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0:44

The

0:49

people of Britain are currently being lightly

0:51

grilled by a heat wave. And

0:54

yet here, on the west coast

0:56

of Dumfries and Galloway, a lady on a sit-on

0:58

mower

0:58

finishes off the meadow in

1:01

front of her cottage. And the waves

1:03

lap in. There is a breeze, a refreshing breeze,

1:06

coming across the North Channel. This

1:09

is always a place I have wanted to visit.

1:11

And the main reason I wanted

1:13

to come to Port Patrick, which will be

1:16

where we're walking to, is that I want

1:18

to see the sunset in one

1:20

of the most westerly points of the

1:22

country. And on this

1:25

extraordinary Hammerhead Peninsula. And

1:28

I would really, if you like maps,

1:30

and I love maps, have a look

1:32

at this area of the

1:34

country. Because it sticks out like an

1:36

anvil down the west coast. It's nearly,

1:39

it's not quite an island, so it's west of Stranraer.

1:42

But it's long and thin, and I think in total

1:44

about 25 miles long. And

1:47

it is directly opposite Belfast.

1:51

I've come here to meet Ian McHenry

1:53

and

1:54

David Rowe. What

1:56

has brought you here, David? We're

1:58

on a long, slow road. walk from Land's

2:01

End to Johnna Grove. And so

2:03

this is our 17th week because we

2:05

had a little gap in between. And

2:07

we started five days ago in this

2:09

tropical heat and we've come around

2:12

the wonderful Hammerhead Peninsula which you've

2:14

just described Claire and we find ourselves

2:16

in this little paradise on this beautiful

2:19

spelt ring breezy afternoon. Let's

2:21

walk away from the sea because we're going

2:23

to head up and over on the

2:25

cliff walk and walking up

2:27

towards Knock and Arm Lodge which is the only

2:30

thing here. People come to

2:32

stay as regulars but it was a house. John

2:34

Buchan actually lived here for a while and

2:36

wrote the 39 steps after

2:38

living here. But it

2:40

also was historically

2:43

a very important meeting place for Eisenhower

2:46

and Churchill when they were

2:48

making the early plans for D-Day landing.

2:56

We're heading up and away from

2:58

the bay and it's very clearly signposted

3:00

Port Patrick Cliff Walk.

3:07

Can I ask how you how you

3:09

first met? Well we're from Falmouth

3:12

in Cornwall which is

3:14

about 320 miles south as the crow flies and

3:18

we were at school together at a primary school

3:21

and Ian remembered this

3:24

one I'd forgotten it. We had a little ginger

3:26

cat at home and it went walkabout

3:30

and I went to school and I saw my

3:32

mate Ian and said I'm really sad

3:35

we've lost ticker and Ian said

3:37

what does it look like? Do you remember?

3:40

Yeah a ginger. A

3:42

small feral ginger. We

3:45

lived in a place called the Beacon which is a high up

3:47

place in in Falmouth and

3:49

we found the cat up there and it was just I don't

3:52

know how it got across there. Dave probably

3:54

two miles a mile away. It's a mile away. So

3:58

clearly the cat had the wanderlust.

3:59

So you found Tigger,

4:01

returned him and you've been... I

4:03

said today, why don't you come home? Because I

4:05

didn't know it was Tigger. So I said, I think

4:07

it might be Tigger. So we

4:10

went home together, then we're at the place called the High

4:12

Street in Falmouth and

4:14

it was Tigger. Yeah,

4:16

we became pals and Falmouth, as

4:18

you may know, it sits on

4:21

the sea there with this vast harbour and

4:24

the open sea on the front. And we

4:27

kept devising different ways to walk home from primary

4:29

school. You get little glimpses of the sea

4:31

as you're wandering about. I don't think our mums and dads

4:33

were too worried that we were too late.

4:36

And so I think way back then in, well,

4:38

I have to say the late sixties, we

4:42

probably thought, oh, we both, we both

4:44

like to wander and going off-piste a little

4:46

bit. Not that we would have known that expression

4:48

off-piste. My friends have a simp. Yeah,

4:51

yeah. They have a simp. Can't go

4:53

off and on all the way through really days, isn't

4:55

it? Yeah, I'm back in Cornwall now and Ian's in Oxfordshire.

4:59

We do see each other frequently, and

5:01

we both have growing families, but

5:04

we get together once a year for

5:06

this little adventure. And

5:09

onwards and upwards to John at Grote, we're not quite

5:11

sure when we're gonna get there. Quite

5:14

a challenge to undertake that. We

5:16

average 19 to 20 miles a day, but

5:19

we might take 10 hours to do that. So two miles

5:21

an hour on a rough coast is okay,

5:23

is acceptable. And we have our break

5:26

in the pub, although we stopped drinking

5:28

alcohol at lunchtime in about the

5:30

year 2000. We didn't think that was wise.

5:33

And then you walk into a place and you go over the brow

5:35

of a hill and you see a little harbour laid out before

5:38

you that you'd never seen before, and there

5:40

lies the magic. I

5:43

think what David meant by that was they stopped having

5:45

a lunchtime drink rather than that

5:47

they drank all morning and stopped at lunchtime anyway.

5:50

They brought it off.

5:50

What a brilliant way to stay in touch.

5:54

And to be lifelong friends

5:56

and have this now in common for a week

5:58

every year.

6:02

That's the great thing about these walks

6:04

is you do a lot of hard work climbing

6:07

and climbing and climbing and then all of a sudden you

6:10

come to a view like this which is almost hanging

6:13

over the bay with the fresh

6:15

air and it's really worth

6:17

it. As David said onwards

6:19

and upwards and upwards is what he meant, the

6:22

very steep but

6:24

relatively short climb and now

6:27

from this perspective we can look back at the beach

6:30

where we started, the woman who's still on her ride

6:32

on Moa

6:34

and there's a real silver hue isn't

6:36

there to the

6:37

colour of the sea. We

6:40

were hoping to see Ireland but

6:42

I mean people have been saying we can see Ireland from

6:45

here but I don't know if you can see it. So

6:47

you just went back 19 miles away isn't it? Yeah.

6:52

I can't I have to say it's quite hazy out

6:54

there. This

6:59

is one of our challenges that we face. I

7:01

was mentioning to you about fences,

7:04

electrocuted fences and that's

7:06

an electrocuted fence and you can see it's just

7:08

across where we're walking

7:11

but of course this one is made a bit

7:13

easier because at least we've got some stones

7:15

on both sides and it's insulated

7:18

so sometimes that's not the case.

7:20

And on the other side guarding their fields

7:23

we've got a herd of cattle. Yeah.

7:27

Young black cows with little white tips on

7:29

their tail.

7:32

There you go.

7:33

They look as if they're on top of the world don't they

7:36

because they're right on the top of a hill and

7:38

we can't see anything except sky

7:40

beyond

7:41

it. Right though, what do you

7:43

think? So we're quite

7:45

often looking out for things like stiles

7:47

and things and that looks like a style

7:49

there so hopefully that's the path.

7:52

Could be. I think so don't you?

7:56

You're listening to Ramblings on Radio 4

7:58

and BBC Sounds.

7:59

Also follow us on at bbcramblings

8:02

on instagram

8:02

if you want to see photographs of where

8:05

I am or indeed who I'm walking with which

8:07

today is Ian McHenry and David Rowe

8:09

who say

8:10

that they are doing the slowest

8:12

walk around Britain. Ian

8:15

it is taking a long time but not because you're slow

8:17

walkers. No, no we we started

8:19

this walk way back

8:22

in 95 and

8:24

we walked and got as far as the west coast of Wales

8:27

and then the coast path ran out and

8:29

I think we have one particularly

8:31

bad summer where it was pouring

8:33

in rain and we were walking through muddy farm

8:36

yards and finding it very difficult

8:39

and we decided to stop. So

8:42

we stopped for I think 12 years Dave

8:44

and 12 years and then in those 12 years we did various

8:49

other walks. We also did a great cycling

8:52

route out on the west coast of Ireland.

8:55

So we did various things over that time and

8:58

then we found

9:00

out that the full

9:03

Welsh coast path was created

9:06

and that then gave us the opportunity

9:09

of completing the Welsh coast and

9:11

as we completed the Welsh coast

9:12

we came into the

9:14

whirl

9:15

and decided to keep going and we've

9:17

been walking ever since. So that 12

9:20

years gap should explain why the

9:23

duration is longer than the actual relaxed

9:26

walking plan.

9:28

How do you plan where, because

9:31

obviously it's a big logistical

9:32

operation this, if you're going to take

9:34

on a massive walk even

9:36

if it's going to be over 18 years doesn't matter. You've

9:40

got a plan where are you staying, what's safe

9:42

you know. Yeah we search

9:45

engine the heck out of it. Ian's

9:48

a great researcher and I rely on him a lot

9:50

but yeah you look at the map you

9:52

work out roughly 20 miles. If there's

9:55

a little cluster on the OS there you think

9:57

well Port Patrick may have a B&B.

9:59

Let's find one there and off we go. We

10:02

book ahead. When we started walking around Cornwall

10:05

in our twenties, we never booked ahead. So

10:07

we'd stroll into a fishing fish. Gunhead.

10:10

8 o'clock at night. Have a pint and say, is

10:13

there a B&B around here? And by

10:16

magic it tended to work, but we

10:18

wouldn't do that now. We're a bit older and a bit more cautious.

10:21

But you're camping not for you now? No, I

10:23

don't think so. We've never got around to it.

10:25

And I think, did you mention the bivvy bags, Dave?

10:28

Oh, okay. So yeah,

10:31

because I was in a

10:34

management position, they sent us

10:36

away on an outward bound course and

10:38

we used bivvy bags. And I don't know if you

10:40

know bivvy bags, but they're thick, like

10:43

huge, great dustbin bags, bright

10:45

orange and thick plastic. And you sleep

10:47

in them, bit of work. And

10:49

we went away and it was great. We're fine. So

10:52

I came back to Dave and I said, just do bivvy

10:54

packing. And so we had this, well,

10:57

I had this great idea to do bivvy where we were.

10:58

Each bought ourselves a bivvy bag. As

11:01

always, we went to the pub,

11:03

took some, I think we might have taken some bottles

11:05

back to the bivvy bag, went down, I think

11:07

it was stacked whole key. And we went

11:09

from the end of there, got into our bivvy

11:11

bags. And I think in the middle

11:14

of the night, Dave, we started to hear

11:16

people on the fans. And

11:19

I can hear these engines and I can, and I see

11:21

these headlights roaring across the beach.

11:24

And it's some people in four by fours.

11:27

They're just gonna think we're bags of rubbish. That's a

11:29

terrible way to go. And also inside,

11:31

I don't know if you've ever been in one of these bivvy bags,

11:34

but they're so wet inside

11:36

because of the condensation. Preppy, yeah. And

11:38

I think we did it for one night though. Well, we

11:40

tried bivouacking for one night, yeah. And

11:42

we've, you know, a thousand nights of B&B, which seems

11:45

like a sensible formula. Was there

11:47

a secondhand market for those bivouacking? Well,

11:49

we have. Very handy for your recycling,

11:51

I would say. Those dear

11:53

bivvy bags. Thank you, Ian, for that idea

11:56

and keep them coming. It was very

11:58

worth it for us. time

12:00

because we used to wing it and

12:02

we used to wait for the pubs to shut and then as

12:04

Dave says it's time to end somebody's day.

12:07

And we've never really been caught out. The

12:09

closest we came was that we

12:11

were walking, not on this walk but on the

12:14

South Coast, we stopped in Swanage

12:17

and we couldn't find any bed and breakfast there

12:19

so we hitchhiked the core, went

12:21

into the core, went into the pub, had a good time

12:24

and about half past ten we said to

12:26

the owner of the pub, is it ok

12:28

if we just sleep in your lounge

12:31

there? And he said no so

12:33

we thought oh ok so this is eleven

12:35

o'clock at night so we hitchhiked back

12:37

to Swanage. David had a copy of

12:40

a newspaper with him so we went into

12:42

an alcove of a chalet, we cosied

12:46

down and we used that as our sheet

12:48

that night. And um. So

12:50

that's under the newspaper? For about

12:52

an hour and as soon as the alcohol

12:54

wore off and we thought oh no so

12:57

I got up and I thought

12:59

I can't face this so I went

13:01

into Swanage and I found a nightclub so

13:03

I went into the nightclub, went in,

13:05

had a drink and there was a girl

13:08

serving down behind the bar and I said

13:10

do you know anywhere we can stay? And

13:13

she said well my mum used to do B&B,

13:15

I phoned her up and she phoned up her

13:17

mum and she said great you can go round

13:19

her a place. So I ran back and

13:21

woke David, he wasn't very happy when I woke

13:23

him up as he was sleeping heavily,

13:26

got Dave, we ran back to this

13:28

place and it was great, went there,

13:31

had the lovely bed for the night

13:33

and a lovely bed. And

13:36

a lovely breakfast so it all works out

13:38

right in the end. It does,

13:40

you must just have been born lucky you two.

13:44

This is Moroch Bay so you can

13:46

see it's huge, I don't know if it's Moroch

13:48

or Moroch.

13:50

That track that I thought was a railway line up

13:52

where it leads to. Most people's houses. Yeah

13:54

two little white cottages, bungalows and

13:57

a boat shed and that's

13:59

it.

14:01

and a beach all to themselves.

14:03

We were at Port Logan yesterday and

14:06

at Port Logan they've got a thing called a fish hole and

14:09

the fish hole is like a hole where

14:12

they put saltwater fish that they catch

14:14

into the water and they keep them

14:17

in there until they're ready to eat them and

14:19

then fish them out and lobsters, ling,

14:22

skate, anything that they catch they

14:25

put into the fish hole.

14:28

You see the headland there as well, we're always

14:30

trying to guess and know which

14:32

headlands they are and I don't know what

14:35

that would be Dave. I think we

14:37

might be looking at the Mull of Galloway there,

14:40

Scotland's most southerly point

14:42

at Little Finger of Land but I can't

14:45

see the lighthouse.

14:48

I like all your notes

14:50

on your map. You've written store, bracket

14:53

shop question mark on the map. And

14:55

what have you written there? World's

14:58

oldest natural marine aquarium and

15:02

ah, the Lord's Garden in the Wicker

15:04

Man. So the Botanical Garden

15:07

here in the middle of the peninsula

15:10

was featured in that very famous film The Wicker Man

15:12

and when I watched it a year ago I was

15:15

amazed at this. They grow echaeums

15:17

and Chinese palms all this way up into

15:19

Scotland. I was more interested in that than the film

15:21

actually. Your interest in Botanical

15:24

Gardens has a reason

15:26

doesn't it? What was your job for many years? I

15:29

worked at the Eden Project until very

15:31

recently and I got a midlife conversion

15:33

to exotic plants when I moved

15:35

back to Cornwall about 25 years ago. It's

15:38

interesting looking at this map,

15:41

that stretch of water in between it just

15:43

says danger area, danger area, danger

15:46

area in red all round it and then bombing

15:48

range. This is

15:50

loose bay and

15:52

the more danger areas and then you

15:54

come back up into the loose sands.

15:57

And we went past an MOD centre

15:59

zone.

15:59

the on the left which we're told

16:02

is the area where they were taking munitions

16:05

out and exploding them in Loose Bay

16:08

and that's why it's a danger area.

16:10

So the map we're on now is

16:12

Strand Rarr and Glen Loose it is

16:15

the OS Landranger 82, the rins

16:19

and do you want to give me a grid reference David?

16:22

We started at...

16:26

you started much further down didn't you? Because

16:28

you walked this morning. Oh yeah.

16:31

So over

16:33

there. There we are. So you

16:35

met us at the lodge which is

16:38

grid reference 02

16:40

probably 03 and

16:43

then 52.1 maybe. So

16:45

that's not can arm lodge where we started from and if you

16:47

would rather have a what three words rather

16:49

than a grid reference it's roses dot

16:52

farms dot crows. I

16:55

wonder who comes up with the words?

16:56

It's random

16:59

selection. Yeah but sometimes it doesn't make sense.

17:01

Isn't it every square meter in the world?

17:04

It's amazing. Incredible. If

17:08

you get one word on there you can end up with something.

17:14

Heather versus we've just come round

17:17

at the corner and leaving a

17:19

very cave-y

17:21

sort of smuggler's bay behind us we

17:23

get our first glimpse of a building and

17:26

it is the the shell of a castle

17:29

or a keep

17:29

or a lookout what's that?

17:32

I'm looking at the OS and

17:34

it tells me it's... I

17:38

failed I can't read it. The old

17:40

eyes failed me. I think it's

17:42

Donsley.

17:44

Is it Dons? No I think you're

17:46

all right. I think it is. How are your glasses?

17:49

They're hopeless. Donsky. But they might be all

17:51

right for me. Donsky. Oh yeah got

17:53

it. Great. Donsky Castle yeah. Yeah

17:56

they're a bit dirty though is that?

17:59

But they are magnifying,

18:02

definitely, because they were. Okay.

18:04

Dunskey Castle, bracket, remains

18:07

of. I think if Dracula

18:10

hadn't landed in Whitby, perhaps

18:13

Dunskey looks like a fitting substitute, do you think? Yes.

18:15

Did he land in Whitby?

18:17

Dracula? Well,

18:19

it's a case of fiction, isn't it? Well,

18:22

yes.

18:26

Ian, who sets the

18:28

rhythm, the pace, of your walking? Well,

18:31

I don't think it's one of us in particular.

18:34

I think we just naturally take in turns. I

18:37

think over the years we've walked so much

18:39

together. I think we realise

18:42

and we sometimes

18:44

spend an hour or two hours in complete silence.

18:47

And sometimes we slip out, one

18:49

of us goes a bit further ahead. And we

18:52

haven't really got a particular pattern.

18:55

Somehow, Dave, we just naturally fall into it, don't we?

18:58

Really,

18:58

Ian. I think you're very tolerant,

19:00

though, because this is what we're

19:02

able to see. But Ian's about six inches taller

19:04

than me. Many years

19:06

ago I was a sprinter and he was a middle distance runner.

19:09

I think, to be honest, he's a bit fitter. So

19:12

I've walked many more steps than Ian. And

19:14

I often find myself having to just

19:16

scuffle behind, hoping he can't see or hear

19:18

that I'm trying to keep up. But,

19:21

yeah, Ian, it's companionable silence

19:23

a lot of the time when we're just walking along, getting in the zone.

19:26

I don't think that pace

19:28

or the way we do that, Dave, has changed

19:30

over the years. I think

19:33

we've always just fallen into it naturally

19:37

and probably never ever really set

19:39

our pace or set any rules around it. We

19:42

just naturally did it.

19:46

Isn't that amazing? So

19:48

what we see ahead of us now, the black

19:51

rocks on the left are sort of low and flat, but

19:53

all of them intercut with

19:56

the deep veins, if you like, of

19:59

wear and tear. and then beyond it, standing

20:01

proud on the cliff, is

20:04

the ruin of

20:05

Dunsky Castle. And

20:07

what's left? I mean, just the holes of the windows.

20:09

Four walls, by the looks of things. Certainly we

20:11

can see three. No roof,

20:15

about five chimneys

20:18

still there.

20:19

It does, I mean, I don't know if

20:21

Game of Thrones has come around this way, but

20:24

it has that romantic,

20:26

elemental sense of a

20:28

ruin built to last.

20:38

It's such a relief when you come

20:40

to a deep inlet like this with

20:42

a burn running through it and there's a bridge.

20:45

Which means you haven't got to go all the way

20:47

in and out again. Our

20:50

sort of rule that we have when we're going around

20:52

the coast is if there's a ferry, if there's

20:54

a bridge, or even I think a couple

20:56

of times we've actually caught the catch the

20:59

lift off somebody in a little roadboat.

21:01

Didn't we, across Gillon Creek and

21:03

Cornwall? And yeah,

21:06

so if the facility's there, we'll

21:08

take it.

21:10

That's very sensible, you see. Because

21:12

also

21:12

when you're writing your own rules, you can't break

21:15

them. You just make

21:17

new ones. But also, if the point

21:19

is to stay close to the coastline,

21:22

going massively far inland is not true

21:25

to the first place. You

21:27

want to go across as much as you can. There's a

21:30

lovely wooden bridge here. That

21:33

water looks very inviting and very

21:35

clear. So lovely. And

21:38

it's much, much cooler down here because we're completely

21:40

out of the sun now. And

21:43

you can appreciate ferns growing out

21:45

of the rocks and

21:46

the little trees that can survive

21:48

here because they're protected from the wind. There's

21:51

not much, is there, up on that headland.

21:52

I mean, it must be battered

21:55

by strong wind

21:56

normally. And the seas have

21:58

ferns over. in the prevailing wind.

22:12

Patrick down this path. Is

22:14

that that deep cut? Yeah.

22:17

And a lot of steps. I don't know. They

22:19

might have just... Have you just come from... Yeah, I've called Donutwick

22:21

and the bike this way. Because coming up is

22:24

hellish. Yeah, you can see how sweaty

22:26

I am. Oh yeah, you can see how sweaty I am.

22:31

Coming down the steps into

22:34

the harbour of Port Patrick. And

22:37

you can see why this was chosen

22:40

as the place to put your town. It's

22:42

got a lovely sort of inlet. They've

22:45

built up the walls to create

22:46

the harbour. And then the house is stacked up.

22:49

The big hotel there on top of the hill.

22:51

Which is vast. A

22:53

buttercream colour with grey roof

22:56

and white framed windows. And then

22:58

you see that bright blue. One

23:00

bright blue house

23:02

down on the harbour side. And

23:04

a pub next... I think that's

23:06

the pub next to it, don't you? I hope so.

23:09

It looks quite the metropolis. You know, we've

23:12

passed several harbours and they're tiny. And

23:15

this place, I don't know what the population is, but

23:18

one can imagine the history, as Claire has just said, this

23:20

was the main embarkation point for Ireland before

23:22

it was usurped by Stranra. So

23:25

what a history here in this harbour

23:27

wall.

23:28

So what's the

23:29

plan, Ian and David, for tomorrow?

23:32

Or are you walking on tonight?

23:33

You're not walking on? No. We're

23:35

going to the pub. Yeah. We

23:39

are finishing our walk by going around the

23:41

Thumb to the north. And

23:43

we're going around to... Can't

23:45

quite get to the northernmost point on the coast.

23:48

And then we're turning the corner and coming about

23:50

six miles north of Stranra. The

23:52

following day we have a six-mile walk, and then sadly

23:55

that is the end of this year's journey.

23:58

And then you pick up from exactly the same point.

23:59

Point next year.

24:00

Back to Stromrara next

24:03

summer, probably July day.

24:06

And we'll start again. Yeah. Another 100

24:08

miles. On we go. Up the air, shark coast.

24:11

I do think it is a wonderful thing

24:13

to do. And what a great way to mark a

24:16

lifetime of friendship.

24:17

That

24:18

you're having this adventure together.

24:21

And you look forward to it for the rest of the day and do the planning.

24:24

Start doing the planning. Yeah. See

24:26

you now.

24:27

Really good. Yeah. Ian

24:29

starts to do the planning and I agree with him

24:32

and off we go. And our wives

24:34

are very encouraging. It's

24:36

good for you. Go on, off you go. Go on, off you

24:38

go. It's been a joy to share a little bit of it with

24:41

you.

24:41

This has lived up to expectation. I

24:43

have wanted for so long to see the sunset

24:45

here in Port Patczyk. And I might

24:47

stay on this bench and do exactly that.