WEEKLY BLOG EPISODE 76 | THE SALT PATH

Well getting back to Sunday posting lasted all of two weeks. Maybe my weekly blog is destined to be a Tuesday or Wednesday affair after all?! Even with being off work for a whole week I didn’t manage it. But I guess that’s the beauty of deadlines and schedules you set yourself… you can always change them.

In fairness, I had plenty of time on Sunday to write this, but chose to put my feet up for a couple of hours instead… I know, priorities hey?!

But it has been a good week. As I say, I had a week of annual leave. I wouldn’t say I did everything I wanted with my holiday from work, but I certainly got up to a few things that felt rather nice. We spent a couple of days in Devon, I had new tyres fitted on my bike, I spent time doing lots of boring but necessary paperwork, I did a medium sized walk on my local hill, and I did lots of relaxing.

So no big adventures, bucket list ticks, or long road trips to write about, but a good week none-the-less. Let me tell you about it in this week’s weekly blog episode.

A Short Camp in Devon

It was so good to get the Green Cone (read my review) out of storage and up in a field last week, my first camping trip of the year. Which considering we’re over half-way through the year is a poor show, but that’s been the nature of life recently.

Thanks to a recommendation, I found a lovely farm-based campsite in North Devon for a couple of nights, and it was just what I needed. And not only because we really hit the jackpot with the weather. It was forecast to be quite bad, and it did rain most of the way there, but we had warm sunshine most of the time, it was glorious.

We were based on the Hartland Peninsula, which is a particularly rocky and remote part of North Devon, right on the border with Cornwall. The whole area is within the North Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (another one scratched off my Maps International map), there are clifftop walks, plenty of coves, waterfalls, and as it’s reasonably quiet, lots of wildlife. You know I love a rugged landscape, and Harland definitely offers that; I imagine the area it quite unforgiving on stormy days (would love to sit at Blackchurch Rock in a storm…).

We did some short walks along the South West Coast Path, visited a rock formation that’s been on my to-see list for a while, ate local pub food and an excellent cream tea, and drove over to Tintagel Castle to see King Arthur.

One of the best things was watching the sunset over the sea at Hartland Quay on Monday, the longest day of the year. It was utterly beautiful, we couldn’t have asked for better.

I shall write a “36 hours on the Hartland Peninsula” blog post, because I think my outdoors focused blog needs one of those (let’s see how long that takes me to write… I still haven’t written about my didn’t-go-to-Poland road trip from last autumn), so I won’t say too much more about it here.

I hope to get the Green Cone out at least twice more in the next month, and if those camping trips are anything like this one I’m going to be a very happy outdoors loving person.

Mini Book Review | The Salt Path, Raynor Winn

I’ve not shared many of the books I’m reading (listening to) recently, but this week I finished one I would love to recommend to you.

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn is about a couple who deal with huge despair by walking the South West Coast Path. It’s a true story about coming to terms with grief, about love and loss, and about doing something proactive rather than sitting back and letting things happen to you.

I know this book has divided people, some seeing Raynor and Moth as spongers and scroungers who made poor decisions, others seeing it as an inspiring story of life and discovery. I choose the latter, to be inspired by the walk and by the story. I enjoyed the descriptions of the path, the commentary on life as a long-distance hiker, and especially the fact that the simple act of walking became their lifeline.

I warmed to Raynor and Moth, and while in the first few chapters I was a little worried it was going to be a very sad book to listen to, was pleased that it was an uplifting one. Considering I was in Devon and Cornwall walking bits of the South West Coast Path it did seem a rather apt read, but I definitely would have enjoyed it even without that.

And yes, now I definitely want to walk the whole path. Maybe one day.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CQjB91sjuoK/

I am looking forward to reading Raynor Winn’s follow-up book, The Wild Silence, which was released just a couple of months ago. But first I have a different adventure story to finish off – The Impulsive Explorer by Karen Espley.

In this true adventure story, which is definitely the kind of book that I enjoy the most, Karen takes a life-changing trip to the Antarctic which leads to her making an impulsive decision to leave the corporate world behind completely. I dream of spending some time in the Arctic and Antarctic one day… I’m rather hoping this book fuels that wanderlust.

I actually started this paperback (yes, a real book, with pages and words and everything) at the Spa (read Weekly Blog Episode 74), but now I’ve finished my latest audiobook I have picked it back up again. Review to come when I’ve finished it.

As always, I would really love to hear from you in the comments below. What have been the highlights of your week? Let me know what your favourite thing about the last seven days has been. And don’t forget to get your One Hour Outside today… whatever day you happen to be reading this on!

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