Saturday 6th September, London.
20 days.
300 miles.
Who you calling a fool?
Hieronymus Bosch's Ship of Fools
There can be little doubt that undertaking a big undertaking is predicated on having a hobby horse of sufficient persistence that it will not give you leave to abandon it by the roadside. The hobby horse is dressed and presented to the public and as soon as it has taken its first unhobbled step, there can be no halting until it has acquitted itself of all duties and services. This walk. Thusly.
So with no great thought and even less planning, I set out over half a month ago to offer moral support to my friend Greg Love, on a part of his traipse to Burgundy. We, being sound(ish) of wind and limb, reckoned on a total of 18 days to reach Reims Cathedral from Trafalgar Square. At no point did we factor in rest days, injury breaks or sightseeing. And yet all of these were somehow shoehorned into the adventure. It is impossible to set out from your front door with nothing but shoe-gazing and pain as inspiration.
I have previously mentioned my rucksack. Monkey. When he and I separated yesterday back in London it was odd to see him emptied of content and all of a sudden of no purpose. He who had hugged me tightly around the waist or swung indulgently from my shoulders. He the pain, he the constant, he the comfort. Silenced, attic-bound. I have had spinal surgery in the past and yet my greatest twinge came from downing tools and being free to walk without this burden. Is this Stockholm syndrome in action?
Man without Monkey.
So what are the insights, frights and delights of such a walk? Well, just being in my own head without interruption for so many hours a day was a challenge. There is a great reconditioning that comes with being 'conscious' with your body for so long and not relying on your fingers to type your thoughts or your mouth to dictate to others their behaviour. It is your feet, your lungs, your shoulders and back that decide if you will progress on the path today, each day, every day. And more than any of these it is the hidden, bloody-minded drivenness that refuses you the rest you crave, the beer you would sell your flat for, the relief of boot-removal...because you just cannot fall below the par you have set yourself. And walking with another bloke provides the iron in the spine that ensures that whoever buckles first is a total blouse-wearer cod-pilgrim.
James the Not Quite as Serious as Sigeric.
And clearly not wearing a blouse.
And what of inspiration along the way? Well, Kent is a staggeringly beautiful county. There are very few places on earth I have seen that are so blessed, wealthy, kempt, inspiring. Just filled with the bounty of tended care. Yet cross the blue ruin of the Channel and northern France seems like a flattened waffle of patched fields that reek of agricultural waste and offer very little relief when all a pilgrim wants is a hillock, a spinney, a thatched roof, a pub for heaven's sake. Curiously, the scenery only livened up when we skirted the northern approaches to Reims and headed up to the Montagne de Reims to seek a vinous path into the city. Suddenly, the comb-rakes of vines turn the landscape into a series of perfect green hurdles, all promising a moment of delight.
Steep breather.
The moments of inspiration:
Laon: staggeringly beautiful and unexpected.
And perspiration:
The Plight of the Bumblebee
I reminded myself throughout the journey that whilst this grande randonnee was inspired by a desire to provide clean drinking water for as many as people as I could it was not going to be without its own transformative elements personally. Did I change or learn anything? Maybe not, but I was reminded of the benefits of slowness. Even in a dull landscape that is devoted to wheat or barley or corn, there is so much to reflect on. We, in Europe, do not live is lands devoted to massive production, devoid of settlement. And everywhere you look, people cling to villages, ways of life, ways of living that may make little commercial sense but are seasoned, watered and blooded by history.
The greatest shock for me was heading into the Somme and visiting Thiepval where my great great uncle Harold Sinclair died on this very day 98 years ago. Blown to pieces in a rear trench at 3.30 pm by German artillery in a small stretch of woodland called Leuze Wood. He was training to become a lay priest and had only volunteered in December 1915 and been with his London Scottish unit for less than 6 weeks. Just one of 750,000.
Here's to you Harold Lawrence Sinclair.
Another - personal - reason for my undertaking this walk was to treat it is a fare thee well love letter to the wine trade in which I have worked for almost 20 years. As mentioned I am planning to move from wine into water and starting an MBA in Sustainability at Bath in a fortnight in order to do so. I don't think man (no nor women neither) can live without either but I suspect water has to be a precondition for upgrading to wine. I am an immensely fortunate boy in that I have enjoyed some exquisite moments in life and met some of the gentlest and kindest folk in wine. What has united the best of them is an implicit sense that life is a celebration of itself...that we are rich beyond measure in ourselves, in each other. All the other stuff drives us apart.
Lastly, and very importantly, I am overwhelmed with gratitude towards all of you who have been so supportive and kind. I set out thinking I might raise a couple of hundred quid if I bullied my family but so many of you have been unbelievably generous. I will send a note when I finally sign off to thank you (if you want anonymity, please say so). The upshot of all this, is that thousands of people will get clean water for life. And you lot done it. I just walked with a monkey. So please be assured of my immense thanks. A different world is possible.
Huge thanks.
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