Emily goes for another walk

It's been an interesting few days. When I took the train down to Cornwall I thought I was leaving behind the experience of trudging through snow drifts. But I have also experienced the kindness of strangers, and the bewilderment of other strangers. The snow fell for most of Saturday night, but had stopped when I left Moretonhampstead. I couldn't stop taking photos of the suddenly silent white blanketed landscape. Every tree had a cloak and every hedge a covering. Up onto Mardon Down, I could see all around the sky was low and grey and heavy. A runner came up alongside me in hi vis yellow shorts. He said his legs were fine but his hands were frozen. He had bare red knees and big gloves on. I crossed out of the National Park with wind blown surface snow in my eyes. Shortly after this it began to snow, first finely, and gradually getting heavier, looking faster due to the Easterly wind blowing it through. I reached Tedburn St Mary and the pub wasn't yet open so I dived into ...

I write this from a warm bar in Moretonhampstead, while the snow falls softly outside, shimmering in the evening lights of the little town. Today has been a rest day, which I knew I needed but didn't realise how much. At 9 on Thursday I crossed the border into Devon, over a brown, swirling, rushing Tamar. I stopped to ceremonially take pictures. This feels significant, although the first border always is. This feeling was quickly dampened by the steepest climb yet, straight uphill, uncompromisingly, to the crossroads at Gulworthy. There I saw signs to Morwellham, taking my thoughts back to a school trip to 'Darkest Dartmoor'. I kept my red Morwellham Quay pencil for years, from a time when collecting souvenirs of pencils and key rings was important. I also realised that was the last time I had been to Dartmoor. Into valley once more I passed a village called Buckland Monachorum, and whilst walking in time to the hymn tune, I wondered if they had only ever managed to recru...

I am at the end of day 6 and sleeping tonight on the Cornwall/Devon border, in a tightly packed in village called Gunnislake, spilling out of a steep narrow valley and over the Tamar river. I would have written earlier but signal/wifi/weather/energy has all contributed to a small silence. But you have probably not noticed! It's a little more magnified when alone and far away. Today was the first really long day - 20 or so miles in 40/50 mile an hour winds and driving rain, descending from Bodmin Moor into the villages around the edge and high sided lanes, with streams running down every one of them. The thing about rain like that is that you don't hang around, so I managed it in 8 hours, with a wonderful coffee stop. I was almost tempted to thumb a lift off the more exposed moor, but conscience got the better of me, fortunately. And it was only because I was struggling to stay upright. A large rucksack and full waterproofs increases the surface area to get blown about. I also d...

Day one began with the lighthouse foghorn sounding out over the top of the hostel and into the misty drizzle hiding the sea. All the waterproofs came out of the rucksack, and after bidding a silent nod of a goodbye to my fellow taciturn hosteller, descended to the point of the Point. The sea was foaming and crashing on the rocks below. I found an unsuspecting delivery van driver, and stopped him in the middle of his unloading into the empty, tiny cafe teetering on the Point, to apologetically ask him if he might take a picture of me beside the very small sign. He was happy to do so, although seemed a bit at sea with an iPhone. He only just managed to keep my head in the picture, and I profusely thanked him. He clearly thought I was mad, but wished me well anyway. With no one else about and just the seabirds to call me to leave, I did so. Immediately it felt wild and lonely. I met a dog walker on the path just beyond Lizard Point, and she turned out to be the only walker I saw all day...