I have a plan – and I have a map

A circular walk in 15 parts

I have just spent far too long dividing the 205 miles into comfortable 25 km segments. You would think that this would be easy enough given that I possess a guide book that describes the whole route in great detail. Apart from the length of the walk I have very few restrictions, I would prefer to finish the walks in a pub rather than in the middle of a field, and a nearby railway station would be handy – but I am of an age that warrants a bus pass, so I have choices.

I quite like maps and, of course, the Ordnance Survey map accurately represents a world without weather. I also quite like my Garmin handheld GPS thing (it’s an Oregon 450 for those who need to know the details) because it has ALL the Ordnance Survey maps (1:50 000 scale) for the whole of the country and it fits in my pocket and works in the wind and rain. The GPS thing would be a miracle if all it was was a kind of Kindle for Cartography, but of course it’s much more than that. Fortunately there is no little voice telling you to ‘turn around when possible’ but it will tell me about Sunrise and Sunset – not that I ever ask. Unfortunately, I do have to tell my GPS thing where I want to go, using Garmin’s own software – it’s called BaseCamp and it’s a nightmare for so many reasons. I’ve never been able to figure out the significant difference between a ‘Track’ and a ‘Route’ let alone a ‘Trip’ or (lately) an ‘Adventure’. I quickly got the hang of creating ‘waypoints’ and then linking them together so that when they were ‘sent to the device’ (downloaded) I knew how far to walk and in which direction – even if lost, although the idea was not to get lost in the first place – I’m not new to SatNav or Marine Chart Plotters. BaseCamp allows me to choose from a variety of ‘Activities’ but then goes on to differentiate between ‘Bicycling’ and ‘Tour Cycling’ also it has ‘Walking’ and ‘Hiking’ for a long time I couldn’t get any of them to work – I was forced to use the activity known as ‘Direct’ which then couldn’t work out how long a walk would take. I then discovered that although I had ALL the OS maps, none of them were ‘routable’. Luckily, I then discovered that I could download routable (and open-source) maps from Open Street Map so now I can plan a walk (route/track/trip/adventure) and get BaseCamp to predict the arrival times, well I could if the software could plan a sensible route through my dotted lines (points/shaping points/waypoints) – it can’t, and here is an example of it’s stupidity.

This is part of the first walk, along the Thames Path, but for no reason at all BaseCamp decides to turn back on itself (close to Dorney Reach Road) and takes me for a 5 km detour.

This detour isn’t even credible. Note how when ‘walking’ along a straight road it wanders off up Priors Way and when ‘walking’ across a roundabout it turns left, to another roundabout and then turns right just to come back on itself.

Finally, what sort of map interface has an icon for a Ghost Town but nothing for a Railway Station

In Summary

The walk has virtually started

Why am I doing this ?

Ostensibly because I’m going on a long walk and, unlike my other walks, I will be going alone.

This walk is going to the 3rd in a series that started with the Capital Ring and then included The London Loop. These walks were chosen primarily because they pass through Teddington – The home of Phil & Gill, who are the two people NOT doing this next walk – of course there will be lots of people NOT doing the next walk, it’s just that Phil & Gill did the previous walks. There have been other walks, The South Downs Way (Eastbourne to Winchester),  The Three Castles Path (Winchester to Windsor) and the Coast to Coast Walk (St Bees to Robin Hood’s Bay) all of which have been extensively documented and often blogged about – Annieraks is one blog that is particularly comprehensive (more walks than you can imagine) and includes a measure of self-deprecation that I (as a northerner) find comforting. My real inspiration for starting this blog (I have started others) is my friend Jos and her blog Moscow on the line which is all about the joy of discovery.

I say ostensibly because – well, who knows what a journey is about before it starts – or even when it’s ended. My mind may wander off now and again, and if it does, then I will try and retrace my steps using this blog as a guide.

I say I’m going on a long walk but in actual fact I’m only thinking about it. I found a book called ‘A Guide to the London Countryway’ by Keith Chesterton. This guidebook describes a ‘new’ (in 1978) long-distance path that circumnavigates London crossing the river Thames at Windsor (which is handy for me) and Tilbury. The 205 mile walk can be completed in 14 days which in my case will actually be 14 weeks (one day a week) I don’t think that I need to describe the route in great detail because, thankfully, desdemoor has already done an excellent job of this – however he didn’t describe the complete route, and  since 2010 has put all his enthusiasm into Beer.

Also, I’ve just discovered Midges, Maps and Muesli

The Ultimate Circular Walk

Which makes a walk around London seem simple.