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Nadine Walks

stories of trekking and travel

Blisters and Jane Eyre; Day 4 on the Pennine Way, Hebden Bridge to Haworth, 15(ish) miles

November 15, 2018

Blister paaaaiiiiiinnnnn!

I’m promise this is (sort of) the last post where I’ll talk about my blisters. Maybe I’ll mention them in the next post. But I’m not sure how else to lead off a post from this fourth day of walking on the Pennine Way, from Hebden Bridge to Haworth, without making it pretty much all about my blisters.

Because this day was all about my blisters. Blisters, and Jane Eyre. But Jane comes later.

I’d woken up early- after a decent night’s sleep in my private room at Hebden Bridge Hostel- and after packing my things I went downstairs to take advantage of the complimentary breakfast. I’d bought some yogurt the day before, and along with a hot cup of coffee and a big bowl of cereal that the hostel provided, I felt ready for my day ahead.

leaving Hebden Bridge on the Pennine Way

What I remember most about leaving the hostel is that, on my walk back along the canal and heading out of town, I had to stop and adjust the bandages on my toes. I wasn’t even 20 minutes into the day’s walk and I had my pack opened before me, my little medicine bag open, my socks and shoes off. Once the blisters were re-wrapped I was again on my way, but my steps were still painful. It wasn’t impossible to walk- not at all- but the pain was ever-present.

But worse than the pain was my worry over the carefully planned itinerary I’d set for myself. I was going to walk the Pennine Way in 15-days, and this is a slightly ambitious plan but one that I thought I could manage. (In hindsight, if I were doing this over I’d give myself a minimum of 17-days, but I’ll save that post for another time). One of the issues with my itinerary was that I’d planned a 26-mile day for myself towards the beginning of the walk, the entire reason being that I’d wanted to detour to Haworth. The details here aren’t important, but basically, the detour meant that I’d have to cover a whopping 26-miles the next day if I wanted to keep on track and finish the walk in the time that I’d allotted.

On a good day- weather wise and with feet and legs in good working condition- 26-miles on the 5th day of a long walk would be difficult, but possible. But as I walked out of Hebden Bridge that morning, my four little blisters crying up to me with every step, I couldn’t imagine how I’d be able to accomplish what I’d set out to do.

walking through the bogs, Pennine Way

And stopping in Haworth was a priority. Haworth is the home of the Brontës, that great literary family of the nineteenth century, and while I haven’t read all of the works from Charlotte and Emily and Anne, I adore the story of Jane Eyre. I’d also heard about the family’s home- the parsonage- and once, years before, I’d seen an old photograph, a grainy black and white image of a solid old home set against a wild and stormy sky, surrounded by open, empty fields. “I’d like to go there one day,” I said to myself.

When I was researching the Pennine Way and discovered that Haworth was just a few miles detour from the main path, I knew I’d have to work this into my plans.

But since the 26-miles wouldn’t be until the next day, I decided to push that detail out of my mind and focus on what was around me. And despite the blister pain, and despite how the path began to rise rather steeply as I made my way off the canal and through the hamlet of Mytholm, I loved the path. There was something really beautiful about the morning, about the dark and quiet little cemetery tucked into the side of the hill, about the way the path narrowed and curved around tiny waterfalls and stone cottages, steps tucked into the dirt, how flowers seemed to spill out onto the path- a burst of red and pink and white.

cemetery on the Pennine Way, out of Mytholm

lush path of the Pennine Way, Mytholm

gate on the Pennine Way, Mytholm

Once I climbed well away from the canal and passed through a series of farms (and an orchard!), I entered Heptonstall Moor, the first true moorland of the walk. Ahh, now this was what I had been waiting for. There is just something about an open landscape, about the wide skies and the fields that stretch to the horizon, and the feeling of vastness and freedom. It’s my very favorite kind of walking. I’d discovered this back when I walked the Camino Frances and really loved the Meseta, and on the Norte with all those sweeping coastal views, and the Aubrac Plateau on the Chemin du Puy. But it was crossing through moorland on the West Highland Way  that had me researching other walks through the UK. “I want more of this moorland,” I’d said to myself.

And here it was. A winding, faint path through the heather, stone slabs appearing occasionally to prevent wet, muddy feet and to help guide the way. I stopped in a grassy spot by a creek for a snack- a banana, a handful of dried apricots, a few rounds of Babybel cheese- and then continued walking through the moorland, on service roads and past reservoirs, on grass and dirt and more stone slabs.

path through the moorland heading to Top Withens, Pennine Way

lunch break on the Pennine Way

Eventually the path wound up to Top Withens, the farm that was supposedly the inspiration for Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights (this is greatly debated and totally unproven, but accuracy aside, Top Withens has become associated with Wuthering Heights and is quite the tourist destination). I’d been alone all morning long, passing the occasional hiker, but now that I’d arrived at Top Withens it seemed as though everyone else had, too.

I walked around the remains of the old farmhouse and then found a quiet spot on the hill behind the building and ate another snack. The skies were overcast that day, and I started to get cold there on the hillside, with the wind whipping around and I could imagine that Emily Brontë had walked here once, or maybe a dozen times, among the weathered stone and gnarled tree branches and dreamt up her dark tale of Catherine and Heathcliff.

Top Withens, Pennine Way

The path detours just after Top Withens, with the Pennine Way carrying straight on and the detour to Haworth descending down to the right. I had about 3 1/2 miles to go, and most of the way was pleasant, but the last bit of walking on the road had my blisters roaring again. But I could see the town of Haworth in the distance and it was early afternoon when I arrived, giving me plenty of time to check into my B&B and then head back into the town for some site-seeing.

I was staying in the Apothecary Tea House which was right in the center of the town, in a quaint square filled with shops and restaurants. Haworth has a youth hostel and when I was planning my itinerary I think the hostel still had open beds, but it was located a mile and a half up a long hill on the way out of town, and I decided that I was going to splurge on a B&B.

Apothecary Tea House, Haworth

And I’m so glad that I did! The staff were among the kindest of any that I’d met on my walk; the owner greeted me when I arrived and when he found out I was from Philadelphia, referenced every song and movie he could think of (and then told me more at breakfast the next morning). I was taken up to my room and even though I had only been walking for 4 days, the room felt like an oasis. A  big soft mattress and extra blankets, a sink in the corner of the room with a fluffy hand towel (and a full bathroom that I had sole use of, with toiletries and more fluffy towels), a large window that overlooked the town, a hot water kettle and a tin full of tea. I took off my shoes and socks and made a mug of tea and stretched out on the bed before I did anything else.

relaxing in a B&B on the Pennine Way

After my shower I headed back out, but before touring the Brontë parsonage I made a stop at the tourism office. I’d made a decision when I’d been up in my room drinking my tea. When checking in, the owner of the B&B asked what time I’d like to have breakfast the next morning. “What’s the earliest time you begin serving?” I asked.

“8:00am,” he said. “It’s a little later than usual because it’s a Sunday morning.”

I told him that 8:00 would be fine and then I set about coming up with a Plan B for the next day. I knew I’d never be able to walk the full 26-miles if I started at 8:00am, especially if my blisters were slowing me down. Haworth had a train station, so I figured that there must be a way to skip a portion of the path.

In continuing with the trend of ‘Haworth as the friendliest village just off the Pennine Way’, the women at the tourism office spent a good 20 minutes with me in order to figure out a plan. They gave me multiple maps and timetables and made phone calls and wrote down train numbers and assured me that not walking 26-miles was absolutely, positively, the right thing to do.

village of Haworth, England

Initially, I thought that I might just be able to skip about 10 miles of the path, and still give myself a decent day’s walk, but after looking at options and considering the state of my feet, I settled on a plan that would cut out nearly 20 miles of my planned walk. I’d still have about 6 to do, but it would practically be a rest day, and maybe it would even give my feet a decent shot of healing.

Armed with a plan and the friendliness of the village of Haworth, I bought a ticket into the Brontë parsonage and of course everyone there was friendly and helpful too. The man who greeted visitors as they entered the house followed me around the rooms for a bit; I’d come during a quiet pocket of time, and as I walked from the drawing room to the kitchen to the dining room, he pointed out small details and told me interesting facts.

Brontë parsonage, Haworth

The table where the sisters wrote each evening!

This kind of site-seeing isn’t something I normally do during my long walks, but this time it felt just right. I wanted to learn more of the Brontë sisters, to see where they lived and wrote; I was, quite literally, walking in their footsteps through this part of the Pennine Way, and I wanted to immerse myself into their world. On my out of the parsonage I stopped in the gift shop and bought a 488-page copy of Jane Eyre. My pack was already heavy- was I crazy to add this very unnecessary weight?

I’ve never carried a book on any of my walks but now I don’t think I’ll walk without one. It adds extra weight, sure, but I can’t explain how wonderful it was to read a few chapters of this book every night in my empty bunkhouses, eating ginger cookies and drinking tea and night after night and then even into the day, Jane became my companion. I was walking alone but I was also walking with this great character. “Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong!”

I read the first few chapters that night, in my cozy room in the center of Haworth, a mug of hot tea and a bag of chocolate candies and if I’d had any dreams that night, I think they were probably full of the wild and windy moors.

reading Jane Eyre on the Pennine Way

the moors of the Pennine Way

Previous Post: Day 3 on the Pennine Way

Next Post: Day 5 on the Pennine Way

8 Comments / Filed In: Pennine Way, solo-female travel, Travel, walking, Writing
Tagged: Brontes, Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, England, Haworth, Hebden Bridge, hiking, Jane Eyre, pennine way, solo-female travel, Top Withens, travel, walking, writing, Wuthering Heights

Day 3 on the Pennine Way: Standedge to Hebden Bridge, 19-ish miles

November 11, 2018

We left off on our Pennine Way adventure with packing up my tent on the morning of Day 3. I was in Standedge and would be heading to Hebden Bridge, a distance of approximately, well, I’m not sure exactly how many miles. My notes said the day should be 14.5 miles, but the actual mileage ended up around 19, so somewhere, I’d miscalculated. Either that, or I’d walked more than I was supposed to (spoiler: I walked more than I was supposed to).

signposts along the Pennine Way

Nevertheless, the day wasn’t set to be particularly challenging; there was much less ascent and the sun was shining brightly. But there was a new element, one that had appeared late around lunchtime the day before. I’d started to feel it as I walked along the reservoirs and at first I thought maybe my sock was just a bit bunched up, or perhaps there was a pebble in my shoe. I tried to shuffle and shake my foot around but after awhile there was no mistaking it: I had a blister developing on the bottom of my right foot.

And as I started walking away from Standedge I could feel the discomfort immediately. For the first few hours of the walk, as  I walked along Millstone Edge and then up the path to White Hill, I could mostly ignore the irritation, but as I continued to walk, things grew worse. I noticed a rubbing on my left foot as well, both on the bottom of my foot and on one of my toes, and when I finally stopped to take off my socks and assess the situation, there were a total of three little blisters on my feet. (A fourth would also develop sometime either this day or the next, ayy!).

What caused this? Careful readers might remember that I had purchased a different hiking shoe model before this walk (my beloved Keen Voyageurs had changed!), and a new shoe before a long walk/hike can be quite the gamble. But I had done plenty of training in them before I’d left for England, and they were as comfortable as the old Keen model. So, ultimately, I don’t blame the shoes. I suspect it was that first 20-mile day through the rain, walking in very wet shoes and socks (I still think a non-waterproof hiking shoe is the best option for summer walking, at least for me, but if it rains hard, it does mean wet feet).

In any case, there was nothing to be done now. The blisters were here.

path of the Pennine Way, out of Standedge

It was when I stopped to look at my feet that I ran into Charlie. She was a 25-year old girl from Norfolk that I’d briefly met that morning, as we each packed up our campsite. She had walked the first two stages of the Pennine Way in one (long and crazy) day, and was currently recalculating her plans.

“I only have 12 days to do the walk and I thought I could do it, but now I’m not so sure,” she said. “My body is exhausted and this is only my second day.”

friends on the Pennine Way

We continued on together for another hour or two until we reached The White House, a perfectly situated pub next to the trail, and we arrived just in time for lunch. (Tip: there really aren’t too many opportunities to stop for lunch in a pub on the Pennine Way. So when you come across something and the timing is right, take advantage!). Nigel and Judy (my Pennine Way angels that had helped me get to Edale) were seated at a table in the corner, and just as Charlie and I were finishing our lunch, David (my trail angel who helped me find the path on that first, rainy day) came through the door.

I was barely three days into the Pennine Way, and the biggest surprise was the community that I was finding along the trail. I’d known that the Pennine Way- or any hiking in the UK- wasn’t like the Camino, and my experiences on the West Highland Way and Hadrian’s Wall were pretty solo. People were friendly, but I certainly hadn’t made any friends. But so far, this route was different, and it reminded me a little of the Camino: how in just a few days, you regard the people you’d met as something like family. Walk into a pub, and everyone shouts your name in greeting.

Charlie and I continued on, and walked together all the way into Hebden Bridge. The day continued to be sunny and warm, and we talked about everything as we walked: our impressions of the Pennine Way, our lives at home, our families, differences between grocery shopping in the US and the UK, the pain in our feet, the places we wanted to travel to. I suspect that we inadvertently added a few miles onto the day’s walk sometime after lunch at The White House. Actually, now that I’m looking at my guidebook, I suspect that we veered off the Pennine Way to walk the circumference of White Holme Reservoir. In hindsight this makes sense, because this section seemed endless. Charlie and I were walking at a pretty quick pace, and yet, we seemed to be getting nowhere.

endless walk along the reservoir, Pennine Way

During all these afternoon miles, we could see good ol’ Stoodley Pike in the distance, a needle-shaped monument that was supposed to celebrate the defeat of Napoleon (but, after he escaped from Elba, the celebration was a moot point). When we finally arrived at the monument, we threw our packs on the ground and climbed the winding stairs up to a small observation deck, where we could look out into the countryside.

The landscape of the Pennine Way was changing. Where we had once been walking through peat moors, we’d now be heading into a more pastoral countryside, with green fields and limestone.

Stoodley Pike, Pennine Way

view from Stoodley Pike, Pennine Way

The walk into Hebden Bridge also seemed to take forever. Hebden Bridge is a bit of a detour from the path of the Pennine Way, but I think it’s a worthwhile one: the walk into the village is along a flower-lined canal with houseboats floating lazily in the water and music drifting from nearby gardens. Hebden Bridge itself is an artistic town full of independent shops, great cafés and restaurants, with a lively arts and music scene.

canal path to Hebden Bridge, Pennine Waycanal towpath to Hebden Bridge, Pennine Way

Charlie and I passed straight through town and up a large hill to get to our hostel (I wrote a post for Independent Hostels UK about this hostel!), and later, went back into town for dinner.

I was happy to have company for the night. I’d expected to be mostly alone during my trek on the Pennine Way, and to have found another young, solo female walker was unexpected and fun. We ate a huge spread of food at a Greek restaurant and later, back at the hostel, we made mugs of tea and split a bag of Maltese candies and spread out our maps and planned the next few days of our walk. Charlie would be walking a shorter day in order to meet up with her mother and sister, and had decided to later skip over a few days of the trail so she could finish by her end date. I suspected that I wouldn’t be seeing her again, so that night we gave each other a big hug and exchanged contact info. “Now you have a friend in England,” she said.

Hebden Bridge Youth Hostel, Pennine Way

I crawled into bed, happy and sore, the blisters on my feet throbbing, the sights of the day running through my head. 3 days down, 12 more to go!

 

Previous Post: Day 2 on the Pennine Way

Next Post: Day 4 on the Pennine Way

3 Comments / Filed In: Pennine Way, walking
Tagged: England, Hebden Bridge, hiking, hiking adventures, pennine way, solo female travel, Stoodley Pike, travel, trekking, walking

Welcome! I’m Nadine: a traveler, a pilgrim, a walker, a writer, a coffee drinker. This is where I share my stories, my thoughts and my walks. I hope you enjoy the site!
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