Dont Worry, its worse than it looks..

This, dear reader, is the part where it all gets weepy and tearful. We started off in great form, refreshed from the stop off in Mwnt and headed off past the lovely little church on the left of us. There was the small incline up a rocky path and then we were back on the coastal path, it looked promising and was even flat for a while. The heat was on us and sunburn started to become a problem. We battled on until we could see Aberporth in the distance. Aberporth has a Ministry of Defence (MOD) Base situated there and we could see all the high tech Aerials and Monitoring gear poking up in the sky - it was very far away, but at least there was some hope. Good things we saw along the way, were seals in the bays below and again stunning scenery, but the big problem here was that we just seemed to be making very little forward movement, we just went up one ravine and back down another and then climbed back up again. We were begining to stop more and more often. I must point out though that Ray wasnt too bothered, as the oldest and fittest member of the crew, Ray kept going without a murmur, whilst the rest of were moaning as if the Japanese Imperial Forces had us on a forced march with a bayonet in our backs.

It was beginning to get tedious, the sun was at it's highest and after going up and down ravines for hours we'd drop into the next valley only to see the Minarets of Jerusalem (as thats what we were now calling the Aerials on the base at Aberporth) only fractionally nearer than they had been two hours ago. This went on for some time. Ray got the map out to see if there was any reason to be cheerful for the next couple of hours - there wasnt and the only thing you could do was plod on - Occasionally Grant would race ahead of us and at one point Ray said that Grant looked like Wallace in "The Wrong Trousers" as he stomped on ahead of us... funnily enough Grant was wearing a pair of walking pants that didnt look too dissimilar.

It went on like this for ages and really there's not much to say about ravines, you dont get to see the coast line and you start to get annoyed. Some of it was pretty dangerous as well - If it had been raining we would have had big problems on one descent - it was bad enough in the dry. Steps had once been built into the side of this ravine, but had now broken off and all that was left were metal spikes sticking up - get that descent wrong and we'd be flying home in an air ambulance. Luckily we managed it okay.

So to break the monotony of the walk, lets have some history of Aberporth. The settlement goes back to 1284, probably as a small fishing village - the name Aberporth means Mouth of the Gateway...or something similar. Herring fishing was big business here, indeed as it was all the way up this coast - right up until the first World War when stocks were almost completely depleted - they have not returned since. Trade with Ireland was big in the 18th Century and Lime was the commodity of the day - used for building and conditioning soil - you'll come across Lime Kilns dotted along the shoreline - one of the best preserved ones is in Cwmtydu which we would visit later on. The Met Office has a weather station here and has been providing data for the shipping forecast since 1941. The MOD set up shop here in 1939 and was initially a naval base, then it concentrated on Radar and the MOD also has great swathes of Cardigan Bay to play in and there are certain parts where you are not allowed to take your boat. Submarines also pop up here every now and then - Currently the place is apparently concentrating on Drone technology and high tech computer listening devices - In fact, there's loads of stuff going on here which should appeal to the conspiracy theorists.

Back to the rather less secretive work of trying to get to Aberporth. We were thoroughly fed up - The sudocrem that had been once used to relieve my nether regions was now being smeared over arms, ears and faces as it is mainly oily zinc.....like the stuff the Aussie cricketers shove on their snouts. Grant resembled something from Colonel Kurtz' camp in Apocalpyse Now as the stuff was all over his face. I had it on my arms and Ray had it on his ears - Ian who was suffering the most with a sunburnt lip wouldnt apply this stuff as he'd known where filthy fingers had been when dipping into it earlier on on this trip! He would suffer for it later.

I'd like to say finally, but it just wasnt happening - the only respite came when we had to head inland as we had to walk around the MOD base - this was a fairly decent climb through a wood which we thought might take us to the Road to Aberporth - it didnt. Once we reched the top, guess what? We had to go down again - Ian said to me "Well at least we're going downhill.." - I told him that it only means there'll be another hill to climb....and there was. At this point we were all getting very tetchy and laid out on a path panting.....unusually though, some people went past as if they were just out for a stroll and just looked at us wondering why we were dying on the floor. This was good news though as it meant civilisation was possibly at hand. We kept going and finally came out on a road but then had a big field to walk over before coming out at the end of the MOD base which was fenced off and covered in Barbed wire. At least there was grass there and we once again lounged out in the blazing sun.

As we started walking again, a bloke came out of his house and cheerfully shouted "It's all downhill to Aberporth from here now boys!" - if only it had been. To follow the map or GPS, that was the next big decision and we went with Ian's GPS - the road said to the Beach - and this was another long descent which kept going on and on. We figured that as it was the beach there was bound to be a pub open. When we finally got there, the beach was packed with families and every pub was closed. The only pub I knew that was open was another mile back uphill in the town. We were reaching the point of despair now and if we'd had firearms on us, there could have been casualties.

Our arrival in Jerusalem was hardly a happy affair - Grant and I stood by the wall opposite the queue of happy families awaiting Ice Cream delights and cursed everyone, I even phoned for a taxi as I didnt want to walk that last gruelling mile. Ian had vanished and Ray went off to sit away from us. I did wonder what Ray must have been thinking. Ray has climbed the Himalayas, trecked the Andes and circumnavigated all four countries at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro - and here he was with Coco the Clown & the rest of the circus who were unable to get their acts together for the last final push.