Day Fourteen

Disaster. David Woke to find his sleeping bag in a pool of water. More disasterley, he found his phone floating in the water. It looks like while he was sleeping, he rolled onto the bite valve of his platypus and flooded the tent.

We explored Hawes. Well, the rope museum and the station (the engine standing in the station now is a replica of “Old Faithful” number 67345, the last train to travel from Northallerton to Leyburn).

Bus to Northallerton, bus to Osmotherley. It’s a shame we couldn’t have spent two or three days walking some of Wendsleydale.

Osmotherley - the North york Moors and on the Coast to Coast and Cleveland Way long distance paths.

YH or campsite? It was a nice day, we choose the campsite. It was another CC site, but they took non members. Good.

They said they were full but we could squeeze on to a small, quiet and delightful green and grassy pitch just over there, sheltered by trees. Perfect.

The lady double checked to make sure -oh, hang on, there was a vacant pitch. Even better you might have thought.

Until you saw it. A full size pitch ok, but it’s an unsheltered bald wasteland stuck between two large and noisy families.

Luckily there was enough grass around the edge for a half decent pitch.

Starved for some proper walking and itching to escape this hellhole, seething as it was with a writhing mass of humanities’ dregs, David suggested a 20 km walk along the Cleveland Way tomorrow, to the Tourist Information outpost at the Southern end of the Hambleton Hills, on the A170.

There are buses from there to Scarborough.

Later as we walked to the village we spy a similar looking tent to ours, smugly enjoying the small, quiet and delightful green and grassy pitch just over there, sheltered by trees. Mike briefly ground his teeth at their good fortune.

Good fish and chips from the unfeasibly small village chippy washed down with a decent pint or two.

This village has three pubs and it was a test of will to resist visiting them all, to delay the inevitable return to the delightful campsite.