Perhaps more importantly, we've also come quite a way through our respective lives - eight years is a long time to spend on any project and our Walking the Chesters project has now accompanied us through a period spanning almost a decade. Caistor, Lincs was our 51st Chester, so we've made good progress and we estimate that there are only 15 Chesters left (although we keep finding new ones!), so we should be alright for another two or three years!
We've also come a long way in terms of our organisation and planning of these walks - as we reminisced about the first ever walk, we recognised how unprepared we were back then, to do such a long walk, on one of the hottest days in summer, not even having our usual pub meal at the end, but settling for a hastily consumed Indian take-away and a beer on the train on the way back!
The Journey Up North
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| Market Place in Caistor, Lincolnshire |
Whilst we're certainly more organised these days, I can't say the same for the British Rail network. The weather has been incredibly hot in recent weeks, including the day we were travelling Up North. As a result of a delay in finding the train driver, health & safety concerns about overheated carriages and the wrong type of sun (well, that's what it basically boils down to!), our 18:03 service from King's Cross experienced a slight delay (driver's words, not mine) until we finally set off around 19:45.
Considering the fact that our connecting train from Newark to Market Rasen had departed 10 minutes before we had even left London, we worked out that we might be in for a bit of an adventure in our quest to spend the night in Caistor - in itself a taxi journey from Market Rasen, the nearest big town with a station. I'd flown into the UK overnight from Canada, so I was feeling quite zen (= jetlagged) whilst I calmly assured Best Aussie Mate (BAM) that all would be okay, before I sought out the train manager, who kindly organised an alternative route, which got us to Lincoln, then a taxi from Lincoln to Market Rasen.
We arrived at The White Hart in Caistor around 23:00 - so time enough for last orders at the bar, which was a blessing, considering it was Friday night and we'd had such a complicated journey.
Caistor to Nettleton Grange (1.4 miles/2.25 kilometres)
Having a stroll around Caistor the following morning, we were surprised to learn that it's quite a pleasant place - lots of beautiful old Georgian buildings and a very strong sense of civic pride. Indeed, as we were standing on Market Place, an elderly man appeared out of nowhere and handed me a leaflet entitled Walkabout Caistor published by the Caistor Civic Society.
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| Holly House, Caistor |
This came in very handy, as we plotted an impromptu walking tour down the High Street to Holly House, then up Chapel Street past the Wesleyan School and Church Street, past the Grammar School and the St Peter and St Paul Church. We then made our way past a very long and beautiful cottage on Fountain Street, before turning down Plough Hill, so we could pick up The Viking Way which would guide us through the Lincolnshire Wolds.
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| Pink cottage on Fountain Street, Caistor |
We've been on The Viking Way once before, when we walked down in Rutland towards Great Casterton and this is a path that links Rutland with Hull - 147 miles in total and a nice contrast to another long distance path we're currently following, The Saxon Shore Way (currently walked as far as Sandwich!)
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| Sign post on The Viking Way |
The path to Nettleton was, not surprisingly, quite nettly, but the weather on that Saturday was a lot cooler than it had been in previous weeks, so it turned out to be an ideal day for walking, with no rain, until we got to the very end of the walk at Market Rasen.
Nettleton Grange to Normanby-le-Wold (3.9 miles/6.3 kilometres)
We met a very friendly, but slightly needy, cat at Nettleton Grange - he seemed too happy to see us and we began to wonder about his life on the stud farm. It seemed as though he'd had enough of horses and was desperate for contact with another species - even humans would do!
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| Nettleton Grange in the Lincolnshire Wolds |
You don't hear much about the Lincolnshire Wolds and they're certainly not as touristy (= a good thing) as e.g. the Cotswolds, but I have to say that they really are very beautiful and we had a real sense of adventure making our way from Nettleton Grange up into the Wolds.
From Nettleton Grange, we walked through four large meadows, each one of which contained a herd of cows. Ever since reading the Bhagavad Gita earlier this year, I'm trying to detach myself from my 'cow phobia' and be more understanding of cows and their existence, on the planet, but also frequently on my path through life! I think I'm doing better than before and I even found time to admire the different breeds of cows we saw on this walk - the owners of Nettleton Grange have a really beautiful herd of Viking White cows and I believe the last herd we saw were a herd of the famous Lincoln Red beef cattle.
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| Meadow with the White Viking herd |
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| Lincolnshire Wolds |
Having said that, given a choice, I would prefer not to go through a field of cows (see my Uttoxeter post from August 2014), especially a tiny field containing two cows and a bull, like the one The Viking Way crosses, just before Normanby-le-Wold. Whilst BAM marched on through the field with her devil-may-care bravado, I meekly took a detour around the field, before we met up again and continued our walk into the village.
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| Curiosity killed the Cow |
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| The road to Normanby-le-Wold |
Normanby-le-Wold to Walesby (2.1 miles/3.4 kilometres)
When I say village, I really mean a couple of houses, an impressive haystack and an old Norman church. You can see a lot of place names in Lincolnshire with the suffix -by, which comes from the Old Norse word for a farmstead or village. Normanby-le-Wold is definitely more of a farmstead than a village, and was a very peaceful place to have a little rest, which we did, scoffing Caramello Koalas on a bench just opposite St Peter's Church.
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| St Peter's Church at Normanby-le-Wold |
We could see half of Lincolnshire and the distant chimneys of Sheffield, as we made our way along the ridge of the Wold, heading south from Normanby. Just before Walesby, we came down off the Wolds and made a slight detour into Walesby (a village this time) as far as St Mary's Church, where a wedding was taking place.
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| View across the East Midlands |
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| BAM walking to Walesby |
Walesby to Market Rasen (4.6 miles/7.4 kilometres)
Rather than walking directly from Walesby to Market Rasen, we did a slight detour down along Moor Road, then over the railway line and into the Middle Rasen plantation. The plantation was very peaceful and nice place to walk, as we eventually came to a pretty-looking campsite at Walesby Grange, then rejoined the Rasen road, so we could finish our walk at Market Rasen.
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| The path through Middle Rasen plantation |
We didn't find Market Rasen to be as pretty as Caistor and it started raining a little bit, which dampened our mood, so we retreated to the comfort of The Advocate Arms, a lovely 18th century building, where they serve up delicious food, although the portions were a bit on the small side for BAM's liking!
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| Our destination: Market Rasen |
Luckily our journey back to London was a lot less complicated than our journey to Lincolnshire, so we had a successful end to our wonderful 51st walk!
Access for wheelchair users
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| Typical rough path on the Viking Way |
As this walk follows a rough path along the Wolds, most of it was inaccessible for wheelchair users - however, there is a relatively quiet country lane from Nettleton all the way to Walesby (or Claxby, if you take a detour), which could be an alternative accessible route. The paths through Middle Rasen plantation and Walesby Moor were also accessible.
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