Advertisement
Published: August 22nd 2019
Edit Blog Post
20190821_092557
Our lodging 20 August, tuesday, our first night in the coast 2 coast walk. 21 August 2019, Wednesday
Short walk on the C2C from St Bees to Cleator. Second day on coast to coast but my 5th day overall.
As I mentioned it yesterday we set out about mid-afternoon to walk around St Bees cliff. This proved to be a much longer hike than we had been led to believe. Completing only the Coast to Coast trail before breaking off and heading back to St. Bees was 7.6 miles. So this morning we retraced some of the route along the railroad tracks from St Bees to the tunnel crossing under the railroad tracks where we joined the Coast to Coast trail again. From this point we had about a four mile hike into Cleator. We are staying at the Ennerdale Country House hotel in Cleator.
There were seven other hikers at breakfast aslo starting the C2C today. So there were at least 11 hikers staying at the Stonehouse B&B in St Bees. We were able to find a somewhat higher and better route back across the sheep pastures to the railroad tunnel. It was almost 2 miles from Stone House BnB to this location. It was about 9:30 when we actually set
20190821_092418
A almost selfie, start of second day walking. out today. Our total distance covered today in just over three hours was 5.9 miles. This included several miss-directions and missed turns along the way. The last part of the walk yesterday as well as all of this walk was new area for me. The guide books and maps are not nearly as detailed as were the guide books and maps for the Camino de Santiago de Compostela.
Of interest to all along this route was a bakery right beside a school where we stopped and had a cookie and a bathroom break. We met to Pakistani men, one the Pakistan and the other from Houston, TX. At one point a gentleman came out of his house to tell us that we had missed the turn for the coast to coast and needed to go back. He gave us detailed directions of where to turn and how to reach the trail again. At another point a lady stopped her car got out and came over to tell us that we had also missed our turn. I had seen the public walkway sign and forgotten that, it was a public walkway used as the route and the Coast-to-Coast mark.
20190821_092513
Flowers at Stone House After arriving at our hotel in Cleator we were told our room would not be ready for another hour. We sat at a picnic table on the beautiful lawn and enjoyed breezy but nice afternoon. We ate our sandwiches that we had purchased at Stone House for lunch.
About 2 in the afternoon we decided we would go to Whitehaven, larger town on the coast, and have our dinner there. Taxi ride was about 15 minutes and cost 10 GBP for the four of us. We walked along the harbor on the coast and around the harbor. We viewed the mine disaster that occurred in 1910 at the coal mine here where hundred and thirty-six miners died. This interesting mine extended over four miles out under the ocean where they mined the vein of coal. It was 600 feet underground. The disaster occurred when a fire started in the mine trapping 136 miners. Youngest minor was 15 years old that died in this event.
In Whitehaven there's also a piece of revolutionary war history. There is a marker noting that on 23 May 1778 John Paul Jones landed in England and Spike the cannon so they could not
20190821_101348
The tunnel under the railway fire on his ships. He sent his sailors ashore but they visited the pub and did not carry out their mission. See the photo marking this occasion.
We then had dinner at a restaurant called 11 and this proved to be a very good choice. The waitress was from from Baltimore and had married a young man from Whitehaven. They had returned from the U.S. to live here so he could finish his college education at a much more reasonable cost. It was about 5:30 when we finished our dinner and called for the taxi to bring us back to Cleator. It had also started to rain and was much cooler. The weather has been miraculously good with no rain the last two days. It appears that our luck is ended for the next several days look like rain. tomorrow will also be a short day as it is on only to ennerdale bridge for the evening.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.147s; Tpl: 0.017s; cc: 13; qc: 34; dbt: 0.1019s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb