Tiny puffins to welcome me - the final stretch, and two endings

I am almost on the way south again, writing this from a strange little hostel in Thurso, whilst the sun continues to shine and the sea breeze continues to keep the temperature down. 

I left Halkirk on Tuesday morning - the place where salmon jump out of the water in the middle of the village - in bright sun, anticipating with mixed feelings the 17 miles of the day. As I left, Senga who ran the B&B gave me back some of the money I had paid, to give to the fundraising. I was covered in suncream and able to uncover my legs again, now that I was out of tick country and walking on quiet road. I crossed the A9 again, and over undulating country, dotted with lochans. As I passed fields of cattle, every herd got up and chased after me, thankfully with a fence in between us. I was obviously an exciting sight. Each cemetery or graveyard I passed had a forest of tall monuments all with urn shapes on the top of them, looking out of place in this flat, sparsely populated landscape. At 10.15 Dunnet Head came into view ahead, looking huge and a long way away. I have found that it always seems to take longer going towards somewhere rather than leaving it, and nowhere more so than the end. An hour later it was clear and close, the sea of Dunnet Bay shining blue below - my first glimpse of the northern seas. I passed a farm just before the bay, whose land was scattered with the ruins and remnants of old wartime buildings - lookout posts and shelters, and strange tall cubic relics. The smell and sound of the sea drifted over the dunes of Dunnet Bay, as  more camper vans and motorbikes sped past. I popped into the campsite on the bay just by Dunnet village to ask if I could camp there after coming back from Dunnet Head, but they didn't have space. Not even for a medium sized walker with no vehicle and a little tent. They did say it was absolutely fine to camp on the edge of the beach the other side of the fence though - after all, it's Scotland. So I put that out of my mind and took the turn onto the headland, signposted 5 miles to the most northerly point of the UK mainland. I was quite glad it said that, just to confirm I had been heading for the right place all along. By this time it was overcast and with a chill wind, so I had put my fleece back on. The road took me through Brough, a gathering of semi derelict farm buildings interspersed with smart bungalows, and a sudden bay looking east with a seal stretching on a rock below. The headland gently rose, becoming moorland with little lochs, and heather, gorse and white rocks. I was aware that this was a significant moment, but I wasn't sure how to feel, so I sang. My left leg started to hurt as though I needed to remind it how to walk, helped by the rhythm of 'Come with me' - because the journey has been long. At the last rise, which felt like enough, I was looking down at the sea, and the lighthouse - the northern tip of Dunnet Head, and the end of the road. Orkney over the sea, with the Old Man of Hoy, was darkly clear and close. And people milled around, looking over the water. I almost wept. I asked an unsuspecting French tourist if he would take my photo with the sign, because 'it's important' - I didn't explain why. And I went down to the bench by the lighthouse, but it was busy, so I took a shortcut over the fence to a better spot, and cut my leg. I knew I was carrying the first aid kit nearly 1300 miles for a reason. I found a sheltered little cove of flat rocks above the cliff, sat down, applied antiseptic and a plaster to the injury, and got out the whisky. The sea was calm, blue, vast, and the cliffs busy with all kinds of birds, and a few tourists passing by, peering close over the edge and then stepping back quickly. Puffins darted in and out of burrows, landing orange feet first, preening their little white bellies, and rushing off again. A bird watcher from Moray joined me on the rocks, photographing a puffin burrow right next to us, and showed me the close up pictures. I told him what I had just walked, and he congratulated me, and there we sat, looking out to sea with rollies and whisky, talking about the journey. He eventually left to photograph different cliffs, and I hadn't asked him his name. After a couple of hours, I walked up to the top viewpoint and could see misty Munros far to the west and Duncansby Head to the east, and so many islands. The hill itself was covered in more wartime shelters and watching posts, concrete and brick relics, with twists and lumps of rusted metal. 

I didn't want to leave really but I also needed a pint, and a place to camp, so I started to walk back. I had no hesitation or feeling of guilt about thumbing a lift though. I only committed to walking to Dunnet Head, not away from it! A couple stopped and drove me back to the village. They were really lovely people and in the short five miles we chatted about our lives and journeys while the tiny dog in a basket beside me quietly listened in. They insisted on dropping me right by the pub door, and I thanked them profusely, and went in for a couple of pints. It was clean and clinical and newly refurbished but the character came from the elderly gentlemen at the bar who knew the places on my route and raised their glasses to me. And then I found a spot by the beach, next to a picnic bench, and waited until the beach was nearly empty, and pitched the tent. At this point, after a couple of pints and a generous amount of whisky, I wasn't that bothered about where I camped, but it was stunning. The air became cold as the sky threw its pink and deep orange onto the water and the wet sand, and the nearly full moon rose behind me. 

And all of this happened and in all of it I wasn't sure how I should feel or whether I 'should' feel anything. I was expecting relief, elation, weeping - at least one of those. But it just felt quiet. And I was tired. 

The clear light lingered and never completely faded, and in the morning I packed up the tent early, and sat with coffee for a good while, watching dog walkers and bare foot early risers. 

I hadn't actually finished as I had decided whilst planning to walk to John O'Groats too, and then on to Duncansby Head. So I left in warm sunshine, saying a silent goodbye and thank you to the vast Dunnet Head headland and made my way east, taking the long straight back road with no traffic at all. The sun was strong and the views to Stroma and Orkney wide and long, with a low hazy mist on the water. A horsefly took a final chance and got me on the back of the leg, just as I was wondering whether this extra day was a good idea. But I decided it was, and arrived in John O'Groats at 12.30, feeling familiar from four years ago. I asked a lady with her mother if she would take a picture of me at the sign, and she initially thought I meant with her phone. She was struggling with her own phone though and I was proud of myself to be able to help her! I bypassed the tourist trap gift shops and walked the final two miles up to the Duncansby Head lighthouse, found the concrete block my dad and I had sat on four years ago, and sat down. The sea was sparkling around the stacks and the two currents at the north east corner below were weaving a break in the smooth sea. I had been told there were orcas to be seen but I looked and looked and still saw none. A Welshman was whitewashing the lighthouse tower, and only very few people were about. And this really was it. If I walked any further I would have fallen off. 

Later at the campsite, with my tent pitched just above the shore, I sat with a mug of black tea, watching a seal bobbing about, and then it hit me. Just a realisation that I really had finished. That was it. I packed away my map, and folded up the map case, into the rucksack. In the shower I peeled the KT tape off my knee for the last time, the strange shape of a suntan around where it was. I didn't have to worry about resupplying, and the water in my bottle was clear. I went to the oddly quiet pub and texted with my sister who was in Torquay for work, on completely the opposite coast. She was struggling to get cool, and I by this point was struggling to stay warm. The single malt in the pub would have required a small mortgage, so I went back to the tent, put an extra layer on my legs and four layers on top with hat, scarf and gloves, and finished my own whisky outside, watching the lowering sun blaze the silky grey sea. The sky turned a soft pink as the fat yellow full moon rose behind me, and two oyster catchers, my constant companions, chased each other above the water. 

And as I went to my tent for the last night it all felt final. I really have walked every single step of the length of the mainland UK in 88 days. I have seen so many things, and felt so much and encountered so many people and overcome more anxiety than I have dared admit and now it is done. 

This morning I dipped my boots in the sea. They have only just held out - the soles are almost completely worn through. I wrote the final postcard to Alice, my niece, and took the bus to Thurso, where I am staying in a very strange hostel and the football is on, which caused a little bit of awkwardness amongst the Scots. England are playing! So I walked along the beach and Dunnet Head had a shroud of creeping mist over the end. Tomorrow I start the long journey south. I hear it's very hot down there. 

Before I left, two friends gave me a poem which I have carried with me all the way, along with a stone from the Looe Bar south of Porthleven from my first day. Here it is (by Ursula LeGuin):

Please bring strange things. 

Please come bringing new things. 

Let very old things come into your hands. 

Let what you do not know come into your eyes. 

Let desert sand harden your feet. 

Let the arch of your feet be the mountains. 

Let the paths of your fingertips be the maps

and the ways you go be the lines on your palms. 

Let there be deep snow in your inbreathing 

and your outbreath be the shining of ice. 

May your mouth contain the shapes of strange words.

May you smell food cooking you have not eaten. 

May the spring of a foreign river be your navel. 

May your soul be at home where there are no houses. 

Walk carefully, well loved one. 

Walk mindfully, well loved one. 

Walk fearlessly, well loved one. 

Return with us, return to us. 

Be always coming home. 

I couldn't have imagined then how much of that would come true. And one day I wish for someone to be able to give this poem to. And I took a small stone from Dunnet Bay to join it all. 

So .... 

Thank you to all of you who have gone the distance with me in so many ways. It has often felt like a long and lonely journey, but I have really never been completely alone. Whether you have patiently read every blog post, even when I get quite rambling, or sent messages, or been at the end of my messages, thank you. And for those who have supported me in person, or looked after things at home, or sent map parcels to unknown places, thank you. For all of you who have donated to the fundraising, and for countless many who I have met who have resonated with it in some way, thank you. For those of you who encouraged me with this idea in the first place, thank you (although I might blame you when I run out of money!). For friends and family who have offered hospitality, thank you. For those of you who have just thought about me every now and again, thank you. And for the countless many generous, gracious, wonderful and hilarious people I have met on the way in post offices, village shops, on hillsides and in pubs, in campsites and hostels, village greens and bothies, most of whom may never read this, thank you. And for those of you who do the things only I will know, thank you. 

Tomorrow everything changes.