Coast to Coast trail -- part 2

Kirkby Stephen is a small, picturesque village in eastern Cumbria (neé Westmorland), snuggled down at the base of the Pennine mountains -- the range that bisects England from north to south.

Perspicacious readers of this blog -- which surely includes you all -- will recall that Kirkby Stephen was the eastern terminus of my hike in May, as I marched resolutely from the Irish Sea, up and down across the high fells of the Lake District, and thence over the rolling hills of Westmorland. 

I'm pleased to announce that I will complete the Coast to Coast hike next July, returning to Kirkby Stephen as our starting point.  Rather than hike alone this time, I'll be joined by five members of my family, including my six-year-old niece Maury.  I completed our bookings yesterday, and all has been confirmed.  The company through which I arrange the hike is -- even as we speak -- booking the ten nights' accommodations that will be required to put up our motley Yankee crew as we traverse the Sceptered Isle..

We will hike a total of 112 miles in nine days of hiking.  I've arranged for us to have a rest day in the market town of Richmond after the third day of hiking, and an extra day once we reach the North Sea, at the picturesque coastal village of Robin Hood's Bay.

Our first day's hike will lead us out of Westmorland ("Cumbria," if you insist), over the Pennines and into Yorkshire.  From that point on, we will be hiking through the Yorkshire Dales and over the North Yorkshire Moors.  All just names to me now, but places that will be fixed indelibly in my mind by the time the hike has been completed.

Actually, Yorkshire will not be totally new to me.  I was a callow lad of 21, off by myself between terms of study in Italy, when I rented a bike in York for a week, and biked a loop around northern Yorkshire.  At one point, I found myself out on the moors -- the same moors we will cross next July -- as night fell, with no accommodations in sight.  I rolled off the road, curled up in a ball, and slept my way fitfully through a rather chilly night.  Luckily, it was June 21, the shortest night of the year.  I eventually made it to the coastal resort town of Scarborough, where I stayed in a youth hostel. (Several shillings a night -- less than a dollar in those uninflated days)

This ancient history is vaguely relevant, because Robin Hood's Bay is a bit north of Scarborough, and -- our trip at an end -- we will need to take a bus to Scarborough where we will find our closest access to the British railway system for our return to London.

How will young Maury hike those 110 miles, you may well ask?  Well, she probably won't.  Her parents plan to take turns each day traveling with her by bus to the next night's lodging or -- if the area is not served by buses -- begging a ride from the van that carries our bags while we hike happily with only a daypack to burden us.  Maury's parents assure me that finding their way will be an adventure, and that neither of them will mind missing certain days of the hike.

July is a long time in the future, but it's fun to make these arrangements now, and ponder the experience far in advance.  If the first half of the Coast to Coast was any indication, it will be a highly enjoyable and memorable experience for us all.