Wed 26th May - Day 40, Hardraw to Baldersdale (25 miles)

Waking up this morning I realised my roll mat was no longer inflated, it was the same yesterday but I thought that was just one of those things, it would appear I have a small hole in it somewhere.

It was another early start at 06:30, the sun was shining in a cloudless sky.

The first 2 hours were all uphill to the summit of Great Shunner Fell (716m).

I came across some red grouse chicks and it was quite amusing watching the mother bird doing the broken wing routine while I was standing right next to them.

Then it was downhill to Thwaite, from here the path went straight back up to contour the side of Kisdon before dropping back down to Keld but I decided to take the shorter, easier option and and stayed on the B road to Keld.

At Keld I crossed the River Swale to get back on the path going up onto Stonesdale Moor, I met Steve again doing a path condition report on this section of the Pennine Way, he was one of the three I saw on day 35 and he is going up to Scotland next week.

It began to cloud over again as I stopped for lunch just before getting to Tan Hill Inn, Britain's highest Inn, I can remember that Mick & I camped here when we did the Pennine Way 29 years ago.

Coming down from the inn to follow Sleightholme Beck I saw a folded piece of white paper on the ground, I picked it up to see that it was a receipt for 2 people for B&B last night.

A piece ahead of me I could see another walker, as I started to gain ground I saw it was a couple, I caught up with them on a bridge that crossed the stream. He was very surprised when I said "Hi, are you Andrew Wright?", it was his receipt that I found, it must have fallen out his pocket. Then we both discovered that we were both walking LEJOG, Andrew started on 10th April and will finish 10th July, as he is B&B'ing his schedule is fixed, his girlfriend Mel was accompanying him on some sections.

Andrew said he had met another walker doing LEJOG, we walked together for a couple of miles until our paths split, he went onto Bowes while I headed north to camp at the YH at Baldersdale.

I arrived at the YH at 18:00, another long day but 25 miles covered.

680 miles completed.