JOGLE 4 Day 8 - 10 Sep 11

Start 0830 Finish 1700 Distance 20 miles. Crediton to Oakhampton. Well Plan B was to walk as far as Yeoford where a railway station that ran a passenger service back to Crediton and onward to Exeter was. Yeoford was the last cut of point or escape route from the walk and therefore an appropriate place to see how things shaped up. It was fairly easy walking along the Devonshire Heartland Way as apart from a Farmers’ field full of Corn that obliterated the footpath otherwise it was Minor roads all the way. I think the farmer will be grateful to us as we didn’t walk around in circles thus creating a local phenomenon but we might have wandered up and down a bit to give some reality to the “Maze” field. At Yeoford a quick appraisal of the medical situation was conducted, that went something like “I’m not coming back all this way to do this bit again, so we might as well keep going!” personally I was thinking, “warm train, nice coffee and doughnut in Exeter and a bit of retail therapy thrown in”, sigh. Well it was only another 15 miles through the undulating Devonshire countryside along some very easy walking quiet minor roads and the weather was holding out as well with sunny spells. As for me I was looking forward to seeing the rolling hills of Dartmoor shrouded in mist. There really wasn’t much to see along the way of any real interest other than the scenery of Devon, very rural. At Sprayton we discovered a pub called the Uncle Tom Cobley which was also a four star B&B, all very nice. We stopped there for a soft drink and sneakily ate our sandwiches outside on the picnic benches. I guess that was the highlight for the day apart from dodging fast moving tractors that filled up the whole lane, luckily the British Military Training came into good use here and I was able to disguise myself as Blackberry Bush. Just as well the tractor was not in hedge trimming mode. Later whilst lent against a hedge and eating an apple thinking about how much further we had to go, what we could eat tonight for supper and what the B&B would be like and more importantly would we find it! A massive tractor and trailing come hurtling towards me and it looked as though the farmer hadn’t seen me, then at the last moment possible and with a big grin all over his face he turned left and only just made the turning such was the size of the trailer. The views of Dartmoor were spectacular and well worth the wait although it had started raining and the hills were becoming covered in cloud. The last few miles saw us trudging through the outskirts of Oakhampton and a fairly easy discovery of the B&B.