Dangeresque

A sampling of our adventures, for your reading pleasure:

Yarm. The next stop is...Yarm.
This is a tiny little town near the horrible black hole of Middlesbrough. We found Middlesbrough on a map and decided it would be a good place to camp on our way to Whitby and Robin Hood's Bay. We showed up at the station and found ourselves in a pretty big city...not great for camping. The tourist information office was closed, but we saw a police station, so Andrew thought we should ask there. We walked in and saw lots of other people, presumably not there to ask for directions. We asked at the desk, and a cop pulled us aside and said, incredulously, "Camping in Middlesbrough? Oh you don't want to do that. Anywhere but Middlesbrough." Oh. So he sent us back to Yarm, about 30 minutes away. There, we found no camping. Several people said we could camp for free by the river, and we went down there, but it was all sheep and mud and bugs, and I just couldn't do it. We ended up wandering the streets looking for something, anything...and finally had to fork over £70 for a hotel. It would have been more adventurous to sleep in the field, but sometimes safety has to come first.

Flood warning
In Stratford, there was rain. More rain than I've ever seen, and I'm from Florida. One night we were heading back to the tent but found our way blocked by a puddle. No, a lake. There was no way around, and it was the only way we knew to walk back. Andrew found a hole in the fence, so we snuck through and tried to get across the field to the road, but the field was full of --I'm not kidding -- thistles and stinging nettles. An entire field of them. After wandering, getting stung, and fearing cholera or worse from the flood water, we fled the scene and had a fabulous, budget-busting Indian dinner instead. Mmm...my kind of adventure.