The Viking Way

Sorry about the late blog. I was waiting for Kate to send me pictures of our eventful day. And guess what? Didn't happen. Pft, women. Anyway, I'll try and add the photos later. Enjoy:

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Ok, as most - if not all - of you should know today I went, with many others, went on a walk. A mud-filled walk. Following this route called 'The Viking Way.'

Here is a brief explanation for anyone who doesn't know: 'This long distance footpath (150 miles) starts at the Humber Bridge, crosses the county and finishes at Oakham in Rutland. The Viking Way passes through the Wolds, through many villages and beautiful scenery, there are plenty of short walks going out from the Way. This gives walkers chances s to explore more of the Wolds. The name of the route is from the influence of the Danes in Lincolnshire, although much of the Viking Way follows much older Celtic routes.'

We didn't walk the whole 150 miles - thank god - but we walked from Caistor to Tealby. Which is a good 9/10 miles, for us that is a hella a lot to walk.

Here is the events of the day in chronological (or the way I remember it) order:

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First, we got there for 8:50. We had to get there by 8:50 or the coach will leave us. Bullsh*t (yea, we encountered a lot of that today). We got there and there were two coaches there - turns out they were the school buses. They drove away. Some time went by...

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*tumbleweed rolls by*

Anyway, finally, the coach arrives and we jump on like a bunch of kids. All was well, the trip there was fine and food was plentiful - well, not so plentiful after it passed my hands :P. It took, roughly, 20 minutes to get there (at least, I think it was 20 mins).

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Ok, we were there. What next? Armed with a map and compass - which we did not use at all by the way - we were set on our way. Not knowing anything except follow the Viking signs, answer the stupid questions that have no relation to your actual revision but are just set to annoy and make you suffer. Oh and we parted ways with the teachers with these words:

Teacher X (kept anonymous for... some reason): Be sure not to die now. Have fun.
Friend: *gulp*
Me: We totally got screwed over...
Not really, dumbass.

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All was fine and all the people were mainly stuck in a large group. For safety. I guess anyway. We walked through a road and crap(quite literally, later on), you know like - walking, except they called it 'rambling.' Don't ask me.

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This was the first real obstacle of the day. A extremely - and I mean extremely muddy - patch of ground. Our group trudged on regardless, and our shoes got absolutely filthy. Oh wait - except Laura; Kris carried her across. Stupid Laura. Anyway, all the girls and some boys (Ben) were like: 'I'm not crossing that.' Some even tried crossing the barbed wire, idiots. And low and behold, Teacher X comes along and says - I'm not joking - 'Hm... You guys (thats us, who crossed it already) carry on. You guys (the ones that haven't crossed) come with me. We're taking the coach.'

My jaw literally dropped to the floor. We parted with the main group - there was about 8 of us, although there were some people ahead of us (Tom, Callum etc.). This next bit was actually the most enjoyable. It was extremely hilly. It was just fun running up hills and running back down - with the occasional fall. Heck, I ran up a hill with Sheeny and Laura, then got dared to roll down(by Gavin) - it was pretty steep - so I thought: "What's the worst that can happen? It's only a steep hill full of nettles." I rolled. Kind of regretting it now, but it was fun at the time. The first meter was good, it felt exhilarating, then came a nettle patch. Ouch. I jumped up only to find I couldn't stop my momentum. Down the hill I went. Lmao, thinking back it was quite awesome. Wish I'd caught it on tape now. I learned a valuable lesson their kids: Never-ever (even if you get dared) roll down a steep, nettle-filled hill.

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Next, me and Gavin ran up a hill - yea, I was the hill-runner-upper - and it was actually really steep. We got about 4/5 up and decided if we went up anymore, we won't be able to get down. So we ran down. Hey, it sounded like a good idea at the time. It ended up with me at the bottom of the hill doing 360s while Gavin was stuck about half way down with the bag around his head. Good times.

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What happened next I will never forget. It was undoubtedly the highlight of the day. And I'm going to pour as much detail in as possible:

Ok, picture this. Me and Gavin are running up a hill (again), the rest of the group isn't far behind. We get to a rather flat bit and see Kyle & Alex reach the very top of it. Kyle even did a "I'm the King of the World" pose. All was well. Until we looked to our right, this is. We see Josh coming over the hill screaming: 'RUN! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! THEY ARE COMING!' We were obviously puzzled - WTF?! puzzled. But then this was shortly followed by a familiar 'Moo' sound and there was a herd of cow (at least 20 of them) charging over the hill, chasing Josh. There was about 2/3 meters between Josh and the cows. LMAO!!! It was really funny. Until, we saw Josh running towards us. Oh sh*t. The cerebrum kicked in and we were running for our lives back down this hill - actually, I thought of "fight" first, but I don't think that would of worked. We passed Ashley and he was like: "WTF?! Why you running back down, it was hard getting up." He walked up a bit and all I heard was a "Ah, I see." And he came charging down as well.

We managed to get away by taking the lower track, which was muddier - argh. We could see the gate, it was within sight - within reach. Then we saw something quite disturbing - no it was not bestiality, you sick degenerate - the herd of cows were right next to the gate and they didn't look very angry. Damn. It wasn't a very good day. Oh yea, at this point, Callum (who was wearing a red shirt, as was I) was telling the cows off. Lmao-style. All was well... for a bit. We creeped quietly - well, as quietly as possible - to the gate. Then I thought: "Fu*k this!" And broke into a run. Which, incidentally set off the cows, which pretty much meant certain death for everyone behind me. PWNED! No - it was serious, but still very funny - haha owned. I jumped over the metal gate, and everyone followed. They all tried to jump over the gate but no one actually thought of opening it. Stupid people.

Me and Gavin got through first and it was a mad scramble - like a discount at clothes stores where there are a lot of women, you get the picture - they were all running for dear life. What made it better was that there was only a narrow plank to stand on or else it's mud all the way to the floor. I was restraining a tear from my eyes - a tear of joy - while they were in mortal danger, I was pissing myself with laughter. Ah, good times. Eventually - and I do mean that - everyone got over the gate, not through, over. At this point, we also saw Daisy get floored. Lmao.

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We met back with the coach and the people who rid the coach. It was like: 'OMFG! Did you all not see that? That was the funniest thing ever!' You get the picture. We moved on - after much eating. It was also at this point that Mr Bailey... er, I mean Teacher X, told us that you got ot hand in some questions. Dammit, totally forgot about that. So we thought, seeing as there is no point anyway, why don't we just open all the bloody envelopes - they were marked for each checkpoint, 1 to 7. So we did and managed to complete them all the way to the next checkpoint. But on the way, there was some controversy...

We got to a field, our group was now behind the main group. The main group walked over to the left. Aka, the wrong way. We noticed with our keen eyes and our overly-intelligent brains, that the sign was obviously pointing the other way. Stupid retard of a main group. Anyway, we followed our way and guess what? We were right! It didn't surprise me one bit. I had no doubt whatsoever that we were going the right way (Gavin: Yea, right. Me: Shh...). The main group doubled back and everyone were blaming each other... yada yada.

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Onto the next bit, not much happened. The course was easier as it was a road and all was fine. If something did happen then I don't remember. Hey, how am I suppose to remember everything bloody thing.

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This next bit was kinda spooky. We walked past this hill and we saw a church and the footpath needed us to walk through the cemetery. Creepy. Wait - by the way, this is after Gavin & Kris tried to slide down a hill, which didn't turn out very well. Lemme just say, it got pretty muddy. Anyway, we got there and decided to take a break... In the middle of a bloody cemetery - it was not actually bloody by the way. We were eating there, and I just couldn't shake the feeling of being watched. Suddenly a masked-man holding a chainsaw jumped out... Oh wait, that was from a film.

*cough* *cough* Right, what really happened was:
We sat down to rest (and eat). About five minutes later we were still sitting there, resting (and still eating). Then suddenly, the bell [that is inside the church] rang. You know what a church bell sounds like. So I'm not gonna put any of that onomatopoeia business here. I think the church was telling us to move on, it felt like we had defiled the place - in a non-sexual way. To this day/time we still don't know why it rung, it was 1:15?! But anyway, it was probably a good idea to move on. So we did.

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Finally after countless hours of walking and talking and eating and resting and more walking and mud, we were nearing the end of our fun-filled adventure. But not till the countryside threw another surprise at us. A field littered with sheep excrement. No joke. It was everywhere. We needed absolute precision to make sure we didn't step on any. We stuck to the fences to reduce the risk of soiling our shoes. Didn't work for me. I don't wanna talk about it, so we'll move on...

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At long last, we saw the coach and walked down somebodies drive (which I still don't get, but that guy must be pissed everytime people work down there - especially kids that make a hella lot of noise. We got onto the coach just as it starts raining.
My feet were wet & muddy.
My shoes were wet & muddy.
My socks were wet & muddy.
My trousers were... you get the idea.

Much relief came from just sitting down on an actual chair. We gave off a final 'Huzzah!' and left for home...

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We got back to school at about 2:40. I had to walk back home. Which normally takes about 20 minutes. Oh and did I fail to mention, I was muddy, wet & throughly unclean. Oh well, I just made sure I got home earlier. Got home and the first thing I did was take a shower (you're not getting a picture of that). Felt great.

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As you can see my day went good great! It was really good. Although I wouldn't do it again for the world - actually, I'd consider if someone made me an offer... But anyway, hope you had a great day as well and everyone else who went. Don't forget the moral of this trip: Never-ever (even if you get dared) roll down a steep, nettle-filled hill.


I'll leave you with that.

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'Bowling?'

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EDIT: Just found out that I got 400 views. Woot! Calls for a celebration. Break out the drinks.

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EDIT2: Thanks Gavin for reminding me. There was a certain someone *rolls eyes* who had an 'asthma attack.' *cough* Daisy *end cough* She spent almost half of the way on the coach. I'm not very happy. Heck, a lot of people weren't very happy.