Bedtime Reading

To make a change from crime I'm reading Wainwright's tale of a 200+ mile walk in 1938 while the country was preparing for war. Its interesting from a number of points of view but the one will share with you, is that he did not think it necessary to take a change of clothes on his two week hike up the east side of the Pennines, along a bit of Hadrian's Wall and back down the west side to Settle. Of more importance to Wainwright was a pot of Indian ink pens, pencils, rubbers and some cards. Those of you who have seen his walking guides to the Lake District Fells will know they are full of the most wonderful drawings. I'm not sure how much time he got to sketch on this trip though because the weather was often awful and the distances travelled great.  He avoided the more up-market inns to stay the night, most likely because he will have turned up each night very dirty, wet and smelly. He hoped his clothes would dry over night, did not carry pyjamas , why bother with the weight and and slipped naked between the sheets. He did carry spare socks, tucked in pocket and reckoned his rucksack carried no more than 2 pounds of weight.