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Day 31: Hay on Wye to Kington (16.6 miles)

I woke with alarm at 7:30. Bit of a headache but otherwise fine.  I took my time wiping the tent down as there was a lot of condensation today and eventually broke camp and got away by 9:30 having chatted to a young lady who had walked from Chepstow on the Offa’s Dyke Path, but had hit her limit yesterday as the 20 mile walk from Pandy over the mountains had been too much for her. She reckoned, like me, that 12-15 miles was more than enough. She was having whisky with her coffee and then getting taxi back to Chepstow with 3 other people - I asked her to give my love to the 3 “10 trekkers” if in fact it was them.

It was a pleasant walk by the River Wye - downstream this time - and I saw another pair of goosander, and continued through fields to a road where the path started to climb. I stopped here for early elevenses as I was already starting to tire. The path then led, soft underfoot, through forest which was being cleared. The larches were coming into leaf, and the smell of pine predominated from the pine being extracted. Ironically the ash had been left alone although looking sickly. A blackbird was singing taking over from a mostly thrush earlier.

There was superb scenery from Disgwylfa hill having walked through undulating pastureland to Newchurch. Apparently the hill was used as an equine racetrack at one point - it was very soft underfoot. Descending again to farmland I saw a kestrel and then a few swallows around the farm and heard the fast bubbling of a curlew in the distance.

Passing through the quiet village of Gladestry, the path soon started to climb steeply again (the third significant hill of the day) to Hergest Ridge where again the scenery was superb - I was trying to work out where the Malverns and Cotswolds were but was surprised just how many hills and ridges there were looking east.  Again the ground was comfortingly soft underfoot, making up for what had turned out to be a hilly section of the walk.

It was with some relief I descended towards Kington as it looked as though the forecast rain was finally catching up with me. Sure enough as I approached the campsite the first raindrops fell and I was rather anxiously trying to curtail the conversation with the very helpful supervisor so that I could get the tent up before the rain really got going!

As it was the rain held off and I went into the town and the Aswan Hotel to have supper. I had the pleasure of properly meeting up with Dan and Ben - walkers I’d seen at the start of the day - comparing notes of the walk and what we planned for the future.

The rain had set in by the time I came back via the village store to pick up supplies. I checked in with tomorrow’s campsite to see if I could stay in their backpacker barn - there’s a weather warning out for rain for the next 36 hours!







Location: Kington HR5, UK

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