I was woken out of my moonlit slumber by people talking, coming up the spiral stone stairway to the upper floor where I’d made my bed. I sat up, fumbled my glasses on in time for their bright torch to sweep over me, bringing them to a halt. We paused, something swinging from the boy’s hand and two or three dogs flickering in and out of the torchlight. One came up and licked the hand I was holding up against the light and this broke the spell, the boys backed away down the stairs.
“D’you wanna fag,” one of them called out. I didn’t answer, not wanting to confirm I was a woman, waiting for them to leave. As their lights swept away amongst the trees, I found my hands were trembling.
I hated to be discovered at night. Constrained by energy and budget, I needed to be able to have the flexibility to sleep anywhere, yet I wanted no-one to see where I was sleeping. I preferred it that way because every time I asked permission to camp somewhere, I was pointing to a place and saying, “Look, I, an unaccompanied woman, am going to be unconscious on the floor over there for the whole night.” I couldn’t do it. Staying hidden, stealthy, untraceable, hiding from other humans, was how I, as a solo female, kept myself safe. Too many years of propositions while hitchhiking, of furtive gropes in nightclubs, of women I knew being assaulted and raped, too many years of having to guard myself against male sexuality aggressively expressed. I didn’t experience any negative incidents while I walked, none at all, but maybe that’s because I was so careful about hiding myself. There’s a deep vulnerability in lapsing into sleep in public, both in an animal sense and as a woman alone.
Leaves skipped and tumbled alongside me, keeping my pace as I walked the length of the seaweed-strewn beach towards Porthcawl. Storms were forecast so I hid in the town centre, waiting out the 50mph winds. First a shower at the gym, then coffee in the ice-cream parlour, watching the ancient Italian vanguard chatting at a back table as their children polished and cleaned their inheritance, serving and nodding with long-practised recognition.
An old man acting confused, army medals pinned to his jacket, out of place anywhere else, but here just ‘Dai’, known, accepted, even if only with amused tolerance. I imagined the beach out there, battering me with wind and noise, and turned away, heading instead to a cheap, anonymous pub. I folded down into a deep seat with a sigh, attracting the attention of an elderly woman nearby. We chatted a bit and she offered to buy me lunch in memory of her son who had died from cancer long before but hadn’t been forgotten. Hers was yet another ordinary face with a heart-felt history. I accepted and began looking at the menu but I wasn’t really ready for food yet and began daydreaming, watching the windows from the comfort of my bucket-seat. I could see scraps and papers flying through the air outside, people staggering on street corners as the waiting gusts slapped them, umbrellas turned inside out. Swags of wiring swung like skipping-ropes, wildly careening in the air, way up over the streetlights.
Suddenly the woman came over to the table, coat on. She’d put £20 behind the bar – for someone on my budget it was an incredible amount for just one meal. I stammered my thanks; as usual my gratitude was too huge to express without embarrassment. I stuffed myself with a burger and ice-cream and still had enough credit for two cheese baguettes. The foil-wrapped baguette bullets were still warm as I took them, packing them away carefully for later consumption.
The storm passed over Porthcawl as I ate my gifted meal, and I left the pub to make progress in the couple of hours left before dark. The setting sun reflected on silver sands and I followed flat roads to the edge of town, where I found a small secluded field to put my tent up in, just before the sandy golf course began. I sat in the tented dimness feeling peaceful, knowing that, although it gets incredibly hard and sometimes I’m tired or sad or fed up, there’s a part of me that never stops enjoying this.
The following day I walked all the way past Port Talbot, stopping for a while in a pub where violence simmered. It had grubby carpets and peeling wallpaper, warnings against drug-taking papered all the way to the toilets. This was a place where people were careful of eye contact, where people sat and stared into space while others muttered conversations in corners or held court at the bar. I walked around the huge domineering steelworks, the strange steams and smells, the grand pipeworks and chimney. It was an unfriendly place for a long-distance walker, there was nowhere to sit or stop. I had to keep winding on through the long thin line of estates that filled the unpleasant space between the motorway and the works. Eventually I made it to the seaside part of town, a long concrete promenade giving way to high walls of sand dunes, and I could finally feel I was distant enough from people to tent up in the centre of the dunes and sleep.
A long, hard day on tarmac and my feet were throbbing. I’d overstretched myself, walked past my usual ten- or twelve-mile limit, through discomfort and into too much pain. I followed with great care the usual routines of foot-rubs, easing the tension out of my muscles as much as possible, stretching my calves, wiggling my ankles, trying to make sure that they wouldn’t hurt again tomorrow.
The final baguette made my tent supper, sitting with the door open watching the sand change colour with the darkening sky. I was sick overnight. I’d waited too long to eat the warm food received in the pub and it had obviously fermented in its foil wrappings. A moonlit tummy upset, scraping sand to cover my unpleasant leavings. I felt weak and shaky the next day, but fortunately it was only six miles to Swansea where I had another place to stay: Neil and Clare, a friendly couple I’d met on the Cistercian Way near Tenby. Months later I was finally here, to accept their offer of a bed. It was mostly a barren roadside trudge along the main motorway turnoff into the city, enlivened by a couple of quiet miles along the Tennant canal. I kept meeting older, weathered men who would walk alongside me for a while and tell me their life-stories in thick Swansea accents, a total pleasure to listen to.
During a few nights camping on my way to the tip of the Gower, I bedded down in a churchyard. That night the chill wind whipped over me straight from the sea and I was way too cold, my sleeping bag was too thin to withstand windy autumn nights. The wild camping had to stop; it was time to retreat inside the tent. I still kept at it though, always looking for a way to avoid the hassle of putting up a tent.
An unsettling experience on my way back to Swansea made me reconsider the ethics of wild camping.
It was getting dark as I came to a thin strip of road lined by a bank of rich houses on one side, an open area of land leading to cliff edge on the other. The Gower is where the rich South Walians escape to. I saw empty houses, second homes, high-class building work being done; blue glass balconies and large windows were clear markers of modern, monied architecture. The ribbon of road led to a farm in a cleft between higher hills and the coastal path turned away over open grassland to follow along the edge of the cliffs. The problem was the cows. They roamed the space between the houses and the sea. There was nowhere to hide from them, just scattered gorse bushes, too spiky and unfriendly to wriggle under. Nowhere to put up a sleeping space without the chance that a cow would come and trample me, its heavy, clumsy hooves thudding onto my tender legs. All the space that was flat and narrow enough to lay a tired body down on had been investigated, churned and opened wide by bovine traffic. I couldn’t face trudging off along the cliffs, not knowing for how long the open area would continue, or what would come next. The sun was setting and I’d walked enough, I had to stop soon.
I kept looking into the houses along the left-hand side of the road, hoping for an obviously empty house or a building site open enough for me to sneak into and lie down in a corner. Nothing seemed easy, and I was too timid to venture into the ones that seemed possible, fearing to be seen by neighbours. There was nowhere safe to sleep and it was starting to get dark.
The final house was a bungalow behind a high hedge. Noticeably shabbier than the others, it had a forlorn, abandoned feeling to it, unmown grass and drawn curtains. I walked in through the gate and wondered, could I sleep here? It was th
e last definitely cow-free place before the open cliffs. There was a quiet orchard beyond the lawn, grass grown long and folded, apples dropped and rotting. I walked to the bungalow and knocked, thinking perhaps I’d ask permission to sleep in the garden but there was no answer. Empty house, I thought, and walked around the back to the orchard, laying out my tarpaulin. But I was wrong.
Boom! My heart jumped in my chest. There was movement inside the house.
“I’m sorry, I needed a safe place to sleep, away from the cows, and I wanted to camp in your garden. I knocked at the door and thought the house was empty.”
It was so hard to go back to the door and say these words, but I had to immediately admit my mistake. I was totally in the wrong and had to accept the force of the owner’s displeasure.
“Why would I open the door when someone knocks on it?”
The man kept his body behind the door, just his head sticking out, bespectacled and glaring, a mixture of bald pink skin and unkempt hair. He was incredibly angry and frightened. A strong smell of weed came flooding through the doorway; the house was saturated with it.
“No-one answers the door any more. It’s all phone-calls nowadays.”
This felt very immediately not OK, a situation fraught with unpredictability and therefore potentially dangerous. I judged it best to apologise and back away, hurriedly pack my bag and retreat, head bowed. He was right to be upset, whatever the logic of the world he held close inside his home.
I was sorry that I’d accidentally breached the security of his retreat. Sorry that I had accidentally made a paranoid person’s world view worse, their perceptions less trustworthy.
I’d trespassed on that man’s property, so fixated on my own needs I forgot that it was all trespassing, every time I bedded down somewhere without permission.
I closed the gate, shamefaced, and returned to the previous problem. Twilight now, and cows still roaming. I walked a short way towards the farm and turned in at the next field. Once I’d climbed over the gate, trespassing again, there was a long tractor-trailer with a single axle, left down on the ground so that its back end lifted high into the air. A diagonal of planks and metal, with enough room for me to wriggle underneath, my head almost under the thick metal axle, positioning my body carefully to avoid a stray coil of wire and the light rain that was starting to fall. I was starting to relax into sleep when a tractor came along the lane and paused, engine rattling, by the entrance to the field. The gate opened and the tractor came through it.
What was happening? All these unexpected people! As the tractor roared into the field and swung around towards the hay bales, I struggled out of my sleeping-bag so as not to be caught vulnerable on the ground. I stood near the trailer for safety, but far enough away that I would be caught in the beam of the headlights as the tractor swung around towards the bales, golden drops of water misting the air. I was the unexpected one, the trespasser, I had to make myself known and await his response. Anger, punishment, whatever that was.
“Oh that’s OK,” the man said. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell the boss…”
It was a surprisingly casual response that came so often from the people who worked the land when they found me in barns, sleeping on commons, or under an upended trailer next to a stack of huge black plastic hay-bales. I told the tractor-driver the story of the accidental intrusion next door and he said the guy was dangerous, known for his odd habits, had attacked other locals, wasn’t a friendly neighbour. We wound up talking about his time as a security guard in Swansea; he was friendly and relaxed, trotting out his best stories as if we were round a table in a pub, not standing together in a dark field. He was a silhouette in the headlights, the fibrous outline of his woollen cap and clothing glowing bright gold. I don’t think I told him of my fundraising heroics, just remained an anonymous, apparently homeless figure.
I returned to Swansea with the promise of another night with Neil and Clare. Could I stay and have a rest day? I tried to take a rest day once a week but really it was when the opportunity manifested; I never spent a whole day in a tent, it was too intimidating to camp for two nights in the same spot, remain where anyone could come back to find me. Instead I took days when a friend’s house appeared en route, or if someone offered me an empty place to stay. I was ready to rest all the time; it was never a case of appropriate timing – only an appropriate place.
I was unused to asking and felt nervous in my hidden need. Asking for help brought me closer to the desperation that would follow a refusal.
“Yes, but we’re going away for the weekend.”
They left me a key and said goodbye half-way through Friday afternoon. I tried to pretend that I really would leave the following morning, but I knew I’d stay for the weekend. An empty flat was too tempting, the chance to wallow in junk food and television. I needed the blankness, the blessed relief of not walking.
I had to give in to the desire to stop, allow myself the rest I needed, but not allow myself to let the journey go by omission. I was afraid that I might keep stopping until I’d quit without ever stating the fact, without ever admitting that I found it too difficult. It was how I did things: how I’d failed my A-levels, how I’d given up on creative projects, how I’d given up on anything I was uncomfortable with. I’d slink away without facing the reality of failure, never admitting out loud that I couldn’t do it.
I knew deep down that I had this quality within myself and didn’t want to do it with this walk. I couldn’t quit, it was too important to me. Ovarian cancer had taken over my life, first through my own illness and then my desire to tell women about the symptoms. I had to finish, to walk back to hospital. I’d set myself this insane target and I wouldn’t let it slip away into nothing. I had to guard against my own tendencies but also allow myself the rest my body screamed for. I needed it to keep strong enough to complete this journey.
I prised myself, unwillingly, from the sofa of the Swansea flat on Sunday afternoon and set out north again. This time I headed directly towards Llandovery, and then resumed the mountain paths I’d followed southwards on the Cambrian Way. There were differences, approaching mountains from different faces, walking through different valleys, but the peaks were the same, I was going towards Plynlimon, Cader Idris, the Rhinogs, Cnicht, Snowdon, Glyders, Carneddau and descending again to Conwy.
The weather got colder as I headed inland. I loved the thrill of poking my head out of the tent in the mornings to discover that I’d survived a frosty night, my sleeping spot leaving a wonderful green patch in a crystal-white field corner. I was enjoying myself, despite the soggy tent and painful feet. I’d given up on trail mix, it tasted fine but the idea of eating it repulsed me. Fortunately, the meal repetition of cold couscous and mackerel remained appetising.
Waking up with a cold nose, poking outside my sleeping bag hood to see if it was light yet; pausing as I came down the hill into a silent, peaceful wooded valley and seeing a heron glide below me around the curve of a small river; trudging up a country lane; resting my pack against a fence post while I checked my map; early-morning fog lying low in the valley bottoms; the sun shining suddenly over a hill, lighting the remaining leaves on the trees around me with a pure yellow light; helping stranded worms to cross safely to the other side of the road; my new hat which had a huge bobble on it; copper bracken glowing in the sunlight, muddy farmyards, puddles in lanes… I loved all of this. Late November and if this was winter, I could handle it.
I was irritated to realise I’d planned badly for this section, finding myself without maps to cover my path over the western edge of the Black Mountain. I’d have to go by road instead, climbing up the safe way to cross the moorland between Brynamman and Dyffryn Tywi. This was a time where I sorely missed a support-team. Without help, minor problems grew to the size of a route diversion.
I’d had a great morning in Brynamman, waking up in a misty field, frost just beginning to creep around the edges of leaves and grass. After a few miles on the road I came to the village. Thr
ee women were standing at the door of a pharmacy, waving at me.
“Well done!” they said “Keep going! Call in at the Brynamman Community Centre, they’re waiting for you.”
They gave me packets of energy tablets and a £5 donation. Further up, into the village, there was the Centre. I found myself at the table of the café, bemused, with a huge cooked breakfast in front of me. Someone had recognised me on the road and phoned ahead, told them who I was and that they should treat me. Every pot of tea during that cold walking-time tasted incredible, hot and bitter and smooth. I gorged myself on a full plate of hot meat and oil, beans and bread and felt wonderful.
The day went downhill from there. I’d aimed to stay in the Llanddeusant Youth Hostel; after two nights camping, in freezing or near zero degree conditions, it was time to treat myself to a cheap bed. I’d have to push it a bit but I could do it, I reckoned. Fifteen miles was more than I could usually manage at that time, throbbing foot-pain usually setting in after about thirteen miles; but the thought of a bed and a shower drove me to try it. It was a solid tarmac trudge up and over the Black Mountain pass, pushing and pushing onwards, up into the clouds and down again, winding around the bends of the mountain road and into the wet farmlands on the other side. I kept checking my maps: seven miles to go and it was 3pm, two hours until sunset.
My feet started to really hurt, strong pain in the heels. I sat down and took my boots off for a while, the wet concrete soaking my legs. Adrenalin kicked in and I strode on, still a few miles to go as darkness fell, but I strapped my torch into my belt and continued, willing myself towards the bed waiting for me.
I walked in pitch black for the last hour, sweating up the last steep hill, pushing myself forward. I found myself focusing on a light ahead in the darkness and chanting to myself in a whisper over and over again, That. Is where. I’m going. That. Is where. I’m going. I was on auto-pilot, keeping myself in movement until I could reach the hostel and relax. Seven hours of near constant walking, fighting foot-pain, just keeping myself going and going.
One Woman Walks Wales Page 23