ITS ALL IN THE PLANNING
A DAY OF COMMITMENT
2014-11-23
Last Sunday was the day I had been looking forward to for many years. For quite some time I have dreamed of loading a backpack and setting off eastward from St Bees on the North West Coast of England with the hopes of ending up one hundred and ninety two miles later in Robin Hood's Bay on the East Coast.Now it may seem as though by my initial ramblings that this journey has already begun. Well in some ways it has but in many ways it is still just a tiny speck of light in a very far off galaxy.
Last Sunday was not a "step off" if you will. Last Sunday was the first day of commitment to the idea and the planning required to make it possible. Last Sunday morning started with a laptop or two and a cup of coffee at Habit. With us for this part of the journey was our new best friend William Shatner, as he "negotiated" our airfare to the old country. Just seconds after our "Bid" went in to the Priceline system, we were updated with a screen advising we were the proud owners of two electronic tickets that would take us from Victoria to Edmonton to Amsterdam to Newcastle.
That's it then. No turning back now.From there we migrated next door to Mole (a good breakfast spot in Victoria) for a bite to eat and to feel good about ourselves and our newly purchased tickets to fly. We soon after came to grips with the enormity of the logistics of this endeavour, so we settled up and walked across the street to Mountain Equipment CO-OP. MEC is a candy store for adventurers of all shapes and sizes. From those who climb Everest to the weekend warrior.
All the gear you would need to stay dry, warm, clothed and sheltered. We wandered aimlessly for a while until a store assistant recognised the blank overwhelmed faces and offered some advice on back packs and hiking boots. The gear shopping was going to be fun but it was also going to take a lot of research and reading to get the right stuff for the right job.We wandered out of "MEC" desperately in need of a pint and in my case a scotch egg (or two). We wandered down the block a ways to a new local pub that had recently been recommended as authentic with top drawer British fair. Several minutes later we were sitting on a stool with two local pints in front of us and nibbles on the way.As you can see the nibbles arrived and they were fantastic. Nothing better than a pint of bitter and a couple of Scotch Eggs.
Now comes the hard part. We have committed to this journey. We need to figure how to get to the start point, find accommodations along the way and a whole bunch of other "stuff" to make this journey as enjoyable as we can.With the right web sites for sourcing information on the C2C we set out to send some emails to local B&B's along the way. With that out of the way we decided that day one had been a good day and one that should be remembered as a great kick off to a fun 9 months of preparation for our C2C in September 2015.