Day: 025
Date: Saturday, 25 June 2022
Start: Jedburgh
Finish: Horsley
Daily Kilometres: 39
GPX Track: Click here for Julie’s Strava & Photos
Total Kilometres: 739
Weather: Windy and variable with sunny periods and showers.
Accommodation: Hotel
Nutrition:
Breakfast: Egg & bacon sandwiches
Lunch: Ham & cheese sandwich/Cheese sandwich
Dinner: Chicken burger, chips & salad, Apple & rhubarb crumble & custard/Sticky toffee pudding and ice cream.
Aches: Dave - tired feet. Julie - nothing.
Highlight: It’s a bit weird, but our encounter with the British Police Anti-Terrorism Squad high in the Pennines was interesting. From mid-morning, as we climbed higher and higher into the hills we could hear occasional short bursts that seemed to be some kind of machinery. We couldn’t see anything, despite being able to see great distances, but the sound persisted periodically. Then, as we crossed Chew Green, an old Roman staging post high in the hills, Dave could see a red flag flying on top of the next mountain in the far distance. Our route was going to take us over that mountain and, as we reached its base, there was a sign warning it was a military firing range and not to enter when the red flag was flying. However, no red flags could be seen from the sign so we decided to chance it, figuring that our route was along a remote road (part of the continuing old Roman Dere Street) and there were sheep around, so unlikely to be in the firing line.
We climbed the mountain on the road, passing more signs and a red flag, though they seemed oriented to prevent us leaving the road. The sound got much louder near the top of the climb and we could see a cluster of parked vehicles that our road was going to take us past. As we got closer we could see about six hire vans and a number of police walking around in full body armour at a roadside lay-by. A very rapid-fire mini-gun (the kind deployed on attack helicopters) was being fired, in very loud short bursts, into the valley below. Someone saw us, they stopped firing, and one of the policemen approached. We thought we would be in trouble for ignoring the red flags and signs, but the policeman just said they would stop firing until we passed because it was so loud (they were all wearing hearing protection). We walked past and they resumed firing. Seemed kind of crazy that they had just set up in a roadside lay-by and were firing this very powerful weapon down into the valley. But, we guess, nobody got hurt and one of the police stopped for a friendly chat later when he passed us on the road.
Lowlight: We took a short break with four kilometres to go and, given the warm sun and absence of wind, stripped off some layers for the walk to the hotel. After two of those kilometres, the sky darkened and a gusty squall with some heavy cold rain blew through. Despite putting our rain jackets back on, we arrived at the hotel very wet. If only the squall held off another 30 minutes.
Pictures: Click here
Map and Position: Click here for Google Map
Journal:
Knowing we had quite a long day ahead of us, we got up early and left our accommodation soon after 6:00am to follow country lanes out of town on a breezy mild morning. There was almost nobody about but us, and we had the beautiful morning countryside to ourselves.
After an hour or so, we re-joined the old Roman road, Dere Street, which was a foot-trail between fields, mostly on easy-walking grass. There were some downs, but mostly we were climbing higher and higher into the grassy hills. There were fewer farms visible and it felt more remote the further we went. The views and scenery were excellent, though the strong wind was chilly.
Around noon, we crossed into England from Scotland and joined the Pennine Way for a while. However, because of difficulties in finding accommodation for tonight, we didn’t follow the Pennine Way for long (we’ll pick it up again tomorrow), instead branching off to follow Dere Street southwards towards a hotel where we had booked a room.. It was here that we had our encounter with the police (see above).
Dere Street, which was a paved high country lane in this area, seemed to go on forever as we followed it gradually downhill through the Otterburn military training area where there were some interesting signs and more red flags, but no actual people.
Finally, we reached a busy road and followed it for the last four kilometres to our hotel where we checked in, looking somewhat bedraggled (see above). The hotel is a little more upmarket than we are used to, and we bought our dinner in their restaurant, another treat. We only have a short day tomorrow and breakfast, included with the price of our room, isn’t until 8:30am, so Dave, at least, will be having a sleep in.
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