Distance: 14.5 miles (Tot: 161.5)
Weather: high cloud, sunny intervals, warm
Number of emu: 1
Park Lea guest house was a good choice last night, and after a very comfortable night and an excellent cooked breakfast we strode out this morning to retrace our steps by a few hundred yards.
Our day primarily featured the River Witham, which is more like a large canal than a river. Its straight lines cry out 'man made' and (perhaps unsurprisingly as there were no contour lines on today's map either) it barely had any flow visible. Whilst rivers or canals aren't generally one of my favourite types of walking, today's was particularly pleasing. Perhaps it was because, by being at the dizzy altitude of 5m on top of the flood-defence bank, we had extensive views of the surrounding flatness. It probably also helped that the weather was better than expected.
A while outside of Boston I happened to look back and wished I had sooner as directly lined up with the straight river was the imposing (massive) tower of the church in Boston. There should be a (poor quality) snap of it above, which can't possibly do it justice.
As if by magic, just as we were thinking about lunch some benches appeared ahead of us, so we had a comfortable break sitting in the sun on the riverside, watching the ducks and swans go about their business. We then discovered that our bench also gave a view of the tower and a section of the runway at RAF Conningsby, where, in the half an hour we were there, three Typhoons were seen to take off and one Chinook land.
The afternoon was short on miles, but we strung it out firstly by sitting and admiring the fantastic-looking Tattershall Castle (there should be a photo of the castle above too) for a short while and then by feeling the need for an ice cream when we found a shop in the village. We consumed our ices on the village green, sitting opposite a girl with her pet iguana on her shoulder.
It wasn't then far to the campsite but it turned out that the entrance was at the far end - 600 yards away. Having walked all the way up to the entrance, we then had to walk 600 yards back once booked in, as that's where the tent area is (and of course we couldn't possibly pitch in a hook-up area, even though there's plenty of room).
Rumour has it that the weather is going to take a turn for the wetter for the next couple or three days. S'pose we couldn't realistically expect the recent good run to last much longer!
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Just about in my old neck of the woods, Coningsby is just down the road from my mum. Should be finding a few contours soon, just gentle ones.
ReplyDeleteIf you go through Stixwould look out for a farm on the right just to the north of the village (TF 166 666). Here I was bitten by a dog for the first time ever - it was a benign looking, aged Labrador which was followed up by a wretched, ferocious little terrier.
ReplyDeleteI camped at Chapel Hill just to the south of you - a rotten site, and I became heartily sick of the Coningsby jets which never seemed to rest.
Keep the posts coming. A bit of virtual walking is doing me good before I get off to Fife a week tomorrow.