My friend Kirsten would have enjoyed the strange – but friendly – creature that I met near the start of the walk this morning.
And if that seems like the perfect pony for a hobbit, the landscape this morning could have been what J.R.R. Tolkien had in mind when he described The Shire.
In fact, it may have been exactly what he had in mind. He grew up in Birmingham which is quite near here. Even the ridges of northern Staffordshire are out of sight now, never mind the high Pennines that I could see only a couple of days ago. The landscape is all gently rolling hills and flat water meadows. For the first time today, I walked the edges of cultivated fields, and saw crops growing.
The bane of my existence is becoming stiles.
While you find these wherever you walk in England, the type varies from place to place. In the Dales, where they have to get you across walls, they tend to be either stone steps or stout wood ladders. The key features of a Staffordshire stile, as far as I can tell, are a high barrier to step over, rotting wood, general disrepair, and some special treat to add variety (encroaching holly, barbed wire, an electrified fence, etc.). Add the fact that small fields mean that you might cross several dozen in a day’s walk, and they become a serious menace.
Today was a rather warm and sunny day – a hint of what I’ll need to be acclimatised for when I reach Italy in June.
Day 10 Route: Alton to Colton via Staffordshire Way. Terrain: field paths over rolling countryside and water meadows. Weather: sunny and warm. Daily distance: 31.5 km/19.5 miles. Cumulative distance: 241.4 km/149.7 miles. Accommodation: Ye Old Dun Cow, Colton.
Come Wind, Come Weather 
Funny pub name! The stiles may be annoying, but make amusing reading! Take some more pictures of them for us. How odd it must be to walk out of one landscape and into another … to leave step by step, first limestone country, then grit, then even these green fields with their irksome stiles behind you. You are walking fast than I can read. I had better catch up and click on the next entry! Kirsten too has been too busy. But soon we hope to have more time – the Easter break is nearly upon us!
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Hello Simon. I like the picture of the pony. I was wondering if it’s a shire pony, but then I realised you were talking about the place where you are. Love from Kirsten. xXx
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Hello Kirsten: I am not sure what type of pony he was. He was shaved on one side and shaggy on the other. Perhaps a punk pony? Love, Simon
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