Day 7 Roker to Dalton Piercy (somewhere near Hartlepool)

Managed to get here, though it took 10 hours, without a map - just had a A to Z with a scale of about 1mm to 1o mile. Aven't a clue how to get to Stockton On Tees tomorrow though.

Day 6 - Whitley Bay to Roker

More like this one please! Got the train across the river Tyne and then a nice easy stretch to Roker, which is on the outskirts of Sunderland and surprisingly nice. Hats off to Tynemouth for also leaving a good impression on me, with its castle, priory and magnificent monument to some local chap (who took place in the battle of Trafalgar and lived to tell the tale). Was glad to leave Whitley Bay in the end, save for “The Fat Ox” pub, it’s all a bit sad really, with rather too many boarded up, and derelict beach front buildings, it looks a bit pitiful to be honest, and is even outshone by South Shields.
I’ve been sat up all night worrying about tomorrow, it’s 22 miles (absolute mimimum), and without a proper map for this part of the journey, I’m probably looking at a disaster here.

Day 5 - Ashington to Whitley Bay

Well, how’s about that then guys and gals! Managed the whole trip of around 15 miles, without walking around in circles, going in the wrong direction for hours on end and staring at the map as if it were a Chinese telephone directory. From Ashington I headed south to Beddlington, east across to Blyth and picked up the coast road down through Seaton Sluice (however you pronounce that) then on to Whitley Bay. The weather was a bit dodgy though and the gorilla had to don his cagoule for an hour or so which was like being sat in a sauna in a duffle coat and wrapped in cling film, - was mightily relieved when the rain ceased a couple of miles from the end. Met up with girlfriend Nikki for a couple of nights R and R, before I head for Roker on Monday.

Day 4 - Lesbury to Ashington

Well, there’s another belter, - I’d written down today’s walk as 13 miles in my little book but somewhere along the line I’d mistaken a 3 for an 8, because this one turned out to be 18 miles. That’s 18 miles minimum, and if I’d have gone down the coast road, you’d have never seen me again. So I had to go directly to Ashington the quickest way which was all the way down the A1068. This meant walking mainly on the grass verge dodging on coming traffic, which was not nice, they simply aren’t designed to be walked on with their thick spongy grass and little pot holes acting as man traps and I stumbled along for mile after mile like a drunken woman in stilettos. The highlight of the day was when I stopped for a banana and to re duct tape me toes.

For the first time I wasn’t panicking about getting lost though so had to amuse myself by talking to no one in particular and singing (my radio packed up 2 days ago).
If you had ever cause to write home, Ashington would not be the cause of it, but the campsite about 2 mile away is excellent, and just as well as I’ve got a day off tomorrow! – might go to Newbiggin-By-The-Sea which is where I should be anyway (I’m about 4 mile from the coast here). Need to do some washing an all – me socks have just had me in a head lock.

Day 3 - Beadnell Bay to Lesbury

After looking at the map I decided that today it would be impossible to get lost as the coast road went all the way to Lesbury, surely even I couldn’t find any woods down there. Anyway, after 10 minutes the path led to the beach and confused the life out of me. I did a detour and ended up down a private road over looking someone’s garden, the somewhat frosty woman put me right and sent me on my way, exactly 10 minutes later I appeared at her garden once more. – What is it with me wanting to walk in circles all the time?! – think I’ll get a check up when I get home as I think that maybe I’ve got one leg longer than the other.
And so another walk that should have been about 4 hours turned out to be 7! – my estimates as to the distances are turning out to be grotesquely inaccurate and the last couple of hours today were pergutory as I battled the blisters incurred after yesterdays fiasco. What I didn’t realize when I planned this was how much more the treading the coastal paths add to journey times, I turn up everywhere late which means I don’t have the strength or the inclination to look round and have a nosey at these places.
The gorilla collected £1:50 in donations today as he came through Craster (another place you’ve never heard of), 3 different couples giving 50p each, add to that the woman from “Brock Mill Farm” giving me a fiver (cos I left before breakfast) and a bacon sarney, and you can see I’m going great guns. Todays comments, - from an elderly chap sat on a wall “Woof Woof” (no, me neither), and a well to do woman who said “We could see you coming towards us and from a distance we thought that maybe you were a Bee Keeper”

Day 2 - Beal To Beadnell Bay

Well that was a laugh, a 16 mile walk that turned out to be a 25 mile mystery tour – and took 9 hours! – but it was a nice day. It was hot alright, and after 10 minutes sweat was pouring off the end of me nose and dripping out of the end of the gorilla mask – via the nostril. From a distance it must have appeared that the old boy was suffering with a heavy cold.
When it appeared that I couldn’t walk along the A1 as originally planned I realized that it was going to be a longer walk than the 16 mile originally planned, I then decided to make the decision to shed the gorilla skin, the distance would now be beyond him, I felt bad about it but there was no way I could carry (or purchase) the water I’d need. He’s a big drinker.
My map reading skills are a joke – though not a very funny one, and I started as I meant to go on by passing the same workmen building a bungalow twice in 45 minutes. I’d actually thought I was getting better but now come to think of it, when I went to the passport office in Liverpool the other day I set off in the opposite direction and ended up in “China Town”. Then, I ended up in thick woodland – for a very long time. As I scrabbled through bracken and bobbed my head up over fences seeking out civilization it struck me that I’d made the right decision about going it alone – the gorilla would probably have ended up with tranquiliser dart up his arse. After about 7 hours I was running low on water and getting a bit edgy I hadn’t seen a single shop since Berwick and the sheer vastness of vegetation becomes un nerving at times like these. When I happened across the village of Bamburgh, the sight of the huge castle gave me a big lift – but not as much as the newsagents across the road – WATER!!! It was only the backpack digging into me aching bones that stopped me from doing a jig around the maypole.

Day 1 - Berwick To Beal

And we're off! - I bounded through the streets of Berwick-Upon-Tweed this morning hoping no one would see me, and though there were a few folk about I was largely ignored - in that marvellous English way, rather as if they woke up every day to the sight of some tosser parading down the high street in a gorilla suit and green hat. (I had originally attached a knotted hanky, but the clouds looked a bit threatening so I plumped for the paddy field job). There was the odd toot of a van's horn as they drove past me, but save for a little girl - "Mummy, what's that?" and a well spoken lady later on on the coastal path - "Excuse me, but can I ask what you're doing?" it was all quite painless really.

It's really remote up here mind and when I located the B and B I noted that there was no road or path leading up to it, just a small stream, and failing to hitch a ride on a Poo Stick, I had to walk all the way round, sticking another couple of miles on the journey. When I arrived there was nobody here, and I hung around for a bit before ringing a number I spied in the porch. "Oh, my wife doesn't get back until 4, just go inside - it's open (not a cat in hell's chance of a burglar finding this place - and the drive is a half a mile long!). After a quick shower, I went out to seek a shop, for I was starving. - No shops, no nothing, just vast, well...nothingness. In the end had a meal in a pub and bought 3 packets of salted nuts for me supper.

I haven't even seen Holy Island which is why I stayed here, by the time I got round to looking for it, it started throwing it down so I bid a hasty retreat and never ventured out again. Tomorow it's the 16 mile trek to Beadnell.

Hello Scotland!?

It's been that sort of week really, running around in circles for days on end getting nowhere fast and disappearing up between my own bum cheeks. After all the training, the preparation and the difference of opinion with the doctors receptionist, passport office security men, and another doctors receptionist, the upshot is that I still have my old passport (which runs out in 3 weeks), I am still as deaf as a post, and after today, coming close to the end of my tether - and I haven't started yet!

The train to Berwick-Upon-Tweed set off on time from York but after an hour we were half an hour behind schedule - I'm still trying to work that one out (I can't remember going backwards at any point). I thought I heard some bloke over the intercom say something about approaching Berwick, (athough everybody sounds like the teacher on Charlie Brown to me at the moment) it seemed to take a long time - a very long time. Thinking back now, it might have been that bit when we pulled up under a bridge, it was a very long train and the front end could have been in Berwick I suppose, anyway I ended up in Edinburgh with steam coming out of me ears - that didn't clear em either. Hilariously it cost me more to get back from there than it was to get fromWest Yorkshire to Berwick???

On the upside, it's very lovely round these parts and the weather seems set fair for the big off tomorrow morning.

Berwick-Upon-Tweed here I Come

Well, I've been back in England now a few days gathering together me trekking gear - and me thoughts, and it's been pretty damn fraught. My nerves have been shredded, partly because I'm walking around stone deaf cos nobody seems to have the time to stick a syringe full of luke warm water down me lug hole, and my attempts to renew the old passport have proved futile in the extreme. Added to this my sudden realization of the scale of the thing, and of the fact that lump on me back is a rucksack and not Doctor Who's tardis, and you have panic on your hands. Have been busy trying to cram everything in there, from bare essentials such as tent, sleeping bag, gorilla costume, sleeping mat, to all the extras like maps, torch, compass, towell, stove, clothes, toiletries etc etc etc. It's been a nightmare let me tell you, and hopefully I CAN tell you if I can get me Netbook (small laptop) to function in the next day or 2. If not, my posts will be limited to the odd time I come across a cyber caff - wish me luck as you wave me goodbye!

Sun Sets On "Groundhog Day"

Hallelujah! That´s my warm weather training over; - now bring on those gale force winds, driving rain and pure misery that is the English summer. I´m going to take tomorrow off, have a few beers for the end of season party at work (first time since St. George´s Day), nurse the inevitable hangover on Monday and then fly back home on Tuesday.
On the whole would have to say that the training has gone well, it wasn´t looking too clever a couple of weeks ago when I was riddled with blisters, the old shoulder was playing up to some tune, and me knees came up like a couple of plum puddings. Oh yes and I was covered in a heat rash even though the sun hadn´t been out for two days. I´ll miss these military style days in a strange masochistic type way. Getting up at 6am, packing up the rucksack with books and bottles of water (to about 15kg), greasing myself down with sun block, prising my eye lids open with the toothbrush and taping up me toes with Duct Tape (was costing me a fortune in plasters). Then it was out to do battle with Spanish speeding motorists ( coincided with kicking out time from the nightclubs around the corner) who hurled abuse while they hung out of their windows, waved their arms like hysterical owls and occasionally tried to run me over. Don´t ask me why. But there´s something about the sight of a bloke clad in a floppy hat and rucksack that drives yer average pissed up Spik into a rage. I think that maybe they think I´m some sort of homeless junkie (as they have no concept of backpackers in these parts), later confirmed when some toothless wonder stopped me today on my way home and asked me for a fag. – probably expected me to break out a clay pipe, offer him a swig out of me bottle of “Emperado” and a quick blow on me harmonica.
Did 21 miles today, the heat was relentless and I was suddenly looking forward to starting the real thing. The route I use is actually very pleasing on the eye, as you can see from me snaps, but I´ve been staring at the same roads for nearly 3 months now and I´m due a change – there´ll be a change alright – I´ve not been rained on once!

Hey! - I´ve Got Some New Gear.

It comes to something when the highlight of the week is buying a new rucksack! But there you are, the belt snapped on me other one so I´ve invested in a “McKinleys Grand Canyon 55” don´t you know. You see with the belt not working on the other one I was taking all the weight on the shoulders....(most people are fascinated by this), and that was bringing on the old injury from last year whereby I incurred a nasty twinge when I knocked the top off my boiled egg (or something equally mundane – the truth is I don´t know exactly know what happened). So anyway, I set off and after a few minutes I realized that the pain had miraculously disappeared from my right shoulder – and reappeared in the left one!? – These modern rucksacks are something else aren´t they, and not only that but after a few more minutes I was feeling heavy legged and doing a passable impersonation of giving Vanessa Feltz a piggy back to the fish shop. Then followed a tingling sensation in my thumb which then spread right the way up my arm – I thought that maybe I was having a heart attack, and briefly thought about lying down on the pavement and adopting the recovery position, - but it was only 7am and there was nobody about to recover me.
Training for this upcoming trek has been really hard graft if truth be known, mentally as much as anything. I set my alarm for 6am and drag myself out of bed cursing. – But cursing at who? – this was all my idea wasn´t it?, nobody is making me do this, it was a twenty miler today and it took me 7 hours – 7 bloody hours! The bare fact is I think I maybe going slightly simple, but I´m enjoying the challenge and my dodgy knees are miraculously becoming slightly less dodgy with every session. I´m slightly more confident than I was a couple of weeks ago (that nasty heat rash has even subsided), but I´ve still no idea what it´s like to hike in a gorilla suit, it all seemed quite comical when I first thought of it, but we´re talking a couple of weeks now and it suddenly dawns on me, that this is quite likely to be the worst idea I´ve ever had.

It´s 4 weeks to the off now for the “Big walk” down the east coast, I´ve been building up slowly – and I mean slowly, it´s taken 2 months to pluck up courage to walk as far as 17 miles, which I did today. This was a triumph, I managed the last couple of miles without thinking I was wading through axle grease and my knees were only aching instead of downright killing me, unlike last week when they screamed out at me to stop and came up like Kenny Ball´s cheeks. I´m not bitter about that ludicrous challenge inside the centre circle, whereby I was scythed down needlessly and had my kneecap rammed round the other side of my adams apple during an Over 30´s versus Under 30´s football match back in 1981 – I hardly ever mention it in fact. (ah-em). But it´s been murder these past few weeks, and I´ve been reliving the incident over in my mind of late (you can read a full account in my book “Are You Affiliated” – available as a free download on www.kevinholt.net (advert over). The fact is, at 18 my career was in shreds and it would have been absolutely tragic – if I´d have been any good. I´ve achieved these recent results by basically walking slower and not lifting my feet up off the ground so much, this results in me shuffling about rather in the manor of an old man in his slippers padding down his garden path to the wheelie bin, - but so be it. The only problem is, now that the weather is getting warmer I´ve started to develop this horrendous heat rash which is especially bad on my legs, it resembles a cross between German measles and injuries incurred by being flung off a motorbike at high speed whilst wearing nothing but a pair of Speedos. Problem is I wear a pair of tennis shorts in the show when I do Cliff Richard, and I´m on in “Sinatras” tomorrow night. – Will a bit of talc hide it do you think, - or will I have to wear tights?