Ep 15: The One With the Refrigerator and the Chicken

0614 Lovesome Hill to Ingleby Cross

Having banked some extra kilometres yesterday, and with probably only another 12-14 to go, we treated ourselves to a very lazy start. Breakfast at Lovesome Farm was similar to many others, with the pleasant addition of an item entitled “Booster” which we all ordered.  This consisted of stewed fruit, fresh fruit, muesli, seeds and yoghurt. The tea served at breakfast is now Yorkshire Tea, a very strong brew – this morning’s tea had perhaps four spoons of tea leaves per cup.  Not for the faint hearted.  Peter is down to the semi-English breakfast, just bacon and black pudding.  We tarried in the garden for some time before leaving (the football commentary did take a little time to compose), enjoying the ambience of the summer flowers, finally hitting the road a little after 11.

Today’s walk was, in many ways, similar to yesterday’s, but with fewer fields and more gravel roads.  Barley continues to be the crop of choice, and proved to be hay-fever inducing. We were able to tick off another of the big five with two separate hare sightings. Along the way we encountered one of the many honesty-based tuck shops we have found on the route.  This one was an extremely well-stocked, rather large fridge in the middle of nowhere offering drinks, chocolate bars, blister plasters and paracetamol.  We only had a ten pound note, so were obliged to take a break and feast.

Val has the attribute, of many in animal facing professions, of attracting wildlife wherever she goes – the farm cats at Lovesome Hill, biting insects, but also today chickens. Let us introduce you to Gregory (Peck) and David (Peckham) who joined us for our morning tea.

As the guidebook today included such exciting points of interest as “overhead pylon”, “A19 crossing”, “motorway services”, and “C2C sign”, and we did not have the pleasure of meeting up with any of our fellow walkers, we amused ourselves by considering the origins of the name of the town that we were departing from.  Danby Wiske …. Is this a hand-held or motorized wiske?  We speculated that Danby may have been a 19^th century viscount, who, being moneyed, spent his days travelling the world in search of adventure.  On one memorable trip to Florence, he was introduced to the concept of whipped dairy products.  On his return to Yorkshire, he observed the structure of a lone cabbage tree in the square of his town and considered that this could be a suitable model for a cream whipping device – thus the Danby Wiske was born.

Alternatively it is also possible that the name is derived from the Old Norse word Danir, meaning farm of the Danes, and Wiske, referring to the nearby river. You be the judge.

The afternoon was spent in leisurely pursuits of resting, showering, drinking gin in the garden and choosing our breakfast.  Our host kindly gave us a lift into town for dinner at the Blue Bell Inn as the hill to our accommodation, while not as strenuous as the hill to The YHA in Grinton, was none-the-less beyond our comfort level for post prandial perambulations. Dinner was universally judged to be perhaps the best of the trip so far.

Distance today: 17km