A walk across the North of England – Day 15
Today is not good. We’re feeling pretty rough and decide to use quiet lanes and disused rail trails to shorten our route to St Bees. Coughing fits force us to stop now and again but we eventually find a village shop which might sell some sort of cold remedies. Turns out the first shop we’ve seen in six days only sells sweets and those right-wing tabloids which are such a popular form of entertainment in England. Remedyless, but with a packet of mints, we make it to the beach at St Bees where we sit on the pebbles and look out over the misty sea at a total absence of landscape. It’s possible to see the Isle of Man and the Irish coast on a clear day. We sit for a while and contemplate the journey, then haul ourselves to the railway station.
Three trains, two positive RAT tests and one car trip later and we’re isolating in Wales for a week. Not the last day we’d hoped for, but that’s how things go and, if a journey like this is some sort of metaphor for life, then it seems a pretty appropriate finale.
Thanks for staying with us for the duration. Hope you enjoyed the trek.
Oh, and if you Instagram, you could follow me @lars_stenberg_paintings for more outdoorsy (and current) arty fun.
St Bees Beach, 2022, digital image.
