The agenda
Monk's habit |
I made one concession to
the ancient dress-code. I wore modern walking boots. In medieval times,
pilgrims could have used the roads. But I had discovered in my pre-walk
trials that I would often have to use the verge to escape from the traffic
that now has ownership of the public highway.
So, while the ancient footwear would have been perfectly adequate for
their time, with walkers marginalized on the modern road, tougher boots were
required.
More about
the clothing and sleeping under the stars (and rain clouds). |
| The 'backstory' for this little expedition was that, as a
monk, I would be able to travel through a countryside now dominated by the
victorious Norse army. My mission was to get news of the agreements reached
at the Thing held in York where the people had agreed to submit to
king Harald of Norway and go south in the spring to conquer the rest of the
land. See how all this fits into the tight timetable of autumn 1066.
1066 Timetable |
The route followed was
Ermine Street which the Romans built to link London to the Humber. The
following pages have images of this wonderful road in its many different
modern guises. |
 |
Six days later, and a
little ahead of schedule thanks to a few lifts to by-pass the impassable, I
reach Harold at Waltham Abbey. And it's still raining hard.
Detailed calculations of speed and distance covered
in the agenda. The weather made photography
challenging as it was cloudy, wet and windy for most of the journey. But as
we passed through all the seasons everyday, there were sunny spells to dry
out the clothing and take a few images. |
