Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bus, Cornwall, hostel, short day, the walk
Cornwall – Boscastle
In the morning I was very pleased to find everything dry. The Path got very technical, with lots of altitude changes. I walked past a huge radar station. I have run out of food and was feeling exhausted. Lats night’s sleep was good, but it didn’t really do anything for me. The ankle got worse again. My speed dropped significantly and I got to Bude only by lunchtime. I realised that I walked only about 16 km (10 miles) in 5 hours. It was very hot and I decided to take a swim in the Atlantic just before I got to Bude. The water was very refreshing and put me in a better mood.
As soon as I got to Bude I had a big burger meal and a milkshake at a beach cafe. I was behind the schedule, still tired and kind of depressed. I started walking again without a proper rest, but as I was leaving Bude I decided to stop and assess my position. The paper schedule indicated that Boscastle (my planned checkpoint for that night) had a youth hostel from the YHA chain. I started thinking that I could take a bus there and spend the rest of the day eating and resting, thus catching up with the schedule and putting myself in a better physical condition. Another scenario was to carry on walking, fall behind the schedule and risk further exhaustion. I took the decision to “invest”, returned to Bude and found the bus stop. It was a Sunday, so the next bus would not come for some time. I spent time by eating ice-cream, restocking food at Tesco’s (bought some deep heat for the ankle) and booking a room in Boscastle on the internet. It cost me 10 pounds to book the room, plus I paid an extra 3 when I got there (YHA members don’t have to pay that). I came back to the bus stop only to find that I looked up the working week timetable and that the bus left half an hour ago:) There was another one in 2 hours and I spent more time resting in the park. I managed to get on the second bus and it took me to Boscastle which is 26.6 km (16.5 miles) away from Bude.
Boscastle was a really nice village. I think I was the only person staying at the hostel, so I had the whole room to myself. I used the opportunity to have a shower and to wash all my clothes. I actually did two things at the same time using the grape crushing technique:) I soaked the clothes with liquid soap, dropped them on the shower floor and walked all over. It works! The BPL merino base layer still smelled ok, so I did not wash that because I needed something to wear into town. I used some deep heat on the ankle.
I went into a pub, had two pints of ale and a big pizza with some onion rings to go. I then sat outside the hostel, swallowed the pizza like a python and felt reasonably full. Back in real life I would have never even finished it:) After that I returned to my room and got into bed.
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South West Coast Path 2009 