Miles to Go - Day Thirteen

 Tuesday 13th July 2021

After a couple of days of idling, I thought that it was high time that I got back to doing some walking.  Nonetheless, as my feet were still aching a little from last week’s all-day walk – not blistered, but with an ache in the muscles of my feet – pitching straight back into another all-day walk seemed a bad idea.  So instead, as I had run out of milk anyway, I decided to split things up, with a walk into Gurney Slade in the morning to buy milk, followed by cooking several days’ worth of Bolognese sauce as a quick meal with pasta, followed by another walk in the afternoon.

The walk to Gurney Slade was pleasantly sociable.  My friend Doom Metal Singer had plans that morning, but I chatted to several other people I met along the way: a man cleaning off a wet Labrador dog after a walk in Harridge Wood; a friend who told me about growing basil from a cutting in a glass of water; neighbours whose gooseberry-garden I admired, who reassured me that the fruit bushes I had bought last autumn would flower and fruit next year once they had settled in; and a new neighbour who had moved to this area just before the first lockdown, and hadn’t really had much chance to get to know anyone.  We exchanged phone numbers, and agreed to meet once I had finished my sponsored walk.

I decided that if I was starting my afternoon walk at four o’clock, a reasonable length if I wanted to be back by eight would be four miles.  As I had meant to include Clapton on the route of my previous walk, and had needed to cut it out for lack of time, I decided to head there now.

The first stretch of the walk, along the sloping pasture between Benter Cross and Blacker’s Hill, with Middle Wood above me and the stream below, was muddy but pleasantly familiar and uneventful.  When I set out, the cattle had not yet come there to graze, but the pathway across the meadows was thick, sticky mud stamped with bovine hoofprints, and the areas around the stiles where I entered and exited were softer, blacker mud.

Next I headed up Coalpit Lane.  The banks on either side were full of tiny but very red wild strawberries.  I picked one, and it was sweet and ripe, but Coalpit Lane is not a good place to forage.  It is very busy for a single-track road, and I constantly had to flatten myself against the hedge as cars or pickup trucks came past.

I wanted to explore footpaths instead of relying on roads, so I took a path across the fields to Chilcompton.  The route was easy enough to find and to walk on, as this was just plain grass that didn’t mind being trodden on. 

Emboldened by this, after Chilcompton I decided to take another path across three fields from Green Ditch Lane to Langley’s Lane, which involved going diagonally across two fields and in an L-shape round a third.

The first field was some kind of grass that looked like a crop that shouldn’t be trodden on, but it was easy enough to walk round the edge instead of literally following the diagonal path on the map.  The second field was wheat, planted, if not right to the edges of the field, at least to a dense border of weeds, without leaving much room for walkers.  Previous walkers had trampled down a row of wheat a short way into the field, so I tried to follow that, so as not to damage any more of the crop than had already been damaged.

By the time I was out of the wheat, which took quite some doing, I had to cross what was probably supposed to be a stile, but looked like a mass of nettles. 

In fact, when I looked more closely, I could see that it was two stiles a few feet apart, both covered in nettles.  As I don’t walk with a stick, I did my best to beat the nettles down with my boots and a folded-up map.  I had put my jacket on during a brief shower earlier, and had been wondering whether to take it off, but now I was glad of the protection.

By the time I had crossed the two stiles, I was starting to wonder whether I was meant to be coming this way at all.  Yes, there were Public Footpath signs on the stiles, but was it the footpath I wanted, or had I got my bearings wrong?  I reached for my compass, and realised that I had lost it.  It turned out to be back between the nettle-clad stiles, so I had to climb back over to retrieve it. 

The last time I lost my compass (on a walk, as opposed to mislaying it around the house) it was hanging on a nettle, too.  Nettles, like many leafy green vegetables, are high in iron, so that could explain why a magnetic instrument is attracted to them, but I suspect that the compass just enjoys making my life difficult.

I was now in a small field, with another pair of nettle-covered stiles to traverse before I could move on.  I hoped that, at least, having beaten down the nettles so that the stiles and footpath signs were at least visible, I had made things marginally better for the walkers who came after me.

The third field was full of a crop which I eventually guessed was oilseed rape from the few remaining bright yellow flowers.  Around the edges were a formidable assortment of weeds: nettles to sting, tall thick-stemmed plants (docks, I think) to be tough and difficult to kick aside; and goose-grass to tie the weeds to the crop, leaving no pathway to walk down. 

I tried taking my camera out to record the jungle, but it was getting bored and taking ‘creative shots’ in unusual colour combinations again,
so I let it play around for a bit and then stuck it back in my bag before I set about shoving a way through the foliage. 
After all, it is impressive that I can get effects on modern cameras by accidentally pressing the wrong button that in my childhood I could get only by accidentally dropping my holiday disposable camera in the sea.

Boots and a map wouldn’t deal with this path; I shouldered my way through with my whole body.  I was warm and sweaty under my jacket, but had no intention of taking it off; I just wished I had thick leather gloves on as well, as my hands were getting decidedly nettled.  In spite of my jacket, weed seeds were finding their way uncomfortably inside my T-shirt, and I narrowly escaped having a woodlouse there too, which would not have been at all pleasant for the woodlouse.

I hoped that I was leaving a better path for the next walker, but I hoped this was a public right of way and I wasn’t just trespassing after misreading the map.  When I reached the road and found a signpost clearly stating ‘public footpath’ I felt vindicated as well as sweaty and seedy.

I had taken an hour and a half to walk the past mile and a half, and didn’t have time for any more adventures, so I decided to come back by road, apart from repeating the first/last stage of the journey across well-known meadows.  The cattle were out by now and staring at me, so I decided to let the camera play with them.

I’ve never seen a purple cow,

Nor ever yet a green one.

But I can tell you anyhow,

I’m glad I’ve never been one. 

Miles walked today: 12 (4 in the morning going to Gurney Slade and back, and 8 in the evening exploration)

Total miles: 116

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