The Road goes ever on and on; Down from the door where it began;
Now far ahead the Road has gone; And I must follow, if I can;
Pursuing it with eager feet; Until it joins some larger way;
Where many paths and errands met; And whither then? I cannot say.
[JRR Tolkien, Lord of the Rings]

Friday, 30 September 2016

WCP: Ferryside to Pembrey

Friday 30 September

Distance: 14.1 miles

Weather: Sunshine and showers

I didn’t follow the WCP route out of Ferryside this morning, as it headed inland up over some lumpy bits, as I guessed it would probably involve yet more soggy farmland and another tedious game of ‘spot the gate’, so instead I took the coast road which, as its name suggests, runs along the coast. Five vehicles passed me during the four and a half miles to Kidwelly.

After a pause there for an enormous Belgian Bun and coffee, I had intended to continue on the WCP, as now it took a line nearer to the sea than the road, but I must have been away in la-la land, as I missed the turn, and by the time I realised it didn’t make sense to go back. I did, however, feel like I was cheating by taking the road-based shortcut, so when I got to the point where the WCP rejoined the road, I followed it in the wrong direction, then turned around and walked back again.

One of a number of rainbows were seen as I first glimpsed the sea on this out-and-back detour:

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Back on the road, I was soon on my way into Pembrey Forest and after what seemed like an awful lot of wiggling around I finally reached an exciting point: as I dropped onto the beach I made the final turn of the trip. This beach was going to lead me all the way to where I finished my walk from Chepstow to Pembrey in March 2015…

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What a fantastic place to finish a Welsh Coastal walk!

…or so I thought. It was only when I turned inland to find Mick that I started to worry that nothing looked familiar, and after a further exploration of the map I realised that I had been mistaken about the route I had taken previously. It was soon solved with a quick out and back walk, which took me to this point, where I’d definitely been before:

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And that was that. Over the course of a number of trips, I have now walked the whole of the way around the Welsh Coast, including Anglesey, and even though a couple of the last few days have been less than fun, they have been very much the exception. Now, which bit of coast shall I make into my next project?

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9 comments:

  1. Louise30 September 2016 at 20:31

    That was fun!
    There's plenty to go at...

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    Replies
    1. Gayle30 September 2016 at 20:57

      Very good fun indeed, from my point of view - except for the nose incident!

      Delete
  2. Sir Hugh30 September 2016 at 21:09

    Well done. Just keep going and see if you can catch up Ruth, Coastal Walker. She is currently approximately somewhere in my domain, but you never can tell because she posts maybe one or two weeks in arrears, and she is doing it in short forays from her home in East Anglia
    Is.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Gayle9 October 2016 at 14:23

      My thinking is to tackle the places where there are official coast paths first, during which time (hopefully) more sections of the complete English Coast Path will be opened, making my route planning and finding easier for me.

      Delete
  3. AlanR1 October 2016 at 14:51

    Well Done Gayle. What about Skye coast.

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    Replies
    1. Gayle9 October 2016 at 14:24

      Caught in good weather, that would be a spectacular option, even if a bit of a trek to get there.

      Delete
  4. Dawn2 October 2016 at 10:56

    Fantastic, indeed fantabulous!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Phreerunner16 October 2016 at 20:37

    Well done Gayle. For your next project perhaps you could start with Arran, move on to Mull, then graduate to Skye, walking over Marilyns first, then going round the coasts.
    Perhaps a sea kayak would be useful?

    ReplyDelete

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