S1 E6: Walking the Thames Path National Trail

Welcome to Second Act Travels, the podcast for curious midlife explorers ready to

trade crowded summers for smart, meaningful off season adventures.

If you're over 50 and dreaming of meaningful travel that fits your freedom and your budget,

you're in the right place.

I'm Elizabeth, and each week I'll bring you tips, stories, and inspiration to help you

travel deeper, go further, and embrace your second act with confidence.

All right, well, welcome back to Second Act Travels.

I always find that the holidays from October, November and December just all sort of slide

into one another.

I call it October. So I was in the holiday slide and I took a little break from

podcasting.

But I'm back today.

I wanted to talk about adventure.

So if you know me, you know that I love to read.

And I read all kinds of genre, whether it's fantasy or nonfiction or mystery.

I love.

Anyway,

I have this theory that sometimes the right book finds you no matter where you are.

And I was searching around for something to read.

It might have been on my Kindle.

In fact, I'm sure I was.

And I came across a book by Joyce Mackey.

I'll put the information in the show notes for

you.

And it was called Walking the Thames River.

One Woman's Solo journey of Adventure and Self Discovery.

But this caught my eye and I thought, wow, what's it like to walk along the Thames river

in England?

So I read the book and I fell in love with it.

and she did it alone.

The Thames path is 184 miles long, or it was at the time.

It's a little bit longer now because it goes right to the North Sea.

But when she walked it, it stopped at Greenwich.

And I finished the book and I said,

well, heck, if she can do it right, I can do it right.

And I thought, wouldn't it be cool to walk then Thames Path National Trail?

So I began doing some research.

Anyway,

so I did some research and I happened to mention to a friend of mine in New York City

that I was thinking about hiking the Thames Path.

And he said that was a great idea.

Didn't say too much more about it.

But when I returned home to upstate New York and I got my mail one day a couple days before

Christmas.

And in it was a package from my friend James.

and it was called Rambles by Rivers.

And it was about a man hiking the Thames river from source to sea.

I thought, this is a sign from the universe that I need to explore this.

So I decided right then and there to set a goal that as soon as Covid was over, I was

going to walk the Thames path.

Here's how I did it.

Well, let me tell you a little bit about what walking the Thames path is actually like.

And I'm not sure how much you've read from people about long distance hiking.

I imagine many of you have read Bill Bryson's A Walk in the woods where he Hiked the

Appalachian Trail,

or Cheryl Strayed's book Wild where she Hikes the Pacific Crest Trail,

or Treks by Robin Davidson, she hikes with three camels across the Australian desert.

Those are really epic tales.

And these people are, you know, concerned about carrying water and they're carrying all

their cooking supplies and their food and their tent,

and they're really not seeing anyone for even days at a time in some places anyway.

The Thames path is nothing like that.

And my hike was absolutely nothing like that.

The Thames path is perfect for this reason, which is it allows you to do some long

distance hiking, but never takes you too, too far away from civilization.

The Thames path starts in the Cotswolds,

in it's a fairly remote area,

but you're always within 7 to 10 miles of a town.

Cell phone service is absolutely fine.

You can call anywhere, anytime.

There's a nice path.

It's very well maintained, extremely well

marked.

You're not going to get lost.

And frankly, all you're doing is walking by a river.

So,

you know, you look for the river and you're probably on the right track as long as you

stay by it.

The other thing is,

and I cannot stress this enough,

the beginning hiker, there are no hills on the Thames path,

so very, very easy hiking.

But every night I had a nice warm bed in a pub or a bed and breakfast,

and I would have a glass of wine with my dinner.

I would call home and make sure everything was okay there, see?

And there were no wild animals and certainly no snakes like in Australia.

In fact, that's one of the reasons I chose to walk in November because I'm so scared of

snakes.

And I knew I probably wouldn't see one during the month of November.

So that's what I mean by the Thames path being a really easy beginner hike.

All right, So I decided to walk the path and I decided on November because one, I hate

snakes.

As I just said, I also don't like crowds.

And I knew that November would be kind of a good sweet spot.

It wouldn't be too cold to walk.

And it would be off season.

You know, I like to travel off season and I

wouldn't have trouble finding inns to stay at every night.

I wouldn't have to worry about that.

And I could take my time.

I wouldn't have to worry about making a

reservation and sticking to that plan.

Anyway,

so while I'm preparing, I did some research.

As I said before,

the Thames path is,

at the time it was 185 miles long.

So now instead of the Thames river path stopping at the Thames Barrier,

it goes on to the North Sea.

It actually meets the sea.

But I wanted to walk from the source in the Cotswolds to the Thames Barrier, which

protects London from flooding.

It's a big structure right in the middle of the Thames.

Anyway,

I set about doing a fair amount of research and I'll put all my resources in my show notes

and they are in my blog.

So I'll link to my blog so that you can see

exactly what I used.

The first thing I did was that I bought a really good hiking guide and I fully, totally

recommend the Trailblazer guide series.

They are published in the uk.

They are extremely readable and entertaining and they break down each section into the

places you're going to see along the way, what the terrain is like, and then they give you

options for lodging, whether it's camping or hostels or a bed and breakfast or a pub.

They'll give you recommendations for food and lodging.

And I just found that the book was so readable.

Obviously you have to find what works best for you.

Some people use the Cicerone guides and those are fine as well.

But for me, Trailblazer is my preference.

So I used the Trailblazer and I read it cover to cover,

probably two times, maybe even more.

And I also joined some Facebook groups.

This is where I think Facebook is really good.

Social media is good for that.

I joined two or three groups on the Facebook

page about walking the Thames,

long distance hiking or hiking in the uk.

And then I learned an awful lot.

And then I also joined a group called Love Her

Wild, which is on Facebook as well because that is about women having outdoor adventures

and I thought that that would be really help.

So those are the resources that I used quickly.

And then I will put the full list with a link to my blog in the show notes.

And I encourage you if you're thinking about walking the TUMS path, to read as much as you

can.

Really.

Now, as I've said in the past, I keep this podcast to 10 minutes because I know that you

have a busy schedule and you like to listen in the car in between errands and things.

So I'm going to stop here for part one and then we'll continue on next week or so with

Thames Path Part two, where I'll talk about packing for the trip, what you absolutely must

bring with you,

and some other helpful tips.

So join me in a couple of weeks for part two of our Walking the Thames Path National Trail.

And if you want to read the full account of my trip, you can definitely check out my

blog@second acttravels.com have a great week and I'll see you back here soon.

So thanks so much for checking.

Second act travels out and I'll see you back

here soon.