A Day In The Journey

I arrived at Salcombe around 9.30. I figured that I had plenty of time to make it to the hostel, which was just outside of town and ended check in at 10am. Unfortunately, I made two blunders that caused my arrival at the hostel to occur at 10.30. Firstly, I failed to flag the driver at the earlier stop...the one that was closest to the hostel. Instead, not realizing that it even made that much difference, I rode the bus all the way to the "downtown" stop. Little did I know, this added an entire long, hilly segment (an an entire jaunt through town) to my walk that I could have avoided. The stop where I alit is on the A. The stop where I should probably have alit is on this A. Since the hostel is to the south of this map, you can see the difference it would have made. My second blunder was really due to not familiarizing myself with a map before arriving. Had I done so, I would have avoided this particular mistake. (Before you say anything, yes, I do usually stop first thing at the information office and get a map/ask for directions. In Salcombe, said office doesn't open until 10. Yeesh.) My problem occurred at the split at Bennett and Cliff Roads. The hostel is south of Salcombe at Overbecks. If you zoom out a little you can see the Bennett/Cliff Road junction at the top of the map. You can also see that the hostel is a decent way outside of town. Especially factoring in that I had forced myself to walk unnecessarily through town first.

Now, as you look at these maps I've provided you, you can see how Cliff Road is a nice, reasonably straight, single elevation road from Salcombe to Overbecks. I say "reasonably" because the part of the road from the first beach (North Sands) to the second (South Sands) boasts a rather significant incline. Nevertheless, it is much shorter and much less taxing than the route I ended up taking: Bennett Road to Sandhills Road to Beadon Road. It is important to note here that Bennett Road is entirely an upward inclined road. Sandhills Road is a bit of up, followed by a very steep down. This would usually not be such a problem except that I was already completely exhausted, and I was lugging about 45 lbs. of luggage (suitcase, backpack, bag). Whew. I was a very unhappy little traveler. "So why take the difficult road?" you ask. Here is why: The brown sign you see here pointed me up Bennett Road. You can also get a taste of the incline. haha Here, a bit closer, you can see the little building and acorn leaf that signifies the YHA. Definitely a sign meant for drivers and not pedestrians. By the time I made it to the hostel, I was exhausted, worn out, my legs were wobbly, and I was emotionally spent. I know, I know, I'm displaying my moments of utter wimpiness here. I was further dismayed when I reached North Sands and realized I had to keep walking. I thought I would reach the hostel at the top of the next hill, but no. Then I found South Sands: still no hostel. In my completely spent state, each setback seemed far more frustrating than it would normally have been. When I reached the hostel and found the door locked (it being around 10.30), I definitely sat down on the bench outside the building and started crying. Yes, crying. In public. Not at a movie. O.o Definitely not my most strongly independent moment of the trip. haha. Well, as I sat there sobbing, a middle-aged gentleman in a gardening apron walked by, unlocked the gate, and entered the gardens. This only served to heighten my discouragement. I rather had hoped to be noticed. I was soon to be, though. The gentleman returned a few minutes later and saw me sitting there, realized I was upset, and asked, "Is there some way I can help you?" It is no testament to my strength of person that I almost couldn't get through my tale of bus, town walk, hill walk, luggage and lateness due to the sobbing. It is a tribute to his kindness that he figured out my troubles and immediately said, "Well, let's go around to the back and see if someone is here. We'll get you situated in no time." Sure enough, he talked to the girl who was working, explained the situation, and I was soon sitting in front of a hot cup of tea signing the receipt for check-in. I felt quite embarrassed at my inability to stop crying for a full 10 minutes, but everyone was very kind and understanding. This is when I discovered there was a closer bus stop. I also learned there was a ferry from South Sands into Salcombe if I wanted to avoid trekking back with luggage when I left. This was very heartening news to me. I spent a few hours reading in the lounge (which had a tremendously lovely view, by the way) and relaxing before I ventured out again. The girl (whose name is Kris) checked on me a couple of times to make sure I was doing all right. :-) I'm sure it isn't every day they have to comfort hysterical American girls. hahahaha.

I finally decided to venture into town and see what I could find. What I found was a lovely little seaside town. It rather reminded me of those quaint New England towns featured in Hallmark movies. Once I perused a few shops, however, I realized it was on the Hamptons/Kennebunkport end of the seaside town spectrum than say, Rockport, Mass. By the late afternoon, I had also discovered a splash of the OC seemed to be thrown in. Really it was an amusing place to observe as it was such a odd combination of older couples surrounded by the aura of money and young people trying desperately to be the hip monied. I'm pretty sure that I was the only female jeans shorts in the entire place. Since I was wearing ballet flats, though, I felt like I at least passed muster. haha. Although I really did want to buy something from the absolutely lovely boutiques, I was loathe to spend £30 ($45) on a grey tank top or £85 ($130) on a simple cotton sundress. Really. I did, however, buy a cute reusable shopper to replace the one I'd inadvertently left in the kitchen of the Keswick hostel. I had a lovely late lunch (alliteration!) that I bought at a bakery: lovely warm pizza with a super-thick crust and very nice cheeses and a donut. More on the donut later. Eventually, I bought a few provisions from the grocery and headed back to the hostel. (This trip I took the Cliff Road both ways--much more pleasant than the morning's path.) After stashing my provisions in the kitchen, I went outside and enjoyed the absolutely beautiful weather/sunset by reading on the bench. Just before time for the afternoon check-in session, a pair of ladies, who were obviously distance walking, arrived and sat on the wall near the bench. We had a lovely chat while they waited to check in. They had walked from Land's End--a distance of about 200 miles along the coast. For the life of me, I can't remember where they were stopping, but I recall they had about 50 more miles to cover. Some nights the stayed in hostels, some nights, their tiny tent. They were both far better packers that I am. hahaha. It also ended up that they were sharing my room. :-)

Also sharing the hostel was a group of university students taking a two week intensive. I encountered several of the boys that night as I sat in the lounge reading. Several of them tumbled in to watch a World Cup game and then tumbled out again to proceed to a pub in Salcombe to finish watching it. I didn't meet any of the girls until the next day, but they were all rather fun and interesting, I found. After breakfast (a full English cooked breakfast that was lovely) the next day, I gathered my rather significant pile of clothes that needed washing and headed toward town. Have I mentioned how happy I was to not rush off to a train station? I was so very happy. I found the launderette and was moderately sad to notice that it had a closed sign hanging. Hm. Well, it was just after 10, so I thought it might not open until 10.30. I wandered about a bit until 10.30 and tried again. The closed sign was still up. I was proactive. I took my shorts-wearing self into the candy shop that was attached and asked the slightly punk-ish teenager working there about the launderette. Slightly abashed, he said it was open, apologized profusely for not changing the sign before, and politely gave me change for my note. I then proceeded, chuckling, down the hall to start my laundry. As with all laundromats I have ever been in, the washing machines were great. The dryers, while also great, were based on completely useless time increments: 10 minutes or 25 minutes. Yeah. A shirt will dry in 10 mins. Two shirts and a pair of socks might dry in 25. Ah well. I started the wash load (no color separation for the first time since...ever...haha), set the alarm on my iPod, and headed out to find a juice and a place to read. I found both and enjoyed a lovely half hour overlooking the harbor and reading the book I'd purchased the evening before. (Agnes Grey, if you're interested--the only thing in town I could afford to buy! :-P) When the clothes made it to the dryer, I ended up just sitting on top of one of the washers to read seeing as I had to be around to check and restart (since the first round wasn't going to cut it.) Eventually, they were ready, so I folded and packed them into my handy little shopper and went out to find lunch. I had a cream tea for lunch. The strawberry preserves were oh-so-tasty and the clotted cream was...divine. I know that clotted cream does not sound divine, but trust me, it was. The tea was quite good, too. haha

I took my time walking back to the hostel just to enjoy that absolutely amazing coastal weather. I pondered walking back down to the beach when I was finished, if only to chuckle at the holidayers laying out almost fully dressed on the beach, but decided instead to wander through the Overbecks garden. It was well worth it. The gardens were charming and peaceful; the museum portion of the house was fascinatingly random. (I took a number of pictures in the gardens, fyi.) That evening as I was reading in the lounge it was the girls' turn to tumble in. They were quite a funny and diverse group: from the girl-next-door type to the OC wannabe girl. We hit it off well enough that when they were about to leave to go into Salcombe for the music festival, they asked me to come along. (That's right--tiny town has a music festival every year.) It was a pretty good time. Of course, there was some widespread angst due to the WC tie with the US. (I had no angst. :-P) But soon the fairly decent cover band had everyone singing and enjoying themselves. I even had some local ale. It wasn't exactly what I expected, but it was pretty good. Since I had quite a day of bus riding the next day (travel on Sundays is, indeed, weird; also, if you miss the morning bus, you're stuck until very late in the afternoon.), I decided to go back to the hostel when one of the girls decided to go back rather than to the pub after the festival ended for the night. Let me tell you: it was dark! I was very glad for the flashlight I was carrying in my bag. I also used it to quietly enter the room where a completely new set of walking ladies was already sleeping.

The next morning: shower, breakfast, walk to Salcombe, wait for bus, bus ride to Exeter, and train to Salisbury! It was going to be a full day.

PS: British donuts are not like American donuts. They are like really big versions of the donuts you get at Chinese buffets. Also, they have jam inside. They are delicious. Not like Krispy Kreme delicious, but still delicious.

PPS: Overbecks is half YHA and half part of the National Trust. When Otto Overbeck died, he donated it to the National Trust on two conditions: 1) it obviously bear his name and 2) it be a place accessible to youth.

PPPS: In case you didn't gather from the title, Agatha Christie was a Devon native, born in Torquay about 25 miles up the coast from Salcombe. She set some of her novels in the county. So did Thomas Hardy, he just changed up all the names.

PPPPS: Here are the photos from Salcombe.