To walk all the way home, that was the plan. Once the idea had taken hold, for
a soft city-dweller it gathered an irresistible green logic.
It would involve a bit more than just getting off the bus a couple of stops
early, however. Doing it properly would mean taking Offa’s Dyke Path, one of
the splendid National Trails, which hugs the England-Wales border from the
Severn Estuary to the Irish Sea and which passes close to the village where
I grew up, a few miles from the North Wales coast. I haven’t lived up there
for more than 40 years, but in the recesses of my mind, cached along with
memories of hopscotch and chilblains and church twice on Sundays, I still
think of Caerwys, Flintshire, as home.
The path extends 177 miles (280km) from Chepstow to Prestatyn, large chunks of
it alongside, crisscrossing, or even proudly surmounting the enigmatic ridge
of ancient earthwork that is the dyke itself. Archaeologists believe that it
was built some time in the late 8th century either to mark the border (and
so the term March, or Marches) or as a defensible barrier between Wales and
the kingdoms of Mercia to the east. I wouldn’t have time to tackle the whole
distance, so the northern section upwards from Knighton in Powys would have
to do. About a hundred miles in all, a knapsack on my back, and six free
days in which to do it.
The hotel in Knighton I had chosen from the Offa’s Dyke Association website
turned out to have been the boyhood home of that indefatigable explorer
Wilfred Thesiger. A good omen, I reckoned. I even had the bedroom that had
once been his and I lay on my back thoughtfully examining the plain ceiling,
just as he must have done on similar summer nights.
From the steep height of Panpunton Hill immediately outside Knighton, the view
the next morning was of silver loops of the Teme in the valley below, and
the Path winding ahead. The “switchback” on the way to Montgomery has the
reputation of being the toughest of the route. Certainly there was a series
of sharp ascents and descents, but none was long, the conversation was
interesting and there were views of turfy hills and dreamy, hidden valleys.
It was only at the end of the day, tired, that I felt pleased not to be
camping on this expedition. The landlady of our B&B was waiting, having
driven out of town, and she walked up the path to meet us. I caught sight of
her, standing like Ruth in an empty cornfield, with her skirt fluttering
around her calves.
The next day I followed a mile of the Montgomery Canal, then crossed a broad,
flat stretch of the Severn Valley with the dark Breidden Hills marching
alongside. At Four Crosses there was a bleak pub. There were two other
walkers at breakfast. One of them zipped up his Gore-texes, strung his
transparent plastic map case across his chest and strode out into the
downpour. The other confided that he’d had enough of the vile weather and
was packing it in this very day.
I ventured out, deciding to take the main road into Llanymynech rather than go
the longer way on the Path. Big mistake. The road was covered by floodwater.
I had walked no more than 200 yards before a lorry accelerated through a
medium-sized lake. I caught the resulting cataract full in the face, and was
soaked. I called a taxi, and booked into a spa hotel in Oswestry for a
massage. Go with the flow. Thesiger wouldn’t have had to deal with rain like
this, out there in the Empty Quarter.
The next day was a reward in itself, as I surged onwards from Oswestry, past
Chirk, over Telford’s glorious aqueduct at Pontcysyllte and across a high
scree section above the dainty valley of Llangollen, with Dinas Bran Castle
etched against the sodden sky.
The fifth day was spent exultantly swooping down the saddles and over the
exposed tops of a chain of hills that would lead to home. In the afternoon I
finally came round the shoulder of Moel Arthur, crowned with another in a
series of fine Iron Age hill forts, and away to the right lay Caerwys in its
cup of fields.
It looked the same as it always did, with only a rash of new building at the
grey stone edges to indicate that this was not 1957. Here was the sky-line
that I could see from my bed. That night, I stayed with family.
Nothing much has changed, except that now there is one empty chair.
At last, the sun came out. The last 12 miles, over the uplands from Bodfari
down to Prestatyn, were scented with gorse and honeysuckle, and the swooning
waft of white clover. Sunlight sparkled on the sea, stretching ahead of us
from Llandudno to Liverpool. We marched down the high street, past the cafés
and the station, over the beach wall and down the dun-coloured sand right to
the point where small grey wavelets broke over our boots. Ahead, new to me,
the huge arms of offshore wind turbines lazily rotated. There are new oil
rigs too, farther out, blowing plumes of flame into the sky.
The hills and the valleys and the plains I’d walked over, bone and sinew of
the landscape, those have been there and always will be there, for ever. I
had walked home.
Need to know
The Offa’s Dyke Association website (www.offasdyke.demon.co.uk)
has information on accommodation, transport, maps and guides.
Reading:
Offa’s Dyke South, Chepstow to Knighton and Offa’s Dyke North, Knighton
to Prestatyn, Aurum Press (£12.99 each).
Useful condensed maps of the North and South Offa’s Dyke Path from Harvey Maps
(01786 841202, www.harveymaps.co.uk)
are £9.95 each.
Where to stay:
Milebrook House Hotel (01547 528632, www.mile
brookhouse.co.uk) in Knighton offers B&B from £49.75pp.
The Old Stores House (01686 668617, www.montybandb.co.uk)
in Montgomery has B&B from £22.50pp.
Tyddyn Llan Hotel (01490 440264, www.tyddynllan.co.uk)
in Llandrillo charges from £95pp for dinner, bed and breakfast.
Offas Dyke is a good walk, but for the uninitiated there can
be problems:
1. In wet weather there is a lot of mud (and worse crossing
some farmyards).
2. Many parts need careful navigation. Take maps. Use them.
3. Public transport along much of the walk is weak/non-
existant. Use http://www.traveline-cymru.org.uk/.
The scenery is mostly rural / farming.
K.Jones, Bristol, UK
It's one of my dreams - to do the entire trail from south to north - where I come from. I shall bookmark this article for future reference.
Tina, Duesseldorf, Germany