The Swell Swaledale Day or Walking and Talking

 

        Today we decided against the higher trail that climbs up to the moors and the ruins of the mining industry. The mines closed at the end of the 1800's, leaving the region poverty stricken and depopulated.  Instead we took the lower trails and spent the day ambling along the green banks of the meandering River Swale, the water stained a rusty color (by iron? peat?)  and it was lovely. It was in fact exactly the sort of vision I entertained when we first got the notion to walk across England.

     Most of the day we were alone with thue sheep and the river, but we saw a few walking friends, members of the nomadic tribe to which we temporarily belong.  These people are of two sorts. The first are  those who are walking the same itinerary and speed as we are and thus meet up again and again on the trail or in the pubs and B&Bs.  They are all acquainted with each other, and trade news such as  "Have you seen Brian and Kate today?"  "Did you hear what happened to the three Canadian women?"
       The three Canadian women, said to have originally been six, are of various ages and races and for some reason are widely assumed to be nuns. Reportedly they told someone that their luggage arrived late, and so they never really got a grip on this walk.  Allegedly they told someone else that they had a compass, but couldn't use it and so they chucked it.  One man said he physically picked up the oldest (very old) and littlest of the women and lifted her over a stile she couldn't climb. Another man said he found them wandering lost in the bogs, where they had no business being (there being an alternative, lower trail that avoids the bog) and he spent three hours up there, trying to get them all safely down.
      The second sort are the people who are walking farther and faster than we are and so they may be seen only once, and move on.  But some of them make a lasting impression.
      There was a little old man who claimed to have visited 120 countries and told us about being arrested in Khartoum.
      And there was a voluble little woman, dressed all in black who overtook us the first day on the cliffs above the Irish Sea.  She had a hefty backpack and a lively, little, black and white dog that she picked up whenever there were horses or cows around. She said she'd walked the C2C many times. Was she perhaps a teacher, we asked, since seemed to have a lot of time for walking?  
      Ah no, you see, she used to be a nurse but that's all finished now. There was a patient, see, an old dear with Alzheimer's like, she was always falling, and well, she died. And another nurse accused her of having caused it, by sedating her, see, but she never! Of course she didn't but it went to trial and now it's in a higher court and she could go to jail. It could happen. But she's not bitter, no, no. It's not going to ruin her life, no, it's going to make her life, yes, it is! She's been doing washing up like, but she's learned you don't need electricity , no, you don't! She collects trash like and burns that and if it smells bad, poison-like, well, you just open the window!
      What to make of this story? This was pathos but she was resolutely upbeat.  Or maybe its not a good idea to be walking along the cliffs, a sheer drop to the ocean, with a possibly mad woman? And on and on she talked until our pace proved too slow for her and she hurried  on ahead.  We never saw her again, of course, but I wonder what became of her.