LEJOG Day 51: Horton-in-Ribblesdale to Hardraw

Weather: Partly sunny and warm with cool westerly

Distance covered today: 25.2km (15.7mi)

Last night's B&B: Golden Lion (£40)

Cumulative distance: 1006.0km (625.1mi)/ % Complete: 52.6%

GPS satellite track of today's route: Day 51 (click!)

What an extraordinary day! It started badly, in that undoubtedly The Golden Lion Hotel in Horton is the worst B&B I have come across so far. The room was OK, but that was all. Supper was inedible, I had to make my own breakfast (not that I minded after the previous evening) because I was leaving “early” (breakfast at 08h00!! How can that be early?), and worst of all, especially for me (!), they refused to let me have the wifi code last evening!!  Of course, I created a fuss, but I was told rather firmly not to upset the proprietor who was nowhere in evidence, as he would probably kick me out. As it happened, I never did see him or his wife, and in the end I managed to hitch a ride on the wifi signal of some neighbour who has not secured their internet connection!  At least the blog was served! And one benefit of making my own breakfast was that I also made myself a packed lunch for today’s long trip, and left the rather tarnished Lion without a backward glance!

The guidebook warned that today would be different in that the landscape would be “featureless” and you would walk “in the certain knowledge that you are alone”. Indeed, along the way, I did pass Dismal Hill and at a little woodland along the way, I was told that one of the plants was called “Melancholy Thistle”.  On the way down from the high moors, I would pass ”Rottenstone Hill”.

Well!  I do have high standards in these things, because I have been to many beautiful places, but seldom have I been somewhere as desolately beautiful as today. I didn’t feel lonely for a moment. Despite continuing problems with my blister infested little toes (they are ruined – amputation seems an attractive option, but I can’t get at them. They are too covered in blister plasters!), I was on a high all day. Literally and figuratively!  At one point, I reached 580m (1,900ft) which is as high as I have been on this journey, and the view in all directions was simply stunning. The photographs just can’t do it justice. It’s hard to believe such a wilderness exists in England.

But the book was right that the way would be easy to follow and it didn’t take too much concentration, so I was able to think. Possibly all that big country and the sense of isolation did have its effect on me after all, because I found myself thinking about death. Earlier on the journey, while on a busy road, I came across a dead blackbird, killed by a passing motorist, its body horribly mutilated, with its head strangely unharmed, with glazed eyes and its beak contorted in final anguish. One minute, it was a live blackbird singing its impossibly beautiful song, the next minute, gone. I took its picture, so that at least its death would not be completely pointless, and resolved to make every effort to prevent myself from joining it and all the other roadkill that I have passed over the past couple of months.

And indeed, I have found myself returning to the thoughts brought about by the demise of the blackbird again and again. The question for me is; what do I really think about death? Does it concern me? Should it?

I realise that there are intensely religious connotations in all this and I do apologise to my many religious friends and relatives, but I can’t answer the question without being clearer about my own thoughts on the subject. A long time ago, I rid myself of the Jesuits’ fire, brimstone and retribution ideas as being simply incredible. And although, in his otherwise very interesting book, “The God Delusion”, Richard Dawkins is scathing about agnostics, as being the ultimate fence-sitters, I can’t see how he can be as certain about his atheism as he is, given all that we know and don’t know. I am also fairly sure that our science has only revealed a tiny portion of our universe. I find myself continually wondering where we sit in the scale of things. If we look outwards, how far do the universe and its brothers and sisters stretch? And if we look inwards, are there microscopic universes within? It seems highly unlikely that by chance, we should find ourselves somehow “in the middle” in terms of scale.

But it also seems to me highly unlikely that we are anything other than a highly sophisticated evolutionary product that has learned to think and to alter its environment in a ruthlessly successful adaptation to an impossibly hostile world. If I was a young person now, I would be seriously considering studying the combination of chemistry and electronics that provides the amazing thinking properties of the human mind. It is hard wired with all sorts of innate instincts, and yet it has the capacity to learn and store that learning on its equivalent of the hard drive to end all hard drives. But that is all it is. When the murderous car took out my poor dead blackbird, it was the same as hitting a hard drive with a hammer. All its instincts and all its memories just ceased to exist. And surely, it is just the same with us. All the rest is superstition.

In which case, it makes no sense to be scared of death. Scared of the process of dying, certainly! The pain and the indignity of a protracted exit are much to be feared and few are as fortunate in that respect as my dead blackbird. But not scared of death itself. It is just the end. All that remains is the memory other people have of one and that too will fade in time.

How can I be so certain? I can’t, unlike Richard Dawkins. But on the balance of probabilities and given all the information that I have learned over my six score years, that is what I think.

As I made my way down the high moors back to civilisation in the very attractive little town of Hawes, I passed some evocative and entertaining places, such as Buttertubs Pass, Lovely Seat, Gaudy House and Backsides. After my lonely yet peaceful vigil in the high moors, I almost regretted regaining normality.

My feet, on the other hand, were delighted!

My dead blackbird

Sometimes I sits and looks at nature, and sometimes I just sits

More broken deserted houses on the moors

Dismal Hill

This is Ling Gill, an upland woodland in a narrow limestone gorge. It is home to the Melancholy Thistle

The beck leading to Ling Gill

On top of the moors on a Roman Road!

Looking back at Pen-y-Ghent across the moors

Deserted countryside......

With fantastic vistas in the sunshine

Moorland on all sides