneath that section of tarp. I have to use a walking pole to prod and poke it so it empties where I want it to and not on me.
It's nearly dark. I'm done for the day. Day 1 - complete. Progress was good although I was really tired towards the end, particularly the last two miles. I've walked about 25 miles today and I'm where I wanted to be. It took me 4 hours to get back to Penzance from Land's End and another 5 hours 40 to get here; not too bad, longer than I would have liked but that can't be helped.
Before getting too comfortable in my warm dry sleeping bag I rummage around in my drybags looking for the nutritional supplements I packed for this section of the walk; I need the works, BCAAs, whey protein and a recovery shake, plus an electrolyte drink. I turn my yellow drybag inside out, slide my hand around the bottom of the pack, in the pockets, inside the red drybag where I keep my spare clothes, in the hydration sleeve...nothing. Unbelievably have forgotten to pack my supplements on the section where I need them most. All I have is powder for a recovery shake and a bar of chocolate. That's dinner. Damn it.
Sarah and I text each other about Day 1. I write my blog update by tapping it into the tiny Nokia keypad which has a small word limit - it is impossible to explain my walk in any detail. Normally I'd write a lot more but I have no choice other than to be brutally succinct. I send it through and then I lie still listening to the rain banging down around me. It's been raining like this for 5 hours. Everything in Cornwall is wet apart from me.
Today's official blog entry:
"Bus A1, stand B. The fare is £5.20 Land's End was deserted at 07:15. I wandered through the leisure complex - donut bothy, chip shack, terrifying blown up face of Brian Blessed, helicopter on a stick - alone. The famous sign is on the far side. There are actually two signs. The one I took a selfie with and the one next to it, which is owned by the operator of a nearby booth (also deserted). It was disassembled. A couple of cyclists arrived and asked me to photograph them in front of the sign. They're cycling to Leeds. We wished each other good luck. And that was that; I didn't hang around. I started walking back along the A30 for about 4 miles until Crows-an-Wra. Then my first encounter with a Cornish footpath which I had to break my way through to find the lane to Brane (cost: 1 broken and 1 redundant walking pole; 1 fall off a gate). From there on it was a straightforward lane walk back to Penzance. I bought a new pair of poles and had lunch at the Tremenheer. Then the long and tedious but effective work of walking to St Erth by busy roads. When the rain came I hunkered down in my rain gear and marched on to where I wanted to be, a woodland to the south west of Camborne where I'm sheltering under my tarp. Stats: 25 miles. 9 hours 40. Map 1 of 46 completed."
Comments
Post a Comment