Best Pals

 It's not often that I wear a tie but on Common Riding Day it's nice to be smart and of course John is always smart.

Bruce & John

Langholm Common Riding

 Crossing the Ewes and by now he was looking a much happier Cornet

 A very apprehensive Cornet Earsman before he heads up the Kirk Wynd.

 Cornet Earsman flanked by the Right & and Left hand men on their way up the Kirk Wynd

Ray Elliot cries the Langholm Fair

The Journey Home

 The return journey was even more spectacular than the one down a week ago with a larger Jet laid on to take David, Tom, and myself back to Carlisle airport. We left the holiday house at 9.45am and by 12 noon we were back in Langholm. A great week's walking in excellent company and with superb weather and excellent food. Martin & John were staying on in Cornwall for a few more days in John's case and a week for Martin.

The Bays and Beaches of North Cornwall

 In our week of walking we covered 55 miles of the North Cornwall Coastal Footpath plus another 7 miles along the Camel Trail. We seemed to just go from one Bay or Beach to another and each one was spectacular in it's own way. Some of them could only be reached  by walking the Coastal Footpath so they were usually empty. These 14 photographs are of the many beaches on our route and there are probably at least another 6 more as by the end of each day I was usually too tired to bother about taking another photograph.

Walking the Cornwall Coastal Path

 Early on the first day when we totally misjudged how far the walk would be and had to walk 13 miles instead of the planned 9 from Holywell Bay to Trenance . By the end of the day we were absolutely shattered and poor Martin had bad blisters. The reason we misjudged the distance was we were unaware how much the footpath winds in and out along the coast. There are also many occassions when we dropped down to sea level and then had to climb back up to 350ft only to drop down to sea level again half an hour later.

 A Cornish Tin Mine on the route.

 This stretch of beach is over 2 miles long and despite it being a lovely day there was hardly anybody on it.

 One of several Lighthouses on our route

 On Thursday we first of all walked the Camel Trail from Wadebridge to Padstow and then took the ferry from Padstow to Rock and walked for another 3 miles to the small Church called Endonoc where John Betjeman is buried. Martin pays homage to this great poet.

 This seat overlooking the grave of John Betjeman was an ideal place to stop for a break and the views from it were just stunning.

 On Thursday evening we were joined by John's fiancee Sandria and dined very well in Rick Stein's Cafe.

David having a well earned rest after walking along this very difficult footpath on the final day of our walk.

Travel to Cornwall

 Our annual walking week was in Cornwall walking the North Cornwall Coastal Path. We were delighted to be offered the use of a Private Jet by David so took off from Carlisle at about 1.20pm and arrived at Newquay airport just over an hour later. Definately the best way to travel. David unfortunately had a funeral in Glasgow on Monday so he flew down after it and joined us on Monday evening. The plan was to walk about 10 miles a day for 6 days. The weather was glorious when we took off and it stayed that way until Monday night when we had heavy rain, but Tuesday's walk was again in excellent weather and this was the pattern for the rest of the week with rain at night and lovely weather during the day. Only on the Friday afternoon did we encounter a couple of showers during the time we were walking.