England Coast to Coast - Prologue

I am still searching for a perfect way to write up the Wayfarers Coast to Coast Walk experience. When I share my pictures with others in person I point things out, they can hear the excitement in my voice and I can to some extent convey just how much fun it all was. But you dear reader have to rely on a very few photos and lot of words. My aim had been to keep this short, but that didn’t happen. The trip was eight days, seven nights which for the purposes of this narrative, I have divided into three parts the Lake District, Yorkshire Dales and North Yorkshire Moors.

As a single traveler it can be a difficult business deciding on how to take a vacation. Somehow I got it into my head that I wanted to walk across England. In April I signed up for the Wayfarers Coast to Coast Walk, as they seemed like a classy group and a company that was truly interested in walking. I didn’t have much idea about what I was getting into, I just wanted to walk across England and luckily picked exactly the right adventure.

The group first met in entirety at the Swan Hotel in Newby Bridge near the southern tip of Lake Windermere. Surprisingly, there were only four walkers: a couple from Rhode Island, a lady from California and myself. We met our Wayfarers guides Bill, walk leader, who would guide us on the trail and Alan, walk manager, who handled all the logistics of hotels, meals, mailing postcards (he even provided the stamps) etc. Bill started off presenting us with a series of maps and a short talk on how things worked. Right away I knew that this trip was going to be fun. We headed off to the first of many excellent dinners where I discovered Sticky Toffee Pudding and one of the walkers discovered just how difficult it is to get a decaf cappuccino in England.

England C2C: Lake District; Yorkshire Dales; N. Yorkshire Moors
Flickr Set