Wainwright's Coast to Coast
- Mar 1
- 16 min read
Blog detailing mine & Jim's thru-hike of the Wainwright's Coast to Coast including itinerary, campsites & trail info :)
Hello! :) It's been a while! I have been absent from my blog for sometime, whilst I have been trying to focus my energies on launching my little guiding business - and what a journey that has been and continues to be! I am so grateful to those of you that have already chosen to support my little business, it truly means the world, I wouldn't be here without you! It hasn't been easy sailing, there has been and continues to be a lot of self doubt, there is something about setting up your own business that feels extremely raw, like you are putting all of yourself out there and that can feel scary at times! I guess, leaving a steady and stable job to pursue being self employed and a totally different career path was never supposed to be easy?! Right?
It is as I prepare for my next thru-hike that I realise how out of date my blog is! So in this blog, let me take you back to June of last year where Jim and I met for our 4th annual thru-hike to hike the Wainwright's Coast to Coast! Mine and Jim's hikes are truly a highlight of my year and this year would be no different... The only difference being that this year, we would be meeting in England for a change! All of our other hikes have been in Scotland to date!
About the Coast to Coast ℹ️
The Coast to Coast walk was conceived by Sir Alfred Wainwright in 1972 and his guidebook for the route was published in 1973...
The trail is approximately 200 miles in distance with a total ascent of around 8500m! The Trail begins in St Bees on the Irish Sea and ends in Robin Hood's Bay on the North Sea! The trail crosses through the Lake District National Park, the Yorkshire Dales National Park and the North York Moors National Park, all 3 of the National Parks offering a stark and stunning contrast in landscapes along the way...
"Surely there cannot be a finer itinerary for a long-distance walk! … The countryside traversed is beautiful almost everywhere, yet extremely varied in character, with mountains and hills, valleys and rivers, heather moors and sea-cliffs combining in a pageant of colourful scenery." - Sir Alfred Wainwright
Access to and from the Trail 🚅
Both St Bees at the start of the trail and Robin Hood's Bay at the end of the trail are accessible by public transport. I arrived in St Bees on the train and at the end of the trail in Robin Hood's Bay, we took a bus to Scarborough Train Station for our onward journeys...
In terms of pre and post trail accommodation, there is a campsite in St Bees where I had met Jim the evening prior to starting the trail. There are also campsites in Robin Hood's Bay, however, they are a short walk out of Robin Hood's Bay itself, we stayed at Middlewood Farm Holiday Park.
Navigation/ Terrain 🧭
The Coast to Coast is currently transitioning from an unofficial, sporadically marked route to an official National Trail with full waymarking expected to be completed soon... We got to see lots of the beautiful new acorn signs along the way with Alfred Wainwright's AW inscribed on them! Despite the waymarking, you cannot rely solely on signs and navigation skills are still essential...
I used the Harvey Maps Coast to Coast Map, which was kindly gifted to me as part of their ambassador program.... You really cant beat these maps! They are just incredible - The entire trail on just one sheet!
In addition, I also downloaded the Coast to Coast Trail on the FarOut App which is my preferred App for navigating long distance trails... As you can see from the screenshot below, the App shows where the next water sources and campsites etc will be and provides invaluable insight into trail conditions, resupply points and so forth... They are not the cheapest, unfortunately, however, they are absolutely worth it!
Itinerary 📅
Day 1 - St Bees - Ennerdale Bridge (14.1 miles/ 22.6km)
Jim & I had met at the campsite in St Bees at the start of trail the night prior, in anticipation of our 4th annual thru-hike together... whilst we were treat, briefly, to some sun whilst we chatted away, catching up on what each of us had been up to since we had last seen each other a year ago, the rain soon set in hard for the rest of the evening...
We broke camp in the rain, with thunder and lightening slowly approaching, we donned our waterproofs and made our way down to the Irish Sea and the official start point of the trail... I would soon realise that making the decision to bring the silly Frog Toggs waterproofs, in an attempt to save some weight, was probably not the best of ideas, considering the amount of rain we were to encounter, in true Jim & Heather fashion haha...
As per Coast to Coast tradition, we dipped our feet in the Irish sea (I mean, they were already wet at this point anyway from the heavy downpour!) and collected a couple of pebbles each which we would carry on our 200 mile journey across country over to the North Sea...
the rain & thunder continued as we made our way around the mud slide of St Bees Head, the paths had turned to streams and slick mud but this would be short-lived as we would soon be road bashing our way along lonely country roads, there was a diversion around Dent Hill to avoid the recent blow downs of trees that were obstructing the paths in the plantation due to recent storm damage, which meant even more road bashing... We were offered a very brief respite from the rain in the afternoon before it started & soon set in for evening... We decided to camp outside the Fox & Hounds Inn in Ennerdale Bridge at around 3pm as they let hikers pitch for a small fee, it felt like a luxury & total novelty to be able to get a proper cooked meal to end the day, that's for sure! These type of amenities are much more rare in our beloved Scotland!
Day 2 - Ennerdale Bridge - Borrowdale Youth Hostel (15 miles/ 24km)
Whilst it had rained hard through the night once again, we were treat to a dry spell as we took down our tents in the beer garden before pressing on to the stunning Ennerdale Water... Most of the other C2C hikers that had stayed at the pub were taking the detour path on the north side of the lake as they had read that the south side was tricky to pass after lots of rain but Jim & decided to risk it and were glad that we did as it really was just beautiful as we passed Robin Hoods Chair and then through some ancient woodland before reaching the end of the lake where we picked up a 4x4 track...
it was here that our dry spell would come to an end and the rain would once again set in hard for the day... We eventually arrived at the remote Black Sail YHA... where we stopped very briefly before battering on in the rain up the mountain pass in low visibility... arriving at Honister Slate Mine sodden, we toyed with the idea of stopping at the café but decided to bash on to this evening's destination, Borrowdale YHA, where we pitched for the evening... Of course I had forgotten to bring any form of ID (!!) which made checking in a little bit difficult but we got there in the end... I was truly spent on arrival and had a mini breakdown where I momentarily questioned my entire being and all of my life choices, before quickly snapping out of it again haha... Jim and I had an early night, hopeful for a little more sun tomorrow :)
Day 3 - Borrowdale Youth Hostel - Tongue Gill (11.5 miles/ 18.5km)
OMG! We woke up to sunshine!!!!! This made me soooo happy!! :)) we started the day with a cooked breakfast at the YHA before I proceeded to spread my gear across the entire campsite in an attempt to get everything dried off & it was a success! Happy flipping days :))
the good weather would continue for the day as we made our way up into the fells toward Eagle Crag, eventually dropping down into another beautiful valley at the other side via Grasmere Common, this section of the trail was just stunning! We stopped for a few breaks beside the gill, both of which proved eventful as Jim's entire pack went toppling down into the river on our first break and then on our second break, I had gone to dip my feet in the river only to find a huge blister on my little toe pad which i proceeded to pop with a safety pin before continuing on and down into Grasmere to resupply... we stopped at a café for some lunch before calling in to the famous Grasmere Gingerbread shop (I adore this shop so much!) and Coop where i bought the biggest resupply of my life and then proceeded to massively regret it on the climb out of Grasmere haha.. We set camp beside Tongue Gill and enjoyed a rare evening of sun at camp...
Day 4 - Tongue Gill - Angle Tarn (11.5 miles/ 18.5km)
We woke up to more rain again on Day 4 which would continue for the rest of the day but today would be a fairly short day... After packing away our camp in the rain, we then made our soaking ascent up to Grisedale Tarn with zero visibility...
Dropping down into Patterdale, we stopped for lunch at the Patterdale Hotel to dry off, we chatted with other fellow Coast to Coasters before pressing on again, in the rain, up to Angle Tarn where we set camp for the evening... The rain would continue but the forecast seemed hopeful for the next few days, at least...
Day 5 - Angle Tarn - Shap (15 miles/ 24km)
Today we woke to no rain and we could now actually see our stunning surroundings, since we had arrived in the clag, yesterday afternoon!! We packed up and made our onward and upward into the fells.....
Eventually we ascended up to the summit of Kidsty Pike (792m) which is the highest point of the trail... The sun was blazing at this point and continued to do so for the rest of the day as we made the steep descent down off Kidsty Pike to the stunning Haweswater... A real contrast to the last few day's weather on trail!
Continuing beside Haweswater, we eventually dropped down into the tiny hamlet of Burnbanks where we stopped briefly at an honesty box, where Jim kindly treat us both to a Ribena and a flapjack (yep, Jim bailing me out once again as I had failed to bring cash - as prepared as ever! haha!)... We pressed on through farmers fields to Shap Abbey, it was here, just after the Abbey, that we had a scary confrontation with some cows with their calves.. As we were walking past them, I could quickly sense that one mamma wasn't happy with us passing, I warned Jim and at that very moment, the mamma cow started drooling and huffing with anger, she started to kick her legs a little but luckily, remained with her calf, we tried to press on as quickly as possible, luckily, she seemed to calm down as we still had some distance to go to the cattle grid and to safety! I am not sure that Jim or I had any energy to run at this point as we were spent from the day's hiking ! Thankfully, we didn't have too far to go before we eventually arrived at our campsite in Shap for the night. We were staying at the New Ing Lodge, which is more of a B&B which offers basic camping facilities but, be warned, the campsite backs on to the railway line which is a fairly active line... We met Jim's friend, Don in Shap for a chippie tea this evening, it was great to finally meet Don after hearing so much about him from Jim and also with us both being so familiar with Edale in the Peak District... Jim and I then returned back to the campsite for an early night...
Day 6 - Shap to Kirby Stephen (20 miles/ 32km)
Today was set to be another belter of a day! We made our way out of Shap, across farmers fields and made our crossing of the M6!! I did feel quite surreal crossing the M6 by the footbridge, especially considering the amount of times I have driven the M6 to Scotland and back!
The trail took us onward further through more farmers fields, we decided to make the short detour to the little village of Orton for a visit to Kennedys Fine Chocolate Shop where we stopped for ice cream, cold drinks and of course, some chocolate... This was a perfect little stop off - I highly recommend taking the short detour!
It felt like the temperature had been turned up by many notches today, at one point we were literally hiking from tree to tree to savour the shade! haha! It turned into a slight suffer fest! I even managed to talk Jim into hitching a short road section at the hottest part of the day, Jim reluctantly agreed and so I stuck my thumb out and a chap kindly stopped, his boot and backseats full of... chocolate! haha! It was the owner of the chocolate shop that stopped for us! What a beautiful coincidence! We arrived in Kirby Stephen and headed to Pennine View Campsite which is a short (uphill) walk out of Kirby Stephen, we had booked in for two nights so that we could enjoy a rest day before cracking on for the rest of the trail... On hindsight, the rest day probably wasn't really needed but it gave us chance to meet some lovely folk in the campsite where we laughed and shared stories and it also gave us chance to align with some other Coast to Coasters, who we would share the rest of the trail with...
Day 7- Kirby Stephen - Keld (12 miles/ 19.5km)
Leaving the campsite, we connected back up with the trail in Kirby Stephen & headed up into the fells up to the incredible Nine Standards Rigg - one of the iconic landmarks on the Coast to Coast - the conical shaped cairns are over 800 years old, they vary in shape and range between 2-4 meters high, their exact origin is a mystery, with theories ranging from Roman decoys to boundary markers...
What an incredible place! It would making a cracking day walk too, if you were ever in the area! Continuing up and over the vast moors, we were treat to the most stunning panoramic views before we eventually dropped down into Keld, the halfway point of the trail!!!! We arrived at Rukin's Park Lodge campsite at around 2pm with some other Coast to Coasters, Fabian, Ollie, Brendan & Charlotte, we set up our little tent village and spent the afternoon chatting before a storm rolled in for the night...
Day 8 - Keld - Reeth (14 miles/ 22.5km)
We waited for the café at the campsite to open for some breakfast before leaving for the day, we chose to take the low route since the rain looked like it had set in for the day, the low route pretty much followed the River Swale the entire way into Reeth through pastures and fields and through so many tiny, non-backpack friendly gates in the drystone walls... Haha... It was a beautiful walk and it was here that I saw both a woodcock and a baby rabbit right on the trail!!! I had never seen a woodcock before today - so special! 😍😍
Eventually arriving at the Orchard Caraven Park & Campsite again at around 2pm, we pitched our tents then headed into Reeth for a little resupply at the shop inside the Post Office and some lunch at Copper Kettle Cafe before returning back to the campsite where we met up with Brendan, Ollie & Fabian again, just in time for the rain to set in again for the evening...
Day 9 - Reeth - Richmond (11 miles / 17km)
Today's walk was a short one which followed the River Swale again for some time, past the villages of Marrick and Maske and over the hills and down into Richmond where we arrived early, grabbed some lunch at Greggs and a resupply before trying to find a campsite, there are no campsites in Richmond itself so myself, Jim, Fabian and Ollie took a taxi to the Caravan Club outside of Richmond... There was noone there when we arrived, the site seemed completely dead but we decided to pitch anyway and wait for the owners to return to the farmhouse, hoping that they wouldn't mind us pitching without any booking... Luckily, the owners took our arrival and pitching in good humour and only charged us a nominal cash fee for staying...
Day 10 - Richmond - Ingleby Cross (24 miles / 38km)
Jim and I left the campsite and attempted to get back on the trail, which proved more difficult than expected... We ended up wading through wet cornfields in an attempt to get back on track which resulted in us having to jump some gates, one of which sent me flying into the mud and nettles below, I needed a moment to collect myself hahaha...
Today largely consisted of farmers fields and road bashing so it was very much a matter of head down and crack on kind of day, we stopped at a church for some respite from the rain as it had an honesty box inside for Coast to Coast hikers so we made a hot drink before pressing on further, eventually arriving in Ingleby Cross after 24 miles! We pitched at the Bluebell Inn in Ingleby Cross as they allow Coast to Coasters to camp in their beer garden for a nominal fee, we enjoyed a lovely dinner here at the pub and also a cooked breakfast the following day :))
Day 11 - Ingleby Cross - The Lion Inn, Blakey Ridge ( 23 miles/ 37km)
The breakfast at the pub this morning was just the fuel we needed today! Leaving Ingleby Cross, we made the steep ascent up and onto the north york moors proper! Today was incredible with the most amazing panoramic views throughout...
We joined the Cleveland Way for some time, stopping briefly at the café at Lord Stones Country Park for a scone and coffee before heading back up onto the remote & desolate moors for the rest of the day, it was here that we saw hundreds of baby pheasants on the path which was just incredible - such beautiful little souls! We were lucked out on the weather as I imagine today's section being pretty tough and exposed in bad weather! We eventually arrived at The Lion Inn at Blakey Ridge - the Inn stands alone, high up on the moors... We erected our little tent village in the beer garden where we spent the night eating, drinking and being merry...
Day 12 - The Lion Inn - Littlebeck (17 miles/ 28km)
Our penultimate day on trail! I couldn't quite believe it was nearly over, I was well into the swing and routine of hiking every day, carrying everything I need in my pack with our new trail family, I felt like I could hike like this forever, unfortunately, Jim probably wouldn't have agreed at this point, I don't think, his poor feet were in absolute pieces and covered in huge blisters! :( Jim never usually suffers with his feet and always prided himself on never getting blisters, I truly felt for him, we wondered what the variable was that was causing the blisters, we suspect it was likely the heat or, perhaps, the amount of road bashing on the trail as he had worn the same trainers (Topo's) on our hike of the much more difficult and remote Alder Trail last year, without any issue... Jim is not a complainer and remains positive 100% of the time but I could see and feel the pain on his face, I truly felt for him and wished there was something I could do to stop the pain he was, quite clearly, enduring and had been for a couple of days now!
We continued over the wild and lonely moors before dropping down into the village of Glaisedale where we popped to the pub for some lunch before following the River Esk down into Grosmont where we stopped again at the local shop for a little resupply before pressing on just a little more to Littlebeck where we erected our tent village, for the final night on trail, at Newton House Farm Camspite, which is just slightly off the trail... Ollie came up with he absolute belter of an idea of trying to order a takeaway and it was a success! We managed to order pizza! What a beautiful last night, the sun shone for us too! :)
Day 13 - Littlebeck - Robin Hoods Bay (11 miles / 18km)
We were all a little more quiet and subdued than usual this morning, trying to process the fact that it was our last morning on trail - all that stood between us and the finish line was just 11 miles of easy walking!! Today, symbolically, we walked together, whereas on most days our group would walk at our own paces and agree to meet later at camp, together we hiked slowly today, stopping at a café for some cake and coffee, we savoured our last moments on trail... It was here that we joined the coast and could see, in the distance, the bay that would mark our journeys end...
What an adventure this had been, different to mine and Jim's usual wild, off--grid adventures where we don't usually see a soul, this trail was all about the people met and the friendships forged... We arrived into Robin Hoods Bay, the end point of the almost 200 mile trail, at around 11.30am with 5 other Coast to Coasters, who we had met along the way and who we had spent the past week with, pitched together as a little village This trail really was about the people & how beautiful it was... There is something about these trails that allows you to forge such strong, special bonds with the people you share them with, I guess you experience so much together, I mean so much happens in one day on trail, let alone 2 weeks! You not only share the adventure but you go through so much together too - the inevitable ups and the downs, the supporting of each other when sickness or injury creep in, the laughs the tears and the chats that can make monotonous miles pass quickly or distract you from the pain for just a moment...
I feel so incredibly lucky and blessed to have spent such precious time with such incredible people, my heart broke to say goodbye and many tears were shed on my part, which is silly really, as I know I will see them again for another tent village again soon and well, all that was left to do was to dip our feet in the sea and throw in our pebbles that had made the 200 mile journey with us... What a journey!!!!
Thank you for reading - Happy Hiking! ✨🗻
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