Day 21 Somewhere in Devon

I am sitting on the doorstep of my Marie Celeste-like B&B. The front door is unlocked, the back door is unlocked, there is no-one in the garden. No car either. I have been here for 20 minutes. I’m just wondering at what stage it is acceptable to search the house to check nothing untoward has happened. I’m hoping they’ve just gone out for a walk and forgotten the time. I can think of other possibilities but I’m focusing on ones that will result in my reaching my room the fastest.

Today started off in suburban Barnstaple. I did feel a bit of a dork in my walking gear amongst the school drop-off crowd. I found myself walking through a musical estate but before long was out in the countryside.

Today was mainly road walking. The roads were surprisingly quiet so I made good time. I was feeling better after my rest day, so much better that I decided to go the long way round. I took the Tarka Trail which had morphed from a flat concrete path into more of a countryside walk. This part of Devon is quite hilly but as it was on the roads there was a welcome absence of steps. And it wasn’t nearly as hilly as the SWCP.

It was, however, surprisingly muddy. There are a lot of streams around and a lot of Spr marked on the OS map. As you might guess, even if you’re not intimately acquainted with OS map legends, Spr (in blue but I don’t have the tech skills for that) is a Spring. It did make for some pretty scenery.

Otherwise, today was a day of signs

I tried to stop at both East and West Buckland churches but they were locked. I had hoped for a village shop-well I had hoped for a full coffee-serving cafe with delicious homemade sandwiches, or possibly a pasty but I felt that was unlikely to happen- but there was nothing. I ate my garage sandwich on a picnic bench in a playing field

Eventually, nearly 14 miles from Barnstaple I stopped at Molland Cross. I passed some homing pigeons, at least I assume they were homing pigeons so took a picture

The B&B owner appeared after about twenty minutes so all was well. There is an upstairs sun room with phenomenal views over the surrounding countryside, and from the dining room you can see Dartmoor. And it turns out that the birds are not homing pigeons but Wolverhampton Tumblers, which tumble backwards, when they fly, but, said my B&B host, with a tinge of sadness, they don’t fly very much.