B2B Day 10 Crowcombe to North Petherton--A Fyne Day on the Quantocks

For an OS map of today's walk (13.2 mi; 21.2 km; 1,514 ft total ascent) click here.

Our day began with a lovely breakfast at Puddies Meadow B & B.  The breakfast was particularly good. There were fresh berries, and we especially liked the thin toast which was toasted with a grid pattern. Our host Trish offered to make us some sandwiches because we wouldn't find any at the village shop, and we gladly accepted. Her husband Rob showed us the way to the path, and Olive the dog demonstrated how we should leap over a short fence onto the path, but we left the leaping to her, and we more sedately stepped over the fence and began our uphill walk.

We walked through several fields and then through moorland, and came to The Drove, a wide dirt path through the trees. On either side, there was an old stone wall with trees growing on it, their old roots twisting down to the bottom of the wall.

Ken on the Drove

We set out onwards to Wills Neck (the highest hill of the Quantock range), and there were several people on horses who rode by. One woman said that the views ordinarily weren't that clear, but today you could see Wales. 

The horses (as you can see, it was a grey and sometimes rainy day)

One of the views from Wills Neck, with Minehead in the distance

We walked down one hill, then on the back of Lydeard Hill, overlooking the Vale of Taunton Deane. It was quite chilly, and we approached a car park thinking that we might find a bench to sit on and eat our lunch. Sara said she felt she must be hallucinating, because she smelled chips cooking. We were hoping that the smell meant there was a refreshment stand or van at the car park. There wasn't. It was a family with a camp stove cooking just on the side of the hill. We sat on a bench parallel to them, and when the woman cooking doled out the food and said, "Sausage, sausage, sausage" as she gave each person their sausage, we were hoping she would keep going to give us a sausage as well, mainly because we were so cold. That didn't happen. Instead, we really enjoyed our tomato and cheese sandwiches, which were delicious. We were surprised that we had two sandwiches each, so we ate one and a half for lunch. 

We carried on downhill, and a little later decided to take the (more direct) road instead of the Macmillan Way, which went far down, then back up the hill. The road was much more level but quite busy and tiring on the feet after a couple of miles. However, at a junction we were surprised to come upon the Pines Cafe.

The Pines Cafe, at a busy intersection

We stopped there, and shared a slice of lemon cake, which was fine but not outstanding. We continued on a less busy road till we got to Fyne Court, a National Trust property. It was very busy, but in a nice way. It was near the end of the day for their cafe, and the cafe had run out of some things (like scones). We were glad we had opted for an ice cream each because it was warm by this time. We sat at a picnic bench outside and watched the families. The little kids in one family were having a great time with some strands of what we call sticky weed--the weed that is long and stringy and sticks to you, and if you let it keep growing, it later forms burrs. The kids were playing a kind of tag by throwing the sticky weed onto their dad and trying to make it stay. 

Fun at Fynes Court

After resting, we set out again and came down to a valley Ken really liked.

A pastoral view as we started our valley walk

After the valley, we went on a forest path which went on for several miles. At first it was nice, but after awhile we got really, really tired, almost as tired as if we had been walking on a road (the path surfaced hardened more and more as we went until it was almost as hard as asphalt. Finally we came to the end of the forest, got to an actual road, took the second public footpath we came to, followed the path . . . and ended up at a locked gate even though we thought we were on a public footpath. We had to climb the gate, and the road didn't seem quite right after that, but Ken got us oriented and eventually to our B&B in North Petherton. Our hosts Kate and Richard were friendly and welcomed us into their home, and I got to do laundry. Ken went to a store to supplement our dinner of the sandwiches we had left from lunch. We ate in the garden and enjoyed seeing all of the plants and hearing the birds sing. Kate is an artist, and we really liked the style of their home.