No trespassing

The plan was straightforward enough: we'd meet up in Kirkby Lonsdale, go for a walk and finish up at The Pheasant in Casterton for a late lunch. There was a little bit of whinging in our WhatsApp group about the possibility of rain but when I got home from work at about one o'clock it was still dry. All systems, I felt, were go.

But then the boys messaged to say that they were too hungry to walk before lunch, so fearing the walk might not happen, I suggested they drive to The Pheasant and I'd walk across and meet them there. Everyone agreed and so we proceeded.

Except that The Pheasant was closed, so Bob, Jon and Rich drove out to Barbon and installed themselves at the inn there. There was an offer to come and pick me up but it's only three and a half miles, so I figured I could walk there in the time it would take them to eat and have a couple of beers. 

Well, I was walking through High Casterton when the rain really started to come down. It was the first proper test for the waterproof coat I bought when the Minx and I went up to Hinterland and, well, it wasn't completely watertight - on the arms, anyway - but it did its job well enough. 

I walked along the top road, behind Casterton, for a large part of the journey but then it was necessary to cut down to the main road, just for a hundred yards or so, to pick up the road into Barbon. To do that, I had to cross this old railway bridge. That old track you can see passes through the garden of the Barbon Inn and it was far and away the quickest route to my friends and a nice dry pub.

I thought about clambering down, which would have been easy enough, and walking along the old railway line. There would be a few fences to negotiate along the way, I knew, but nothing too challenging, and I doubted that there would be any farmers or landowners supervising the length of track, perhaps a mile long, that I wanted to go along. Much of it was in a cutting or under trees, anyway.

But I couldn't bring myself to do it. Walking through this land, trespassing, tempting though it was, was something I couldn't bring myself to do and I set off along the roads, walking that bit further but, actually, probably a bit quicker, too. It's a shame the old line can't be turned into a footpath, really; it would make for a lovely Sunday stroll.