|
|
 |
Having so thoroughly enjoyed walking the South West Coast Path, We were eager to share the new-found joy of long distance path walking with others. The first target of this proselytizing zeal was Anthony’s wife. He wanted to walk a long distance path with her, but knew that she would be faintly horrified at the prospect. Whilst she enjoyed a Sunday afternoon stroll as much as the next person, the thought of spending an entire holiday walking would not appeal in the slightest. A Stealthy introduction to the concept would be required...
I decided that the stealthiest path would be the Thames Path. It was the closest National Trail to us (the Marlow section was just 5 miles from us) and so I could easily and subtly build some riverside walking into our next Sunday afternoon walk. There would be plenty to excite interest (boats and the like) and the level riverside path would evoke no complaints. In addition, the western end of the path could be completed on Sunday afternoon walks with my Mum and Dad, who live in North Wiltshire. The plan worked perfectly. Ali loved the walk, and said how much she enjoyed walking beside the river. I returned home from work the next day triumphantly grasping the Aurum Press Thames Path guidebook in my sweaty paws. "How about it?" said I. "Well, maybe we can do some more bits on our Sunday afternoon walks" she conceded. Now committed to walking the path (well, sort of), I did a bit of research. At 184 miles in length the Thames Path is one of England and Wales' longest National Trails, and the only one to follow the entire length of a river, running (or preferably walking) from the source in a remote part of Gloucestershire, all the way down to the Thames Barrier. It attempts to follow the route of the old towpath, although sometimes this is impossible due to subsequent riverside developments and the closure of the old river ferries. I straight away decided to change the "normal" rules of a long distance path. Whilst we would walk the entire length of the Thames, if we felt that the official path was not on the most attractive side of the river (such as the bit through Reading) then we would choose to walk on the other side instead – we wanted to see the best of the Thames, and that might not necessarily be the side that the towpath used to run on. It was going to take a long time to complete if we were just doing 5 miles at a time, but that was fine. To be quite honest, based on our first experience, the best way to walk the Thames Path is as a lazy Sunday afternoon walk, for this encapsulates the pace of life on the river. Boaters drift slowly along, idly watching passers-by on the bank, whilst those same passers-by were in reality idly drifting along watching the passing boaters. This is not a path for fast through-hiking at twenty miles a day; this is one where you can spend most of the day walking just a few miles, making use of the many tea-rooms, pubs or even just sunny river banks for a leisurely break on the way. This is a path to amble gently along on warm summer afternoons, where with countless cream teas and pub lunches you could well end up fatter rather than fitter! I was looking forward to it... |
||||
