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Toiling in the lowlands ....
I woke at just before eight to a very pleasant morning — all sunshine and blue sky. A few early locals began to stir as I ate a breakfast bar and packed the tent, but nobody seemed to notice me and I slipped unobtrusively out of Aust at about twenty past nine.
From today, my Postcode South route was virgin territory. I hadn't gotten any further south than Aust during my June attempt.
I walked past the Boar's Head and struck out on what turned out to be a delightful path called Foss Ditch — a long strip of grassy ground five or six paces wide, hedged on both sides but open to the light and sunshine. A water-filled ditch ran like a trench along my right for the whole of its length. Mature oaks hung over the strip at intervals and formed a partial tunnel and it was quiet and peaceful, the sun warming my face gently. I shared the Foss with an elderly man walking his dog some two hundred metres ahead. Now and then I had to open a wooden gate to progress to the next section, and after a quarter of an hour or so these gates petered out and the fields around began to look wilder and broaden out.
This was where the morning's problems began.
The track divided — one branch going off at a right angle, one carrying more or less ahead. The trouble was that the track on my map appeared to do neither, but made a half-hearted kink to the right and carried on. I dithered and eventually went cautiously ahead. I approached an isolated little wood called Asnum Copse and grew more confident — my route went past it on the map, as I was doing now. If I seemed to be walking by it at a slightly different angle than indicated, and seemed to be closer to the wood than intended, I put this down to map-scale trouble and carried on.
I had to go through a tunnel of trees, swishing through wet grass up to my thighs, then into another open field where I followed the right edge until I came to a fenced hedge and a dead end. Water trickling nearby. I peered into a ditch beyond the hedge, running with water — Lord's Rhine. Clearly I had gone wrong. I backtracked and guessed at another avenue through trees, which led me to another cul-de-sac. I had now spent twenty minutes wandering in soggy circles through long, wet grass. My feet were growing accustomed to being wet. My frustration deepened when I realised I had become disorientated and could no longer be sure how to get back to Asnum Copse, where my problems had begun.
I blundered about comparing map and compass for some time before finally resorting to the Maps app on my iPhone to establish where I actually was. I discovered myself as a pulsing spot on the screen and used it to navigate back to the Copse. By now, nearly an hour had passed since I had left Foss Ditch and I was barely any further on. I trudged back to the original fork and took the right-hand track this time, through a hedged meadow of pretty yellow flowers. I passed Asnum Copse at a greater distance and this looked more in keeping with the map. There was another wrong turn before I noticed I needed to follow Lord's Rhine from the other side to my previous approach, but finally I began making halting progress through a series of fields, using the brook as a guide.
The whole area was waterlogged and threaded with rhines — Old Splott Rhine, Bilsham Rhine, Holm Rhine. Where there were no rhines there were fields of marshy grassland. Very wet, very slow walking. The stiles along here were overgrown and hidden by a summer's worth of virulent brambles and nettles, and my hands, arms and legs were becoming minor war zones of scratches and rash.
I wasn't done with wrong turns. I walked into a field I had no business being in and encountered a herd of cows that gave a comprehensive demonstration of how stupid they can be. They were in the furthest corner of the field, and I was walking at an angle away from them — presenting no conceivable threat — yet they still saw fit to startle as a group and stampede directly into the corner I was heading toward. This, of course, now meant I was walking toward them, a fact they rapidly cottoned onto. Looking fearfully bewildered, they stampeded again back to their original corner, where they stood regarding me with swishing tails and profound distrust. Realising I was off-route and would have to turn back, I did so — which sent the whole piebald bunch careering about the field again, kicking up great clots of mud in a panicky mass. I watched them, with no surprise whatsoever, choose the gap in the fence I had entered through as their final destination, effectively blocking my exit.
"You are ridiculous, stupid creatures!" I called out in exasperation.
This caused them to leap about and collide with each other in fresh terror. They fled back to their original corner.
"I had a steak last night and I'm going to have another bloody one tonight!" I shouted at their retreating backsides.
Back through the gap, I searched about until I found a narrow stile hemmed into the hedgerow — the route I should have taken. This led past Bilsham Farm to a B-road, which I no more than crossed before heading over another stile into another soaked field. Another wrong turn here — no distinct paths, the whole area saturated and low-lying, not enough features to stay faithful to the map. A morning of trial and error, with a decided emphasis on the latter. I circled one particular field with a feeling of resignation, wondering what the occupants of a white farmhouse overlooking me were making of the spectacle, if they happened to be watching.
Eventually I reached the correct end of the pasture and went through a gap in a hedge into another field — this one a genuine aquatic beauty, with open sheets of water glittering across its surface. I tried walking around them, then admitted defeat and waded through. This brought me to Holm Farm, which offered no obvious way out except to climb a metal gate and walk through the yard between the stone buildings.
I looked back across the open field I had just crossed. The Severn Bridge stood in the day's sunshine, looking clean and white and blue-framed at this distance, and confirmed that I had now been walking for two hours and barely moved on from where I had started. I climbed the gate on the far side of the yard and found myself in a lane, at which point I made an error that was entirely my own making. The map was clear that my route lay to the right. I turned left.
Nothing during the pleasant walk along this lane told me I had gone wrong. The map said I should be passing a small piece of woodland shortly and I duly did. The lane should turn left and indeed there was a left turn. The trouble was I was passing different trees and taking different bends from those I should have been. I began to wonder about the number of right-angle turns that didn't quite correspond, but told myself I was being too speculative. I would hit a bridge over the M4 soon and that would confirm everything.
I came upon the bridge. I filmed from it. Then I set out toward Easter Compton and realised, with a hint of dismay, that I had covered only half the distance toward it since leaving Aust that morning.
Hospitality from the Fox ....
I had crossed the M4 on the wrong bridge and was almost two miles further east than I needed to be. The earlier wrong turn at the farmyard had come home to roost.
I cursed, established that the situation was recoverable, identified a track cutting south across several fields to rejoin my planned route near Torrs Farm, and set out across it. Hard going with the usual obstructed stiles, and my friends the cows had churned whole sections of the fields into muddy quagmires which they had then considerately topped with their droppings. Elsewhere, previous churned sections had baked hard in the sun and provided an uneven platform of nine-inch clay cobblestones to stumble across. I was becoming unfairly hostile toward cows as a species. In this manner I inched south as the morning tipped into afternoon, crossing Pilning New Rhine on a small wooden bridge,
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Passing Brynleaze Farm on the way to Easter Compton |
And then, finally, the outlying residences of Easter Compton. came into sight. The transition from wild saturated fields to cultivated gardens was sudden and a little startling — a line of low wire fencing strung between concrete posts, familiar from the council estate in Birmingham where I grew up, though I had spent all day in the wilds and the change surprised me. A man was pottering in one of the gardens. He saw my confusion, pointed out an alleyway between the field fence and the garden fences at the bottom of the properties — identical, I noticed, to the rabbit-warren alleyways I had scampered up and down as a child in Ely Close. I waved my thanks, climbed over the border fence and walked along the alley until it turned right and delivered me to a street and the main road through the village.
Easter Compton. I had made it.
Typically, I immediately set off in the wrong direction looking for the pub.
I corrected this quickly and walked along the main road to The Fox, set back from a tarmac car park. It was coming up to two o'clock and I knew the pub would be busy with Sunday lunch customers. I also knew that I stank to high heaven and looked as though I had dragged myself through dozens of hedges, which was exactly what I had been doing. The sight and smell of me was going to raise eyebrows and crinkle noses, but I was past caring. I really fancied one of those Sunday roasts. I entered the bar and took my rucksack off rather than bowling customers over with it each time I turned around.
The bar lady was lovely — cheerful, welcoming, keen to know where I had been walking. She poked fun at me a little when I admitted that I had spent all morning and part of the afternoon covering the distance from Aust, kindly refilled my water camel and poured me a cold pint before taking my food order. I sank the first one quickly and took myself out into the beer garden with a second. Now was the time to sort my feet out. I took off my wet boots and socks, left them in the warm sun to dry, discarded the sodden dressings and spent a while applying fresh plasters and clean dressings. I pulled dry socks from my rucksack and threaded the wet ones through the straps on the outside so they could dry as I walked.
My meal arrived while I was doing all of this and had cooled a little by the time I finished. It was delicious regardless. A full stomach, a quenched thirst and warm, snug feet between them produced a transformation — I felt relaxed and considerably more optimistic about the afternoon. I spent a while chatting to the bar lady about her job and leisure activities before hoisting the pack and saying goodbye.
Into the city ....
I was not at all surprised to have difficulty finding my route up Spaniorum Hill, which turned out to involve a tiny alley, a children's play area and then open fields again. I crossed a minor road, reached the base of the hill and started up eagerly. I had been stuck in flat, saturated lowland all day and the climb felt like an escape from it. Within twenty minutes I was at the top, looking back at the morning's ground and forward toward Bristol, and out to sea where the island of Flatholm appeared as the Bristol Channel opened up. Two horses were up here with me and whinnied for attention while I filmed, but would come no nearer when I spoke to them. The descent was swift, along the edge of woodland belonging to something called the Community Forest. A track led to a lane, then my second motorway of the day — the M5. I stopped to consider my progress, filmed, then walked on along the lane on the other side.
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Crossing the M5 on the way to Henbury, Bristol |
No room at the inn ....
I approached two men in identical oil-stained blue overalls who were dismantling a tired old van. I asked if they knew of any local B&Bs. They were friendly and well-meaning but sent me off on a lost cause at a moment when my tired body and sore feet could have done without one.
Following their directions, I walked back on myself to the end of Durdham Down — a lovely open park, busy with people strolling in the early evening light or sitting out on picnic blankets — and searched along a row of houses for a particular B&B they had mentioned. I walked up. I walked down. I walked around the back, which involved a very steep descent and a climb back up a street that should by rights have had a chair lift. No B&B. I started knocking on doors to ask. Most people were helpful. One charmer knocked on the window from his upstairs apartment and told me to get off his property. The woman I had been talking to shrugged apologetically, and as far as either of us could tell this was all rented property anyway and he owned none of it. We remonstrated with each other for a while, exchanging graphic insults by sign language across the barrier of double glazing and the floor between us. I invited him outside to continue the discussion, mainly because I was tired, my feet were hurting and he had irritated me. In retrospect I should have left well alone — he looked a little odd and was probably eccentric and harmless, if thoroughly unlikeable. I gave him a final universal gesture of my opinion and wandered off.
It was probably just as well. I was in a posh part of the city and the B&B would have cost a small fortune. When in doubt, find a pub. I walked down another steep side road and deposited myself at a bar requesting a cold cider. The bar lady was a Brummie and an absolute diamond. She phoned a taxi for me after consulting the regulars, who agreed unanimously that Southville was where to look for accommodation. The taxi driver was friendly and chatty and deposited me in a street containing three B&Bs. Surely, I thought, I had been rescued.
No answer at any of the doors. I ended up phoning mobile numbers left on cards for potential customers. The first place said they'd be back within an hour but offered no laundry facilities. I considered the state of my clothing and politely declined, and got no answer at all from either of the other two properties. I was now walking the streets of Southville on feet that were actively painful, looking for vacancy signs in windows. I knocked on doors and was turned away or ignored for over an hour. I was beginning to feel like a double-glazing salesman.
With relief, I rang the bell several times and then punched in the displayed mobile number. After a few rings, an Irish woman answered.
"Oh, I'm sorry," she tinkled, "There's no vacancy — we must have forgotten to take the sign down!" She laughed merrily, as if to illustrate what a silly thing this was. Right then and there, I could have collected half a dozen house bricks and stoved each of her windows in. I forced myself to walk away, stalking over a bridge across the Avon and toward the floating harbour with my evil intentions in tow. I tried a bar — upmarket, brass rails, dimmed lights — but they couldn't help. I wandered on and came across the Youth Hostel I had visited with my son several years ago. I went in and asked about a bed with something approaching desperation.
They had vacancies. And while being checked into a dormitory, the young woman at the desk remembered a last-minute cancellation on the top floor. My own room. Twenty pounds.
I bought washing powder from the desk and settled in. Tired, sore and aching, I just wanted to lie down — but laundry had to come first. This necessitated several trips between the laundry room in the basement and my room on the top floor, going up and down in the lift and then climbing the final flight on foot, until all my gear was washed and drying. Then a walk to the local supermarket for fresh dressings and plasters, food and the next day's lunch. I added two bottles of beer to my basket, not noticing until I was halfway through the first one that a sign in my room instructed guests not to bring alcohol onto the premises. Oh well. What they didn't discover wouldn't hurt them. Next morning I stowed the empty bottles in a bin in one of the communal bathrooms — sorry, YHA.
I spread my tent over the wardrobe to air and had a shower that made me feel like a new man. At last I got into bed and thought about the day's walking and the days ahead. I wanted to post a used map home and buy some postcards for the people who had asked me to keep them in touch with my progress. My brother phoned at ten o'clock — he had started walking the Centenary Way a few weeks before and was getting sections done as he found the time. We talked about our respective journeys south. After the call I struggled to keep my eyes open long enough to finish the second beer. I tried reading a few pages, but sleep arrived within minutes and I didn't stir all night.
Daily Tweets
- Just leaving Aust near the Severn bridge on a lovely sunny morning. Be glad of a proper B&B tonight, mind. I pong. Heading for Bristol now.
- A horrible morning in terms of distance covered. Ever seen an ant carrying a leaf? That would be me, meandering all over the bloody place.
- Now sitting in the gardens of The Red Fox in Easter Compton, about to eat a Sunday Lunch. Lovely manager, who gave my camel pack a refill.
- She also hasn't seemed to mind me displaying all my wet and reeking laundry on one of her garden tables. I'm trying to dry it in the sun.
- My feet are sore but have held up, thanks to dressings and tape. Will have to redo them, though, as they're wet and disintegrating.
- Bare feet are now airing in the breeze. Coincidently, all the children have stopped playing on the garden swings and have dashed indoors.
- Bristol's a sizeable city, right? You'd think I'd be able to get myself a room on a Sunday evening? Hah! Bloody, sodding hah!
- Two hours walking around the streets of Bristol, looking like a hobo. Smelling like one, too, come to think of it.
- A hot shower just now made me feel like a God!
For a full profile of the route (PDF format) click here
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