The idea of hiking between Land’s End and John o’Groats
occurred to me sometime during the latter part of 2007. It just seemed
the natural next-step in my walking career, both logically and
literally. However, it wasn’t until mid-2008 that I realised that the
idea was definitely not going to go away, so I had better do something.
OK, but ideas are two a penny. How do I make them actually happen? I
know! I’ll tell all my friends, neighbours, business clients and even my
dentist. Now I will look like a right banana if I drop out. That was
easy! Now, on with the plan.
After a bit of research on the Internet I came to the conclusion that
an End-to-End walk, mainly following footpaths, would have a
length of around 1,200 miles. With a full rucksack, I felt I could
realistically manage this distance in about 12 weeks. I could certainly
do it quicker if I was prepared to suffer more pain and risk the
possibility of injury, but decided early on that I wasn’t interested
in breaking any records. I wished to gain some serious pleasure out of
the experience, be free to make interesting detours, such as climbing
the odd mountain peak, have the time to stop and chat to people along
the way and enjoy the odd rest day in pleasant places.
Next - timing. Well, being self-employed and VAT registered, I am
expected to prepare accounts and refresh the government coffers from
time-to-time. Since this presently happens in January, April, July and
October, I thought it might save hassle if I could squeeze the walk
between payment dates. Limiting my choice to the warmer months meant
either April to July or July to October. The final decision arose
because I reach my 55th birthday in the latter period during 2009, which
seems like a good time to go out and find some solitude in which I
could contemplate my future. There are certainly parts of Scotland where
I don’t think I will have any difficulty in finding solitude.
My accountant confirmed that he could deal with my VAT Return right
at the start of July (thank you, Dave) enabling me to get to Scotland
and commence my trek around the second week. Barring mishap, this would
theoretically get me home by early October,
just in time to prepare my next VAT Return and pay any amount due, which
should of course be zero since I will not be earning anything whilst I
am walking - unless the BBC and the lovely Julia Bradbury decide to do a
documentary on me, of course.
Given the Summer to Autumn timing of the walk, my own logic persuades me
that I should start off from Scotland when it is at its warmest and move
south as the more southerly weather cools. This should certainly make
walking more comfortable (memories of walking the South Downs Way over the hottest week of 2003), provided
that I can tolerate the plague of the Scottish midge. Also, although it
is easy to fix a start date, I don’t know exactly how long the walk will
take. It is cheaper to advance book a reduced-price single rail ticket
to Scotland over the Internet and buy another full-price one at Penzance
Station for the shorter journey back to Hampshire, than to do this the
other way round. Given how incredibly mean I am, the latter argument is
very compelling.
Thus, the trek will be a JOGLE (i.e. John o’Groats to Land’s End)
rather than the much more common LEJOG. One ‘friend’ suggested that my
route would be easy because it is downhill all the way! Naturally, Andy
has now been removed from my Christmas card list.
What’s next? Ahh, I know. The route! Well, there is no standard route
between the two ‘Ends’. The chosen means of transport clearly has an
influence as I have some difficulty imagining a Ford Model T being
coaxed across the Pennines (although one was driven to the summit of Ben
Nevis in 1911). Those using a pony & trap, a skateboard, a
wheelchair, a cycle (uni- or bi-), a car or a motorcycle will tend to
follow roads, as did Ian Botham who, I am told, walks nearly as fast as
the latter.
Anyway, us hardy, traffic-shy, trekking types prefer to choose routes
which avoid the roads as much as possible. I had several relevant
long-distance paths on my ‘to-do’ list, namely the Great Glen Way, the
Pennine Way and the Cotswold Way, so it made sense to try and
incorporate these into my walk. Also, since I had already hiked the
lengths of the West Highland Way and the South West Coast Path, I
preferred to find alternative routes rather than repeat these. The
downside of following off-road paths is that they make the route
typically a third longer. What the hell! It’s well worth the better
views.
Describing the route that I eventually walked in detail would take
longer than you or I have time for here, so I have relegated this to a
separate tab, entitled, you’ve guessed it, ‘THE ROUTE’.
Have a look at this when you have nothing better to do or are planning to
use it yourself (feel free).
Irrespective of the route, there are still a few logistical details
to be resolved. Perhaps most importantly, where do I sleep? It seems
that the majority of walkers arrange B&Bs or seek hostels. This
enables them to walk without the weight of a tent and sleeping bag, and
hopefully get a comfortable night’s rest. I have done this on previous
walks, and it is fine. Out of season I have never failed to find
somewhere to stay, although pre-booking might be necessary in the
summer. The latter can be a problem as a single day’s delay upsets the
whole booking schedule. It is not cheap either. At £30 per night,
B&B’s would cost me around £2,500. Furthermore, without cooking
facilities I would undoubtedly end up spending even more money buying
meals in pubs and restaurants. Thus, since I have already expressed my
meanness with regard to rail journeys, you won’t be surprised that I opted to take a tent and cooking apparatus. Sacrificing three months
of income is quite enough without substantially increasing my outgoings
as well.
In practice I wildcamped when and where it seems sensible to do
so, but opted for a hostel or B&B if one was available and I need a
break, a shower and/or a warm bed. And yes, I occasionally ate in a
restaurant when I got sick of dehydrated food, oat biscuits and squeezy
cheese. In truth, the real attraction of a tent is the freedom that it
affords in not being tied too rigidly to a schedule or a route - the
freedom to simply walk until I felt I have done sufficient for the day
and then find a quiet spot, out of people’s way, to make camp. The
downside is that I occasionally had difficulty finding a suitable
campsite, and that the weather on some nights was windy, wet and
chilly.
Weight was the next issue. I knew that I could carry a load of around
15kg (including the 2kg weight of the rucksack itself) over long
distances without undue strain. At 0.12kg each, the (roughly 40)
1:50,000 OS Landranger maps required to cover the whole JOGLE route weigh 4.8kg. Were I to use 1:25,000 OS Explorer maps, of which
roughly 55 would be required, the load would have increased to 6.6kg. Next, I
would typically need a minimum of 2 litres of water per day (which conveniently
happens to weigh 2kg). However, in the more remote regions of Scotland, I
may be away from a domestic supply for up to 3 days - implying that I
would need to carry 6kg of water. Last, but not least, I know from
experience that I will wear out the soles of at least two pairs of boots
along the way, but would rather not carry the 1kg weight of a spare
pair. It is starting to look like I won’t have room for the tent,
cooking gear, food, clothes, etc!
My solutions were as follows:
Maps: I found some alternative, lighter, Harvey maps covering
the Great Glen Way and the Cotswold Way. Also, two Aurum Press National
Trail Guides, which reproduce strips of the relevant OS maps, cover The
Pennine Way. The weight of the remaining OS Landranger maps was reduced
dramatically by discarding the cardboard outer covers and taking only
the bits required.
Water: I took a water filter so that I could draw water
from streams in the remoter regions. If, after filtering, I still had
concerns about bacteria or viruses then I either boiled the water
(fine if I was having tea or hot food anyway) or uses sterilising tablets.
Thus, I did not need to carry more than 2 litres of water at any one
time.
Boots: I could have simply bought another pair of these along the way, but prefered to use a pair that I had already worn-in. I anticipated that I would need
these replacements somewhere around the southern end of the Pennine Way.
Fortunately I have a friend, Jim, who without any arm-twisting at all
agreed to re-supply me at Edale near Sheffield.
Being re-supplied at Edale also enabled me to further reduce the
weight of maps carried, since I could leave behind those I had finished
with and pick up the new set. I could also change clothes and leave anything
else that I wouldn’t require further, such as the midge net and the water filter. In the unlikely event of a further re-supply
being needed, Bath is only about two-hours drive from my home, so I was sure I could persuade someone to bring things out to me.
As it happened, when I finally prepared a list of all the kit that I
will need to carry, the total came out to rather more than my target of
15kg. The maximum total weight of everything,
including what I would be wearing, came to 25kg with food for three
days and 2 litres of water. However, assuming half of my provisions had
been consumed, and ignoring things like trekking poles and what I wear
or keep in my pockets, the typical weight for the rucksack alone came down to around 18kg, which doesn’t sound quite so bad. For those
interested in these details, I have included full information under the
heading ‘MY KIT’.
When I first mentioned my plan to undertake this trek to friends and
acquaintances, several expressed their hope that I would do it for
charity. Whilst agreeing that this was a good idea, the effort required is increased substantially because of the need to publicise
the activity, get the website constructed, arrange mechanisms for people
to give money and, finally, provide on-going progress reports.
It is useful to put some sort of figure on the effort needed to
plan and undertake this adventure. I didn’t realise quite how large
Britain was until I had spread what seemed like a huge number of OS maps
on my living room floor, and still only covered a small portion of my
route. Route planning and map preparation turned out to be a very
lengthy operation, taking over a fortnight of effort alone. Then there
is equipment selection and purchase (although I was fortunate that some nice equipment suppliers helped with this), talking to potential
sponsors, persuading people to assist, preparing the website material,
training for the walk and, finally, doing it.
The time and effort involved in preparing for this walk - not just
mine, but also that of all of those helping me - was easily equal to the the
time spent on the walk itself. Even after the walk was completed the work was not over since I was expected to prepare presentations for some of my sponsors. However, meeting the £10,000 donation target for the charities was deeply satisfying and made all this additional effort worthwhile.
As for the walk itself? Well, I cannot imagine anyone doing something like this without having their perceptions changed. If you want to understand what I mean then you are going to have to read the BLOG iteslf.
