THE morning after my arrival in Lancaster, I emerged from my hotel full of enthusiasm, energy and significant quantities of breakfast. A blue sky was bedecked with fluffy white clouds and the clouds were also full of enthusiasm and energy — but probably not breakfast — judging by the speed at which they were bombing across the heavens.
Tag: powerstation
CXV – Flint to Chester
MY MOST recent walk was neither particularly long nor particularly coastal, involving as it did an amble alongside the River Dee as far as Chester, which is not on the coast. But what Chester lacks in coast it makes up for in being absolutely lovely and that was justification enough.
CVIII – Cemaes to Amlwch
I AWOKE bright and early in my hotel in Cemaes to find that the promised ‘glorious sunshine’ was indeed glorious. Later, when I was on the cliff tops, I would find that it was accompanied by a howling gale of a wind, but one that was suitably sun-warmed so that it felt as though walking under the blast of an enormous hairdryer. This is not the weather usually associated with North Wales (I’d had some of that the day before).
This was to be a short walk, just far enough to get me to Amlwch, from which I could catch a bus that would begin my journey home.
Continue reading “CVIII – Cemaes to Amlwch”CVII – Holyhead to Cemaes
WHILE I may have avoided walking in August, on account of hot weather and everywhere being booked solid, September is an entirely different prospect. And this is good because if August is optional then the start of September is almost compulsory for walking: I started my coastal perambulations on the third of September 2010, which means that as September rolled around again I was into my fifth year of walking.
XCVI – Harlech to Portmeirion
ON GOOD Friday, I returned to Harlech at an hour well before any shops would have opened even if it hadn’t been a bank holiday. To achieve this I had cunningly left London the night before and stayed overnight in Aberdovey.
Sadly, my cunning hadn’t extended as far as remembering either a bottle of water or my phone charger and my phone decided to register its discontent by rapidly dropping down to one bar of power. This was annoying, not least because I would be ending the day’s walk in Portmeirion, a place I wanted to take photos of.
Continue reading “XCVI – Harlech to Portmeirion”LXXXI – Milford Haven to Westdale Bay
I had a cunning plan to make the best possible use of Easter and its attendant four-day weekend by walking great distances along the Pembrokeshire coast. It was a good plan and I liked it, but the common cold virus had other ideas and decided to prove that it’s not only Martian tripod pilots that it can bring low if it wants.
I thus spent Easter feeling somewhat sorry for myself and occasionally wondering if I’d somehow stuffed a hagfish up my nose.
Continue reading “LXXXI – Milford Haven to Westdale Bay”LXXX – Pembroke to Milford Haven
ON THE third day of my last walking trip, I awoke bright and early and — just for a moment — enjoyed very much the knowledge that it was Monday and that I had taken a day off and so didn’t need to get up for work. Also, as I would only be walking about ten miles that day, I didn’t need to get up early to start walking either.
LXXIX – Bosherston to Pembroke
I AWOKE on Mothering Sunday a little before dawn and, in my half-asleep state, careered about my room like a drunken elephant with numb legs. A shower helped wake me up, as did a splendid Continental breakfast left on a tray outside my door (I would be leaving before the inn’s usual breakfast time and they had offered – practically insisted in fact – that I could have something left out for me). Breakfast mostly comprised a croissant with some excellent ham and tastily mature cheddar, washed down with a glass of apple juice.
LXVII – Barry to Merthyr Mawr
I MAY, as the twilight began to lighten the horizon on Saturday morning, have wondered to myself why I thought it was a good time to be sitting in Cardiff Central Station (or Caerdydd Canolog in Welsh). The answer, of course, was that it enabled me to catch the first train to Barry and so to resume my walk around the coast. It didn’t, on the other hand, do much for sating my body’s desire for sleep. But hey, it had had a two hour snooze on the overnight coach from London. That would just have to be enough…
LXV – Newport to Cardiff
I AWOKE early on Monday morning, refreshed after a deep and restful sleep. I leapt from my hotel bed with a bound of enthusiasm, keen to get on with more walking. I threw back the curtains and looked out of the window, ready for whatever the world chose to throw at me. What I saw out there was Newport.