Want to walk across a country? Try the English Coast to Coast trail | Canada Voices

The sky glowered over the brooding fells ahead of us, deep in Cumbria’s Ennerdale Valley in the north of England.

Sheltering from blustery rain, we huddled by the fire with fellow hikers at our hostel, Black Sail Hut. We’d just emerged, dripping and pungent, from a dark, mossy, tunnel-like path and ahead were the Lake District mountains, or fells. The ordnance survey map showed steeper and steeper topography, receding civilization and an evocative list of Tolkien-esque names: Riggindale, Honister Mines, Helvellyn. We were two days into England’s classic Coast to Coast path and Blake’s poetic “green and pleasant land” hadn’t shown up yet.

Explore a historic corner of England from the newly refurbished Alfriston hotel

We’d been looking for a multiday hike with a clear sense of purpose – ideally sea-to-shining sea, spanning the full width of a nation. Back at home in the land of big Canadian things, our reasoning was that walking across a small country shouldn’t be that hard. So, if we were to write a guidebook for walking across a country, the first rule should be: Pick the right country, preferably a smallish one.

Canada’s 28,000-kilometre Trans Canada Trail was never under consideration. Nor was the 8,850-km route along the Great Wall of China.

At 306 km, however, the English Coast to Coast trail is much more manageable and worth every one of the 14 days needed to complete the trek through a medieval landscape of jigsaw fields, dry stone walls, and wilderness that made the 19th-century Lake Poets swoon. Accessible but challenging, remote yet familiar – the C2C (as it’s known by aficionados) ticks all the boxes.

We opted to walk from west to east, Irish Sea to North Sea, with the wind at our back and the most challenging climbs early on. Our journey took place in September, when the crowds thinned and the days, though shorter, are statistically drier than in the spring. On this trail, if the weather doesn’t suit you, just wait an hour and it will change.

Starting in the Cumbrian village of St. Bees, we dipped a toe into the Irish sea under an ominous sky. That was the driest our boots would be for several days as we disappeared inland, into the often rainy Lake District National Park. A second rule for walking across a country could be: Prepare for rain (because it’s probably going to rain).

Weather aside, for the long-distance walker who craves variety and surprise, as well as sheep farms and village greens, this route is the gold standard. But don’t be fooled by BBC period dramas: Those green, rolling hills, so benign onscreen, can be jagged-tooth, ankle-breaking monsters up close. (According to the Lake District Search and Mountain Rescue Association, there were 32 hiking-related fatalities in 2024.)

But when the clouds lift, the views are more than breathtaking. Rule number three: Remember to stop and stare, because rest time is rare.

With the right attitude and a fairly high blister tolerance, a C2C walker will find atmosphere and history around every corner – this was the land of William Wordsworth, John Ruskin and sheep stealers. Richmond Castle, perhaps the best-preserved Norman fortress in England, is on the route as well, not long after a march past one of the U.K.’s largest modern-day military camps, where Royal Air Force jets fly practice missions overhead.

The setting is a little more peaceful around the lonely Shap Abbey, founded late in the 12th century in a secluded valley of the River Lowther. Watched by a curious sheepdog, we ate roast beef sandwiches on a broken stone wall built by monks 800 years earlier.

We walked along abandoned Industrial Revolution-era railways, past derelict mines and slate quarries. This is a land that has been transformed by humans for more than a millennia. Some places, such as the town of Grasmere with Wordsworth’s grave and busloads of tea room tourists, are well-preserved and highly visited. Other struggling towns on the Cumbrian coast lack retention of tourists and locals alike, seeing residents emigrate elsewhere (my grandmother included). Yet, she never lost the accent, never lost her love of this special place, and never tired of telling stories about working at the Traveller’s Rest – her aunt’s country pub, where she added extra mustard to the fox hunter’s sandwiches to boost beer sales.

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For a hike across a small country with almost 60 million inhabitants, we encountered astoundingly few other humans, sharing the gorse-covered hills with hardy Herdwick sheep instead. But when you’re looking for it, civilization is often just over the next misty fell and down in a valley smelling of a welcoming coal fire. The daily route can be planned to end in a cozy nook, or “snug,” at a friendly pub, with local beer and a Cumbrian sausage (with extra mustard).

One of these spots, with exposed beams and flagstone floors, is Swaledale’s Tan Hill Inn. Sitting at 528 metres above sea level, it’s the highest pub in Britain, often cut off from the world during winter. Tan Hill provided a clay hot pot of beef brisket, a bed and a soaking bath after a long, hard day. Like most stops on the trail, it welcomed smelly walkers and smellier dogs with open arms and a drying room for hiking boots.

Other accommodations on the C2C range from a remote hostel in a converted shepherd’s bothy (historically, a stone mountain shelter) to B&Bs on working sheep farms to tiny rooms above tiny pubs. Pints are pulled with knowing nods and generous amounts of advice: “Tomorrow? That’s a bloody big hill you’re up for. I wouldn’t chance it if weather sets in. The mountain will always be there, mind.”

Instead, the next morning in Swaledale dawned frosty and bright, the first hint of colour visible in the changing leaves, the end of the trail still days away. But we’d reach the North Sea eventually, and the end of a long path is both rewarding and bittersweet. The hiker’s world of boots and mud and maps is a hard one to give up. Each day had a single-minded objective: to reach a destination before dark. Conversations on the trail could run the course of several hours given the luxury of time.

The end came after a cliffside hike down into the village of Robin Hood’s Bay, its maze of alleyways perfectly aligned with its history as a smuggler’s haven on the wild Yorkshire coastline. A disappointingly small quayside plaque marked the terminus. We yanked off our boots and rancid socks, waded down into the North Sea, then tossed in the pebble we’d carried from the beginning, as tradition dictates.

In the Bay Hotel’s bar we joined others who had also finished the trail, trading stories of blisters, bogs and wrong turns. A final rule for walking across a country: Pick the right walk. Preferably a splendid one like this.

If you go:

Most guidebooks advise setting aside 14 days for the walk, with a rest day at the end of the mountainous first half. You should be capable of walking eight hours per day on rugged trails with steep ascents and descents (averaging 762 to 1,067 vertical metres per day) at an elevation of up to 1,067 metres above sea level. The total elevation climbed is greater than Everest.

The route is largely unmarked and can often be confusing. Some map-reading experience is essential (phone signal can be iffy), and there are superb books that describe the route almost step-by-step. The Coast to Coast Walk by Martin Wainwright was our go-to.

You can join a guided group and have everything planned for you by companies such as Wilderness England and Alpenwild, or you can use the excellent Coast to Coast website to do your own planning.

Summer can provide great weather, but also crowds to match. We’ve hiked this route both in the fall and the spring, when crowds thin considerably. September and October days can be crisp and mostly dry.