In 2026 the Coast to Coast will become an ‘official’ National Trail. This comes with undoubted benefits; increased funding, better path maintenance and protection against land management practices. However with the Coast to Coast in particular this can be a poisoned chalice.
A National Trail is a long distance footpath which links places across the UK, almost exclusively in a linear route. There are many hundreds of long distance routes across the country (you can make up your own) but only 20 (about to be 21) are ‘official’ trails. These official trails get heightened promotion, funding often via the authority in charge, Natural England, and therefore improved maintenance and signposting. For many, if not most, of the routes this is a positive.
However looking at the list there appears to be some oddities. Why is the popular Dales Way not on, or the Cumbria Way but the Cleveland Way is. In Northumberland, Hadrian’s Wall is but neither St Cuthbert’s Way or St Oswald’s make it. In the Yorkshire Dales the excellent Lady Anne’s Way and the Bracken Way, my own long distance footpath, do not make it. It’s an odd list and now the Coast to Coast is about to be added.
St Bees, the start of the Coast to Coast…my finish!
The Coast to Coast was ‘invented’ by Alfred Wainwright when he completed the 190 mile walk in the early 1970s. He wrote an excellent guide book and the route gradually gained in popularity with the explosion of recreational walking. It is a wonderful route, crossing 3 National Parks with their very varied scenic beauty. It is also satisfying to go from Coast to Coast. My enjoyment when I walked the route was only pipped by the Southern Upland Way. You can find my personal crossing story here.
The designation of ‘official’ status for the Coast to Coast happened initially as a funding exercise for the Yorkshire Dales National Park, which bid to manage the whole route (as they do for the Pennine Way). The application via Natural England was successful and plans to improve sections of the route are already ongoing. I understand fully the need for National Parks (in this case the Yorkshire Dales) to look for outside funding to supplement the ever decreasing public funding they are receiving. As a stakeholder on the Management Plan Committee for the Yorkshire Dales I get it but, in this case, I could never support it.
The funding for some of the footpath repairs is most welcome, the Rangers do an excellent job. However the increased promotion the status brings is not. No-one (bar the Park) will benefit from the National coverage the route is now receiving, least of all local businesses and those attempting the hike.
These are my reasons why the increased attention on the Coast to Coast is a bad thing and symptomatic of all that is wrong in our recreational outdoor policy at the present time.
Keld, a small village at the crossroads of the Coast to Coast & the Pennine Way
The Coast to Coast is already very popular, it does not need to be more so. Many hotspot accommodation providers are full 6 months ahead, not many places need more. Keld is particularly limiting but Ennerdale Bridge. Shap, Danby Wiske and much of the North York Moors has very limited places available to stay.
The accommodation issue is exacerbated by the fact that most providers do not want (and do not take) single night bookings. Why would they? A long distance path is not good for accommodation providers or, if they then hike their prices, the whole trip becomes very expensive. If you do want to walk the Coast to Coast it is getting to the stage where you need to take out a new mortgage. The fact that National Parks and other authorities promote the trails as a benefit for accommodation providers shows an utter misunderstanding of what they want. They want multi night stays, the majority certainly.
When popular trails were hiked in the past there was a lot of camping and basic youth hostels. This simply does not happen now and availability is much more limited.
Signposting should be useful but not overbearing
When I walked the Coast to Coast (I actually did it from east to west, backwards in essence) one of the joys was route finding. It was not well signposted and there is no doubt I lost my way on a few occasions. Now it looks like so many signposts are going to be put up any route finding challenge has been lost. It will become a simple route march, similar to the Yorkshire 3 Peaks Challenge where you just follow the many signs. Being able to navigate properly is being lost as a skill due, in some degree, to the random use of signposting.
Of course any sign posting will not be consistent. With three National Parks and councils involved you can guarantee they will be in the most obvious places but not the ‘awkward ones’. Walkers are enticed on to the Coast and Coast with promises of good signposting but if one or two key ones are missing they will not have the skills to find their way. Much better to keep signposting limited and tell walkers they need basic navigation skills to complete the route.
As an aside, very few walkers are aware that legally signposting only has to exist where a public right of way leaves a road. That is why it is so variable, depending where you are walking.
The new path over Nine Standards Rigg – a wilderness lost?
I think the rangers in the Dales and Moors and the Fix the Fells volunteers in the Lake District do a fantastic job. However at times new paths simply do not work. On the Coast to Coast there is now a brand new, shiny footpath contouring the slopes of Nine Standards Rigg between Kirkby Stephen and Keld. To me it looks awful and tames a wild landscape. It is like walking through a town centre albeit with rather better views. Mind you on Nine Standards I have yet to get a view, always cloudy and wet!
The argument for the path is to protect the landscape, the important blanket bog that covers Nine Standards Rigg. The peat is vital and should be protected. However this is not the way. It is an eyesore, surely a more aesthetically designed route is possible. The crossing of Nine Standards is part of the legend of the Coast to Coast and to tame it in this way destroys the wild attraction of the walk. If you are going to do this at least re-route and surface it sympathetically.
There is also the hypocrisy of designating the Coast to Coast a national trail, thereby increasing its popularity, and then complaining about the erosion the hikers cause.
Wainwright’s Personal Route on the Coast to Coast
Alfred Wainwright, the famous guide book writer of the 50s, 60s and 70s, created the original Coast to Coast. His premise though was not to follow a direct route but to create your own. As long as you start in St Bees and finish at Robin Hood’s Bay that is fine. His guide book was simply his route across the country, not followed incidentally by the present one. He would be horrified by a prescribed route you must follow.
I understand that land management issues have changed and there is a feel not to allow people to walk randomly across the countryside but, with some navigation skills and imagination, the route is vastly improved by some off path exploration. I climbed Helvellyn on my walk as a case in point.
Grasmere does not need more reasons to visit
The Lake District, for sure, does not need the Coast to Coast. The visitor businesses in Rosthwaite, Grasmere and Patterdale do very well anyway thank you very much. Trying to encourage yet more visitors only creates confusion for all on waymarking and negligible extra business for the accommodation providers and pubs. Yes they will take the extra people but do not need them.
Many, if not most, walkers across the Lake District have their own challenges and walking challenges. Climbing the Wainwrights is very popular, a multi day challenge bringing tourists in for longer stays and heading off the same prescribed routes. The Yorkshire Dales has the “Dales 30” challenge. Surely it would be better to promote this rather than the Coast to Coast?
The designation of a National Trail, in the case of the Coast to Coast, will make very little difference to the actual numbers walking it, due mainly to the lack of suitable accommodation. That won’t change because accommodation providers do not want single night bookings. Those who do walk the route will be those who can afford the very high costs associated with the challenge. It is hardly an example of inclusivity and those who pushed for it should be aware of the pitfalls.
The paths will be better, the signposting more obvious but the experience will be worse. It is yet another example of walkers and hikers being shoe horned in to the same places, missing the wilderness experience of exploration and the joys of creating their own adventure.
What next, a treadmill in your own home with a video in front of you of the route and scenery….oh wait!
Enjoy your Walking
Jonathan
Living on the C2C, partway into day one, it always amazes me how many people already need a gentle nudge to follow the/a route: not helped by a massive change in possible options since AW completed it. We now have a busy road that can be circumvented by the path that was then a railway line, etc. – but so many say they want to “follow in his footsteps”: which I’m not sure is possible anymore. As such modern variations probably apply to many of the other days (and all the various high/low route options AW initially suggested, etc.), making one official route strikes me as bonkers (especially if they take it along the wrong side of Ennerdale, as AW recommended… – possibly as a joke).
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