Day 40: Most Difficult Day -- Morebattle to Kirk Yetholm

Another nice breakfast and we were off!

Knowing this was going to be difficult walk I had to psyche myself up for it -- not so much the going up but the coming down -- when you have bad knees that's the part that hurts.

We started out our walk on a long stretch of paved road -- not my favorite. 

I loved seeing the silhouette of a lone cow on a hilltop:

And nearby as we walked along the road a rooster greeted us:

While walking along the road we heard a lamb crying. She was stuck between two fences and we didn't know what to do. Her Mom was close by and looking at us. We flagged down a man crossing over the other side of the road and pointed out the problem. "It's not my land but I'll see what I can do". We watched from afar as he apparently loosed the lamb from her predicament. Whew!

I came upon this sign and paused -- there is a small period after ass which means it's an abbreviation for association. Not clear as you are driving or even walking.

We headed across a small bridge and were on our way. 

The good news is that there was very little mud and the winds were calm. The bad news is the ascent and descent were at times very steep. NOT good for bad knees!

Ruins along the initial part of the walk were beautiful!

Started up -- and the higher we went the views were unbelievable! The pictures I'm posting won't begin to do it justice:

Three horses and and their riders came down from the top here is a picture of one of them who came right up to me as if to say, "don't you have a carrot for me?"

We continued going up:

Summit!

Made it! We sat and ate lunch -- Ian and Kath -- two of the very nice walkers we met were finishing their coffee on the hill as we approached. Ian pointed out the Iron Age hill fort:

It is hard to believe that exactly one week ago this hilltop was covered in snow!

We took a congratulatiry selfie:

And the view was breathtaking:

Then we headed down. But there were ups and downs in the heading down. I kept on thinking to myself that I am walking the way of life: there are beautiful and easy walking paths at times and at other times I'm walking around and through manure, tripping on rocks, navigating muddy and murky areas, trying to find the right path, etc. Sometimes the walks make me feel invigorated. Other times I feel tired, battered and bruised. I prayed about decisions made and decisions regretted. I prayed about all the people I've met on my 'walk'. What lies ahead? I don't know. I can just try to be faithful and stop and take in the beauty and the love when I find it and not get stuck in the mud.

Crossed into a sheep pasture:

A young man with a bike helped us as we were trying to figure out the path through the sheep!

We crossed not over to a farm road -- much less 'poopy' walk:

Then we hit the 'real' road -- tempted by a taxi sign, we resisted temptation and walked on.

I liked one street sign in particular:

Aa we were getting closer we were walking next to a wetland and were supposed to go through a fenced area where we discovered cows and calves -- we realized we couldn't walk around them on the path so we went the long way round through the wetland. We caught up with the cows on the other side of the fence -- here are two of them/

Crossed a bridge and we met a woman who runs local B and B and who was raised up on the hill on a farm. Wow.

We took a short walk after dinner -- it's much colder tonight!

What a day -- so much to think about and process!

Total steps walked: 22,376. 8.61 mostly hard miles