Day 12

Today we walked from Alston to Greenhead which was 27km with 540m of climbing. We left the YHA this morning at 8:30am after a filling breakfast. Amazingly we were able to wash our clothes last night even though we couldn’t wash ourselves as the YHA doesn’t provide towels. We walked along the upper reaches of the river Tyne, resulting in quite slow walking as a lot of time was spent on the uneven path. We also walked through a lot of farmland with mazes of dry stone walls, which caused a slight hiccup in navigation as we often found our selves on the wrong side of the wall. This was because it wasn’t very clear on the map, according to dad. Will unfortunately wasn’t impressed when he pointed out that it was blindingly obvious. We also saw some very large rams in the fields with massive head and bodies, probably why they didn’t run away when we stood next to it for a photo. After lunch we found a bath tub in a field that was surprisingly clean on the inside, so we sat in it. Not the first one we have seen on the walk but it was by far the cleanest. We also went past loads of sheep that were being fed which was quite a sight. There was also a Roman fort which we went past so we kept our eyes open for any artifacts. Our efforts to take a direct route at the end were rewarded by getting lost on an overgrown footpath resulting in us having to drag ourselves out of a thicket only to emerge on to the verge of a fast A road. We arrived at the hotel at 4:30pm which gave me the chance to do some maths homework which I had been meaning to do for a few days. The rooms were also spacious and which meant we could try out some stretches a fellow walker had recommended, all it really did was highlight how inflexible we are. Best wishes, Ned and Will Battersby