We were meant to walk from Plumley to Adlington today but it was always touch and go as to whether Tarrant was going to be able to do it, but she’s a brave little soldier and decided to give it a go. What’s the worst that could happen? Aside from, y’know, permanent maiming. She was thinking that maybe her ankle supports were causing the issues with her shin so she didn’t put them on and for the first part of the walk when we were on some decent footpaths she was fine. It was actually a lovely walk even though the stiles were made from nettles and misery. I don’t think many people come this way.

There was a proper cowocalypse incident though which she bravely dealt with. We could see the bovine horror as we approached the field and thousands of them (potentially a minor exaggeration) stood up and flocked to the gate. Oh Jesus fuck! They were very vocal too, only young things I think but that doesn’t stop them from being the size of a fucking tank. A small tank but shut up, they’re utterly terrifying.

Tarrant climbed over the stile first because she’s double hard like that and shooed them away. I followed as she waved a path through them and they recongregated behind me. Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit! This is it, this is how I die! We got most of the way through the field, heading towards the stile in the corner, when we noticed there was literally a whole cow just casually wandering along the train track that the footpath ran adjacent to.

Well that could be messy for everyone involved. Tarrant used the phone next to a crossing to call it in then she continued moving the cows away to get us to the next field. She’s my hero. I mean, swoon. I’ve been thinking a lot about a career change recently and I think I might just hire her out to hikers who are scared of cows which, I think, is quite a lot of them. Fair enough really, cows kill more people per year than sharks do. I made the mistake of joining a Facebook group called Killer Cows and that has done absolutely nothing to assuage my fear.

We carried on along the footpaths into Knutsford and pretty much as soon as we hit the tarmac Tarrant’s shin piped up. I’d suggested to her that we fuck it off until she’s healed so she can actually enjoy the walk but she was having none of it. She continued having none of it all the way through the centre of the lovely, bunting-adorned town until a local park called The Moor where we sat down for a snack and a rest.

She really didn’t want to give up. We decided to walk another two-ish miles to Mobberley and see how she felt then but we didn’t even get too far away from The Moor before the pain got too much for her. No, fuck it, there’s no point if it’s not going to be any manner of fun. We called it right there and headed to Knutsford train station.’

We will pick this up again at some point. It does sort of feel like this section is a bit cursed but Tarrant really needs to take some time to sort her feet out. Her ankles still aren’t quite right since The Bottom Half. I think it’s always best to abandon a walk if you’re not feeling it, we had to fuck off the North Downs Way three days into it because I was getting pains through my butt cheeks every twenty metres, if we hadn’t called it and gotten it sorted I wouldn’t have been able to do any of the big hike at all. It’s the best decision I think and it’s only two more days of walking. We’ll come back and do it in a weekend once she’s fixed.

STATS
Day: 94a
Day on LEJOG: 53a
Distance walked today: 4.75 miles
Total walked so far: 1173.72
“The Top Half” total walked so far: 59.55
Weather: Started off bloody freezing but soon warmed up. Clouded over just as we were finishing.

Jump to “Useful shit to know…”

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Plumley, Cheshire to Knutsford, Cheshire, England

Useful shit to know…

• Adlington (Cheshire) train station has parking for £2 a day but you need to use the RingGo app which costs 40p. You should have enough signal there to do this.
• The train from Adlington to Plumley cost £21 each and we had to change at Stockport.