Friday 18th March 2016 – 613.33 miles. Didn’t need to get away early today so had a leisurely morning.

Dave cooked breakfast – fried egg sandwich. We had some morning visitors join us for breakfast too – Dave gave them some of our seeded bread. Not sure what sort of geese they are – over to you Chris!

We both made use of our shower tokens – thanks Elaine, the showers are great. Tent and rucksacks packed just before 12.

We said our goodbyes to Elaine then walked away from Leisure Lakes Caravan Park and along quiet roads and it wasn’t long before we joined a cycle trail across open farmland, over a busy road and then on down to the canal where we stopped for a break.

We decided not to follow the canal as the towpath was along the edge of fields and may have been muddy. The cycle trail took us to the River Douglas where we crossed over a bailey bridge at a place called Red Bridge (although the bridge was painted green!)

and then on towards Bretherton. We met a cyclist – Matt, who wished us good luck – thanks Matt. As we came to the edge of Bretherton we came across a couple of large stones to sit on for a break. Unbeknown to us, just along the road were two benches!

Ah well, you can’t win them all.
We then followed a busy road which led onto the even busier A69. There was a footpath along the road so reasonably safe if not a little noisy! It wasn’t long before we left the main road to follow a much quieter lane heading towards Longton where we had arranged to meet up with our friends for supper at The Dolphin Inn. Just a short distance from our destination we reached the turning to the pub when who should we meet but our friends coming from the other direction. Lovely to meet Ivan and Sarah who we haven’t seen for more years than we care to think about.

We enjoyed a great evening with Ivan & Sarah and their friends Duncan and Debbie. After a good meal and an undisclosed amount of beer we all walked back to Duncan and Debbie’s house. We then spent a very pleasant time drinking whisky while Ivan showed us his photograph albums recording his Land’s End to John o’Groats walk in 1993. What a lovely ending to a special day.