Walking to Camelot (2 page)
Read Walking to Camelot Online
Authors: John A. Cherrington
In a very real sense, villages represent the underlay, the basic fabric of British culture. It is the common footpath, bridleway, and green lane that draw the threads of this fabric together, like some vast spiderweb stretching outward around the country.
The signposts, stiles, lanes, and paths of England have become iconic, and survive within a swirling milieu of fast-paced asphalt and metal modernity. Yet they form an indissoluble link with England's past. Nathaniel Hawthorne once observed:
“
These by-paths . . . admit the wayfarer into the very heart of rural life, and yet do not burden him with a sense of intrusiveness. He has a right to go whithersoever they lead him; for, with all their shaded privacy, they are as much the property of the public as the dusty high-road itself, and even by an older tenure . . . An American farmer would plough across any such path . . . but here it is pro-tected by law, and still more by the sacredness that inevitably springs up, in this soil, along the well-defined footprints of the centuries.”
Walking is the most popular outdoor recreational pursuit in Britain. People can trek on any one of several dozen long-distance footpaths, defined as any route over 31 miles. Some are loop walks, which allow one to park at the village church, walk several hours, devour a ploughman's lunch at a pub en route, and be back at one's car without retracing one's steps. That said, not enough Brits get out and do this, and only a small percentage emerge at all from their stuffy cocoons in the cities. The rich Londoner might buy a quaint cottage in some country village to which he scoots in his Porsche for the weekend, but most urban dwellers prefer to holiday on the Continent, with cheap flight vacations to Spain, Portugal, and other hot spots around the Mediterranean.
Legally speaking, both the common law and the Countryside and Rights of Way Act of 2000 protect the right to walk. What is unique about this vast network of British paths is that most routes pass over private land. There are also “permissive paths,” where there is no public right but the owner has agreed to a temporary right of passage; and finally, there is the “right to roam” that is mandated under the 2000 statute, whereby walkers have a conditional right to roam over some portions of uncultivated private land. This right to roam is a partial redress of the elimination of such rights by the Enclosure statutes of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which removed millions of acres of common land from the public domain.
The Ramblers is the largest walkers' rights association in Britain, and indeed the world. It is an activist group that boasts some 123,000 active members and played a vital role in the passage of the 2000 statute. The Ramblers do not hesitate to launch court action to save a path from being closed by a landowner or the highway department, and its credo is that public paths form an invaluable part of the national heritage. There exist some 485 Rambler groups in the country, with 350 affiliated bodies, such as the Footpath Societies.
This book is a celebration of walking â specifically, walking a long-distance path through the heart of the English countryside. Along the way we will examine the topography, flora and fauna, and rural customs of the English heartland, plus meet a fascinating array of historical and contemporary personalities. The perspective is that of a North American, probing the English landscape, history, and character.
The journey awaits us. In the tradition of William Wordsworth, W.H. Hudson, Edward Thomas, and Robert Louis Stevenson, cross-country walking is an escape into another world. One enters Narnia via C.S. Lewis's wardrobe door, the portal to that other dimension. A single stile will suffice as our own portal to escape the present, discover the past, and rediscover the self.
BOSTON IS AN
ancient port situated on the Wash, a North Sea bay on England's east coast one hundred miles north of London. It was a wool-exporting town for the Hanseatic League in the thirteenth century and diversified to salt and woven fabrics over succeeding centuries. The port has a strong tradition of religious dissent, as it is here that John Cotton became vicar of St. Botolph's in 1612. His fiery preaching energized church attendance, but his Nonconformist beliefs enraged the Church of England so much that he was soon encouraging parishioners to join the Massachusetts Bay Company and emigrate to America, where he himself fled in 1633, helping to establish Boston's namesake â a true Pilgrim father.
We are too fagged with jet lag to walk much of the town this evening. We find our
B&B
, which turns out to be a rather sleazy little hotel off the main drag, and crash. I am dimly aware of sounds of revelry from the streets, and wonder if the gypsy carnival runs at night.
Before nodding off, I lie there in a dingy, cramped single bed thinking about the adventure before us. In the news this spring of 2004, Madonna is battling it out at hearings before the Countryside Agency over the planned opening of walking paths on her vast country estate near the WiltshireâDorset border â threatening in good old American West style to shoot any trespassers on her land. Another wealthy landowner, Nicholas van Hoogstraten, has been fighting the Ramblers for thirteen years; after numerous court battles, the High Court ordered him to reopen a footpath on his East Sussex estate to the public. He calls the Ramblers “the scum of the earth.”
In English literary history, the footpath and stile form a common backdrop in the works of many writers, including Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy, Wordsworth, D.H. Lawrence, and George Eliot. Often the footpath is a haven for lovers to meet for an evening rendezvous at a chosen stile. It is cherished by others as a convenient connecting point to another village. Many landowners, however, view the common footpath as the domain of vagabonds, gypsies, and rogues. In Eliot's
The Mill on the Floss,
Mr. Tulliver blames his lawyer for losing his lawsuit against a “right of . . . thoroughfare on his land for every vagabond who preferred an opportunity of damaging private property to walking like an honest man along the high-road.” So van Hoogstraten and Madonna are in a long tradition of landowners wishing to close off their leafy acreages to the public.
I fall asleep and dream of gypsies, trains, and Pilgrims â and, oh yes, of Madonna, standing with a shotgun at a wooden gate, clad only in her wellington boots, guarding her estate.
Lincolnshire Lanes
“Beyond the Wild Wood comes the wild world,” said the Rat.“And that's something that doesn't matter, either to you or to me.I've never been there, and I'm never going; Nor you either, if you've got any sense at all.”
âKENNETH GRAHAMEâ
The Wind in the Willows
I AWAKE DAZED WITH JET LAG,
then smell the gammon sizzling in the breakfast room. I quickly dress and stumble to the appointed table, where Karl sits with his coffee. I am bleary-eyed, stomach still rumbling. Harold, the greasy-haired, middle-aged proprietor, who resembles a wrencher, curtly offers us a full English breakfast: fried tomatoes, mushrooms, eggs, gammon, and the option of sardines. I decline the sardines but am foolish enough to order the main concoction, which is duly presented â only a tad less greasy than the proprietor's hair. All the while, the radio blares loudly, the strident
DJ
interspersing rap music with bits of an imaginary conversation between Britney Spears and a bimbo hotel receptionist, occasionally throwing in a crude joke and burping loudly.
Harold the Wrencher asks if we've noticed the East Europeans in town. I say we had, and that I understood they came here looking for jobs under relaxed
EU
labour laws and were helping harvest the vegetable crops of the Lincolnshire lowlands.
“Aha,” he says, “that's true, mate, that's true; but we locals are upset because they work for lower wages than our English lads. But time will tell, won't it? At least they're better than the gypsies.”
Karl's breakfast consists of half of a cup of coffee. He will snack on trail mix and quaff a pint of Guinness midday if the opportunity arises, but otherwise his only real meal of the day is dinner. He shakes his head reprovingly as I struggle to finish the soggy repast awash on my chipped plate.
“Tomorrow, John, just have toast and coffee instead of that swill. Your stomach will thank you. Now let's get moving.”
I can't resist another brief look at St. Botolph's. I discover that the church boasts 7 doors, 12 columns in the nave, 24 steps to the library, 52 windows, and 365 stairs to the top of the “Stump” â well, you get the picture. Obviously, the builders were trying to exhort the populace to repent of their sins in the face of time marching on. I consider it a good omen that St. Botolph, a Saxon monk who died in 680, is known as the English saint of travellers, and that his feast day is celebrated on June 17, the date that Karl and I hope to march onto the sands of Chesil Beach to complete our Macmillan Way journey, some 290 miles away. We also expect to add 60 miles or more by taking a few interesting diversions.
We say goodbye to Boston without further ado and trudge southwest, through some gates and out to the dike area beyond. Immediately we find ourselves immersed in a vast sea of garbage, screeching herring gulls, and giant earthmoving machines that are working to reshape the local landfill, known as Slippery Gowt. We stop at the spot on the Haven inlet where in 1607 William Brewster and his pilgrims congregated to board a sailboat to Holland and thence to America, only to be arrested by the authorities for trying to emigrate without permission. Many of these determined folk were aboard the
Mayflower
when it sailed in 1610.
We both climb nimbly over the first stile. Karl is in an ebullient mood. Thus far the rain has held off, though a brisk wind blows off the North Sea and fleeting clouds scud across the sky like skittish sheep.
It is a sine qua non for civilized walking in Britain that one carry a walking stick. Mine happens to be made of blackthorn, with a gnarled knob grip and sharp nodules sticking out like quills, which nodules I have found occasionally useful in fending off violent dogs and bovines. The Dutch call it a
wandelstok;
the German term is
Spazierstock;
the Scots wield a
kebbie;
the French deem it
une canne
.
The stick has a variety of uses. It supports one when one is fatigued, especially uphill. It clears those early-morning spiderwebs, brushes aside fallen branches, tests the depth of streams, wards off canines and charging cattle, and gives one a sense of balance and well-being. My son-in-law made a walking stick by hollowing out a straight maple branch, in which he placed a fishing line, compass, and jackknife; he even composed a song about it that he calls “The Survival Stick.” And there are numerous historical reports of walkers stashing the odd vial of spirits within a hollowed-out stick for when they paused for a nip on a rural footpath or, for that matter, on a London street.
Another rule for planning a long-distance trek in England is to prepare one's feet. Ensure that you build up calluses beforehand, that your boots are well worn in, and that your pack is not too heavy. Otherwise, blisters will develop and you will be miserable. (I learned all this the hard way.) So take preventive measures. Blister spray, which allows one to literally acquire a second layer of skin each morning of the trip, is available in England.
Finally, make sure you wear waterproof clothing and carry a compass, water, a guidebook or Ordnance Survey map, and good binoculars. Not all walking manuals are as thorough as the
Macmillan Way Guide
(which we called simply “the
Guide”
), so the detailed Ordnance map is a must: it shows every little path and stream, even key farmhouses. The binoculars you will need to scope out the next field you are about to enter, because that field may contain a herd of dangerous bovines, including perhaps an ill-tempered bull. And because the path is often ploughed over by the farmer, you will have to assess which route to follow in crossing, taking care not to trespass, while trying to determine which gate or stile on the far side of the vast acreage is on the proper route. Believe me, an African trek with armed guides is much easier and safer. It's a fair bet that more people are killed and injured by bovines in British fields each year than tourists are killed on African safaris. So be careful.
If you are North American, then you also have to know that every day holds one or more
Fawlty Towers
experiences. Paul Theroux has noted that the English think North Americans funny, but it is their own habits which seem wildly out of whack â such as, he notes, paying a licence fee each year to watch the telly, or saying they are sorry when you step on their toes. A few other examples: charging you twopence for a tiny white plastic spoon with which to eat the yogurt you have just purchased at the local grocery; refusing to let you eat before seven o'clock (the French are worse â it's 7:30 or even 8:00
PM
); their habit of stopping for a spot of tea every hour without exception; looking puzzled when you enter their village and ask directions to a village two miles away â then remarking that they have never been there; queuing without complaint for service; and coming up with place names like Knockdown, a village close to Bangup Lane, which is not far from Tiddleywink.
The concepts of comfort and customer service in this country are, well, just concepts â not practice. The English still have not come to terms with central heating, and most natives would rather put on a jumper than touch the sacred thermostat. They have a propensity to post the “Closed” sign wherever possible and invent weird hours of operation â castles, manor houses, museums, and shops have erratic opening times, sometimes allowing visitors only two or three designated days a week for just a few hours. Service facilities can be haphazard, even dodgy. I once took the train to Greenwich and, upon alighting, headed for the loo, only to be met with a sign stating that the station toilets were closed on account of the Railway Authority being unable to secure a sewage discharge easement from a neighbouring landowner! Then, of course, there is the matter of driving on the left. (The most hazardous part of travelling in Britain for a North American is walking across a road; one looks the wrong way as one steps off the curb.) But I digress.
That said, the English are immensely tolerant, reticent, self-effacing, slow to anger (except while driving), and all too modest about their country. After years of travel in Britain, the two most common words that come to mind are “sorry” and “closed,” often appearing in the same sentence. And the English will give their lives to protect their dogs. They are so politically correct that until recently it was difficult to obtain permission to fly the national flag â the Union Jack â for fear of offending minority groups. Not that the Brits are a flag-waving people; that is reserved for the pageantry of the Queen's Jubilee and other national celebrations. And when it comes to World Cup soccer matches (“football” to Brits), since England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland all have separate teams, the English fly the Cross of St. George from rooftops and cars until England is inevitably ousted from competition.
THE PACK STILL FEELS
heavy. Karl's weighs in at a mere twenty-five pounds, and he just laughs at my grimaces. Our
Guide
cautions us, when striding past Frampton Marsh, “do keep as quiet as possible all along the sea bank, so that disturbance to wildfowl and other birds is kept to a minimum.” More than 160 species of birds nest or stop over this area. We see mainly gulls, geese, lapwings, and a few redshanks and avocets. A pair of acrobatic lapwings are putting on a show overhead like the Blue Angels, swooping, diving, and rolling at impossible angles. What a lot of effort to expend just to attract a mate! Speaking of which, we pass by a birdwatching blind from which much giggling emits, though we cannot see inside. The Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust has requested that visitors report “unsuitable behaviour” to police, after several reports were received of people having sexual encounters in the hides. Rachel Shaw of the Trust advises, “There are certain things that happen at nature reserves that really shouldn't.”
The Fens are a wild, lonely place, and have formed the setting for many novels, such as Dorothy Sayers's
The Nine Tailors
and Graham Swift's
Waterland
. Though there is a haunting beauty here, it is far from Arcadia. Swift was well aware of the loneliness: “Realism; fatalism; phlegm. To live in the Fens is to receive strong doses of reality. The great flat monotony of reality; the wide empty space of reality. Melancholia and self-murder are not unknown in the Fens. Heavy drinking, madness and sudden acts of violence are not uncommon.”
The eeriness of the landscape is brought home to us by squall after squall now slashing us from the North Sea, as those scudding clouds turn violent and black and dense. Lightning flashes through the mist. Thunder cannonades like artillery fire over the vast reaches of marshland, scaring the birds. There is nothing to do but stuff our Tilleys into the packs, shroud our heads in our Gore-Tex hoods, and soldier on. There is no shelter in the Fens, nary a shrub for protection. Then, in midafternoon, the vast gunsmoke clouds miraculously part like the Red Sea and the sun blazes through, casting a bright sheen over the surrounding wetlands.
Local residents walk over the tidal marsh and pick up samphire, a plant with salty, aromatic leaves often pickled and eaten. Huge quantities of marsh samphire used to be harvested and burned for the soda content used in the production of soap and glass. The fenland surrounding us consists of drained shallow water, where dead plants help give rise to new growth in saturated peat, allowing vegetable crops to flourish. In fact, the great drainage schemes of the eighteenth century led to tens of thousands of acres being reclaimed for farming, turning this region into the agricultural hub of central England â and Boston into a major port. In 2003, the Great Fen Project was initiated to restore portions of the Fens to their original state. Certain farms, abandoned or no longer viable, are purchased and then selectively flooded to create nature reserves.
We reach Fosdyke Bridge, a village of some five hundred people on the River Welland. Residents must be especially noise sensitive, as our
Guide
cautions us to “please keep as quiet as possible to limit disturbance to house owners.” Why, do they think walkers are so unruly as to shout and curse and play ghetto blasters? In any event, we don't see a soul as we tiptoe through the village. It feels like Sleepy Hollow.
Yet Fosdyke Bridge has a claim to fame. In October of 1216, wicked King John (of Robin Hood fame) was passing through these parts with his retinue of sycophantic servants and lapdogs when he was taken ill. He had reached King's Lynn in Norfolk, but decided to return to Spalding, which is very close to us. For an unknown reason, the king chose to send his baggage train, which included the crown jewels, by a different route, on a causeway bordering the Wash. The baggage train was lost on the way, reportedly engulfed by an incoming tide. The king had no time to ponder this misfortune, as he died a few days later.
In the thirteenth century, the tidal streams and surrounding marshlands were constantly inundated by North Sea waters. Recent satellite imagery and tide-table data have led historians to believe that the king's baggage train likely met its demise at or near Fosdyke Bridge on the River Welland. And so Karl and I find ourselves peering into the inky waters of the river, seeking a glint of light from rubies and diamonds.
Fifteen miles later and with very sore feet, we stagger into Surfleet, and into our booked
B&B
, which we find to be a dilapidated old inn. Most of the
B&B
s en route are farmhouses, but occasionally one has to throw the dice and book an inn. This one is pleasantly situated on the river. We are greeted at the pub entrance by a huge grey bull mastiff, which advances toward us barking furiously, causing me to raise my stick in apprehension.
“He won't bite you, mate,” a voice utters. A beefy tattooed bloke in a black
T
-shirt emerges from within.
The bull mastiff retreats and we are ushered in. The pub is cluttered with dumpy sofas and soft, sagging armchairs, the usual hunting-scene reproductions on the grimy walls, a pool table, and a dark-stained burgundy carpet. One solitary patron stands at the bar staring curiously at our Tilley hats, packs, and sticks. We are escorted by Black Shirt upstairs to our room, where two beds lie in dim light. Black Shirt reveals that he is currently between jobs in the army and navy, just looking after the inn for the owner, who is vacationing in Spain. The toilet is down the hall and shared between us and four other rooms. Have they never heard of ensuites?
