Day 14/Hike Day 12: Clay Bank Top to Glaisdale

We had yet another beautiful day on the moors: the sun was shining all day, which made the 19 miles pass by rather quickly. It's hard to believe tomorrow is our last day of hiking, although the glimpses we caught of the sea today certainly made it look rather close!

We started with another hearty breakfast at the Wainstones Hotel. Things are starting to get interesting at this point in the hike...although we did not order the Walker's Porridge, the gentleman sitting next to us ordered it without the porridge, and we all got a pretty good chuckle from that.

Our hike started with a steep ascent up to Carr Ridge, which was made all the better by a large herd of Belted Galloway cattle gathering below the ridge.

The sunshine and the pheasants guided us onward until we reached the top, after which it was smooth sailing over well-maintained paths through more of the beautiful and rugged moors.

There were some fun ancient stone carvings along the trail today: we grabbed a quick selfie with this particularly smiley rock before heading on to our lunch destination, the Lion Inn. The lnn is right on the trail, and also along a rather desolate road, but was nonetheless packed with locals when we arrived right at noon. We grabbed some drinks and a quick lunch while chatting with the nicest gentleman next to us, who told us the Inn dates back to the 1600s. He also told us he could tell it wasn't going to rain on us today (rain was in the forecast later in the afternoon). I believed in him more than I would ever believe in any weather forecaster, and naturally, he was spot on.

I told you things started to get interesting today...another highlight of the trail was our visit to Fat Betty! Fat Betty is yet another old stone sculpture located right off the path, but she is a special one! The Coast-to-Coast tradition requires that you leave a food offering and take one, so we did just that. There were many tasty options (fudge, dried fruit, nuts, granola bars, mints, etc.) but only a few of them were wrapped, so I feel like my trade of gummies for the Rx Bar was an ideal (and healthy!) one.

Up the trail a little later, Dad and I kept noticing large numbers of grouse (their near-constant cakcling makes them hard to miss). However, we were quite surprised when we came across not one but two grouse hunting parties, which were not actively shooting but had taken a break for lunch. These, however, are not the camoflauge-clad hunters we have in the states, no sir. These gentleman were dressed to the nines: shirt and tie, full wool suits with woolen vests and woolen hunting caps. My biggest regrets today were a) Not asking to take their picture and b) Not asking if any of them were a Lord of something. Dad and I literally had to hold in our laughter until we passed them, they were dressed so outrageously British. I had to steal this picture from the internet, but this was literally them. Except SOME of the gentlemen today had the Sherlock-Holmes style hats on. And no, this wasn't some kind of historical reproduction or movie shoot. It was real.

On the bright side, I DID manage to sneak a quick pic of the hunting dogs they brought along, taking a well-deserved rest after a hard day's work.

Just a few more miles (and lots more grouse...these guys may have looked the part, but they apparently were not very good shots), we reached Glaisdale and our destination for the night, The Arncliffe Arms. I saw they had a Hawaiian pizza on the menu here tonight, and I may just have to try it.

One (of many) surviving grouse

Until tomorrow, when I will write you from the sea!

Kelsey and Brian

Step Count: 37,687

Miles Hiked Today: 18.8 miles

Elevation: 1191 ft

Time Hiking: 5 hours, 53 minutes

New UK Breeds Seen Today:

I *think* that cute little brown dog in Rover with the labs was an English Field Spaniel. Regardless, she was super cute so she deserves a shout-out here :)