Day 27 - Chepstow to Monmouth - 19.6 miles
Oh Woe is me!!!
Last night I stayed in The Two Rivers at Chepstow. The room was modern and comfortable and instead of a door key, I was given a credit card that let me in to the room but also had to be inserted in a slot to get all the lights and power sockets to work.
You can already see where this is going!!
Having gone off to sleep last night before charging my phone, I woke this morning to find it had already died a death. So, while having a shower I managed to charge it to 14% and then plugged in the stand-by battery but as I left the room for breakfast, I took the key out of the slot and went downstairs not realising that I'd switched off all power.
I set off knowing that both phone and battery were on low charge.
Chepstow is not as I remember it. In 1974, while studying at Cardiff, a group of us architecture students were parachuted in to Chepstow for a fortnight to establish what made the town tick, what it needed to tick more healthily and then to design a building to address that need.
My recollection was that in 1974, Chepstow was not a healthy patient!
Today, of all the small towns I've seen in the last few weeks, Chepstow seems really well placed - lots of small independent shops, an active town centre, an attractive building stock - a nice place to be!
I remember getting a lift from Cardiff with four others in a Belgian 425cc Citroën 2cv with front opening suicide doors. It gasped up the motorway hill from Newport with trucks overtaking on all sides.
Our favourite watering holes for that fortnight was The Five Alls.
Fortunately, the site I'd identified back in 1974 for a Willis Faber Dumas styled arts centre has been far FAR more sensitively used for infill housing. I didn't see an arts centre anywhere this morning but I bet there is one.
There's some really good recent sculpture in the town centre. How about this..
A Chepstow Salmon's worth his weight in gold"
Apparently Chepstow was identified as a strategic location by the Romans so its not surprising that Offa followed suit and in his attempt to keep the Welsh in their place started to build his wall here.
Archaeologists think that the Dyke he built was 90 foot wide and 27 feet high - we must have been a really troublesome lot.
A battle reignited at every 6 Nations.
The walk northwards from Chepstow first passes the Castle
On the climb out of Chepstow I met
Debbie, Bella and Sadie from Cockermouth. All keen walkers, between them they seem to have walked all the major walks in the UK.
We joked about the idea (popular in the US) of trail names and they suggested
Deborah, Elizabeth and Sarah. - I think I prefer the originals.
A very interesting threesome. It would have been very easy to chat for longer and a shame that I had to push on.
It was not a lot later that my phone died and nothing I did seemed to kick it back to life. I was confused as to whether it was the phone, the battery, the cables and I was even considering heading out on Sat morning to get a new phone!!
For the rest of today's walk
- No camera but most importantly
- No OS and
- no way of establishing accurately where I was!
I did have a guide with hand drawn maps which seemed to be out of date and soul destroyingly out of scale.
I can only tell you about
the views of Tintern Abbey
the forests of Beech and Ash trees
the stunning banks of bluebells
the interminable ups and downs - particularly that stupid last one from Lower Redbrook to Upper Redbrook - a rise of 700 feet when I was only 2 miles from Monmouth. There's something about walking uphill after Mile 14, it starts to erode my good humour!!!!!
Eventually arrived Monmouth after 7pm. It had been a late start and what felt like a VERY long walk.
Fortunately, in the pub with a solid electrical supply and proper WiFi, we're all up and running again.
Note to self, I'm NOT going walking again without an OS map. If my phone ever fails again, I'm catching a bus.
Conversation overheard in the pub this evening....." There is no car faster than a hire car!"
I'm hearing that making comments on the blog is proving problematic. If you'd like to leave a comment it'd be lovely to hear from you. Please persist or send me a text or email.
Total distance so far = 344.2 miles
Total ascent so far = 44 948 feet
If you're tempted to contribute to any or all of the great charities I'm supporting, here are the relevant links.
Just Wheels UK - this is a small charity set up to provide wheelchairs in a rural community in Tanzania. It does this through funding training, education and the local fabrication and servicing of bespoke wheelchairs. My nephew uses a wheelchair and as he grows I can see the life changing freedoms that proper wheelchairs can bring to both users and their families.-
Parkinsons UK - My dad had Parkinsons in his latter years and the research work this charity funds and the support it provides to patients and their families is invaluable. - https://www.justgiving.com/
- RNLI - these are the brave guys who selflessly head out to sea to help others. I volunteer at Littlehampton RNLI shop and often meet families of those who’ve had first hand experience of their loved ones being saved from the sea. Having sailed for years I can say thankfully we’ve never had to call on the RNLI's services but it’s amazing what it does to know they are there
https://www.justgiving.com/
Comments
Post a Comment