Day 1 - St Bees to Cleator

I have a full English breakfast to start the day.  To help preserve my trim post Lycian Way physique, ruined only by a month of extreme tapas eating in Spain, I skip the toast and stick to sausages, bacon, eggs, etc.  The plan is to have lunch at midday at a pub in Sandwith that is mentioned in the Coast to Coast guidebook. We start the day with a 700m walk from St Bees down to the beach, pick up the traditional peeble (to be deposited on the opposite coast at the end of the walk) and get underway in fine weather.  The first part of the Coast to Coast is a walk along cliff tops.  It is prime bird watching territory, and with our newly purchased binoculars we manage to identify: gulls, gulls, and more gulls.

Not Broadchurch

We reach Sandwith at 1pm ready for a big lunch, but the pub that the guidebook describes as "open 7 days" is closed on Mondays, and of course it is a Monday, and there is no where else in the village to buy any food.  

After 10 minutes spent licking a wooden picnic table for nutrition, we decide to press onto the next village where the guidebook informs us a bakery and cafe await.  Fifty minutes later we reach the next village.  The bakery is shut and the cafe has gone out of business.  My plan is to catch and spit roast a cat, but Fiona convinces me to press onto the next village.  It is 4pm before we find anywhere selling food.  Not the best of starts to our walk.

Lesson's learnt today:

1) Carry some food with you, even if you think that you will have numerous dining options along the way

2) Don't trust the guidebook

3) In Britain - dogs grow in planter boxes

Distance walked today - about 15km