Not Alot To Say

I could say alot of things about today but I will try and keep today's blog update as brief as I can.

In short, we had 23 miles of road and other hard terrain walking to do - including 2.5 miles of road walking just to get us back on the C2C path from where we had stayed in Great Broughton.

Leonie has been walking with ankle supports for the last 10 days and was walking from about 8 miles into today's walk in real pain. I could see that she was visibly limping with every step she took, and I knew it must be bad as she isn't the kind of person who makes it obvious when she is suffering.

We arrived in Glaisdale about 5pm, with 3 more miles to Grosmont but Leonie's ankle had had enough and she could walk no further. Neil, a friend who I met in China last year, had come to meet us in Glaisdale to walk to Grosmont with us and had luckily parked his car in Grosmont. So, Neil and I walked to Grosmont, collected his car and went back to Glaisdale to pick Leonie up.

At this stage, it isn't clear whether Leonie will be able to walk tomorrow's 16 miles to Robin Hood's Bay. It now seems that she has been walking for the last 10 days with ever worsening ankle ligament damage and she is in tremendous pain.

I don't have ankle ligament damage and my feet furt like hell so I dread to think the pain that she must be going through.

Whatever happens tomorrow, I would like to say that Leonie has demonstrated courage and determination that I have never seen before. Only today have I realised the true pain that she has been suffering for the last 100 or so miles. For her to come so far as she has (mentally and physically), she deserves the upmost respect and I doff my dirty, sun-bleached cap to her. I would like to know of any other Coast to Coasters who have gone through so much pain for such a long period of time just for the sake of walking from one place to another - which is, at the end of the day, what it is.

With hindsight I now think that I made a mistake in having two long days to finish - I mistakenly thought that our bodies would get stronger as we went on when in fact they are both beginning to show real signs of breaking down after 14 days and 170 odd miles of walking in all weathers and on all manner of surfaces.

Spirits are low tonight so we shall see what tomorrow brings.

Finally, just a special big thank you to Neil (aka Finners), who was our Knight in Shining Mini Cooper today.