It’s just after 6 in the morning. I left my bed next to the A35 ten minutes ago, just a bit of flattened grass the only reminder of my brief sojourn. The Monarch’s Way hugs the river Brit as it meets Bridport. The first building in Bridport I come across is Palmer’s Brewery on the other side of the river. It is a sturdy grey stone building. Piles of pallets are stacked behind the river wall that must have been built at the same time as the building in 1794. Palmers can proudly claim that ‘Since then, there’s been non-stop brewing on this site.’
As I get closer there is a deep rush of water, the recognisable sound of a weir. There is a fish pass here donated by the Rivers Trust to the brewery and opened in 2011. It allows fish to pass up a ladder alongside the weir. A BBC article celebrated its opening and explained ‘The construction is designed to help salmon, brown trout and sea trout bypass a weir that has blocked their path since the late 1700s’
There is also a sculpture by Greta Berlin of a Stalking Dog poised looking over the fish pass. Perhaps waiting for a migrating salmon. Behind it is Bridport Football Club and what looks like the beginnings of a construction project.
A solitary white dove flaps over and lands on the wall of the brewery. A man in a high vis jacket flies past me. Gritted teeth and white knuckles. Is he late for work? Otherwise the town appears asleep.
I am now heading inland. The Monarch’s Way does a great loop all the way back up to Yeovil.
I always use the Ordnance Survey map app now with the ubiquitous red arrow. I feel rather sad and nostalgic for the old floppy pink maps that use to be jammed into my back pocket. It meant that I had to use some basic orienteering to pinpoint my location. But the OS app has become my stalwart guide on these solitary tramps. And also the ubiquitous Monarch’s Way signs that display The Surprise – a collier (coal ship) – that finally took Charles II off these shore into exile, the Crown and the Boscabel Oak, where he hid from Parliamentarian troops shortly after his defeat at the Battle of Worcester.
I am wandering through the sleeping back streets of Bridport. There are gardens with Tibetan prayer flags and a window with the oft seen blue and yellow of the Ukrainian flag, so much a sign of our times. Outside one semi-detached town house a sign reads ‘King or queen do we need one? Have you thought about it? Republic has’. While opposite another hand written sign simply says ‘Dracula June 14 16 17 Tickets £10’.
The route takes me through the ‘suburbs’ of Bridport. Cul-de-Sacs and estates where curtains are closed and hatchbacks are still parked in the drives. One is called King Charles way.
I have been head on into a constant northerly wind since I left West Bay. I did well to find a dry stone wall last night to get shelter. I’ve learnt my lesson from previous nights where the wind’s icy fingers manage to reach into my bag and get around my neck and shoulders. But now I’m cold. I get changed out of my shorts into jeans in the cemetery while neatly kept tombstones watch me in their serried ranks. A dog walker gives me a hard stare on the other side of the wall.
Is it just me or are people not very responsive in Bridport? Some say ‘morning’ but two women don’t look up at all. One man just nods. Maybe it’s the sight of someone with a rucksack, a woolly hat and pale blue socks that makes them hesitate. As Marie said when she found me looking at the view in the meadow where she has her sheep last week ‘I thought you were some weirdo’. Or maybe they’re last just half asleep like me.
A transition. How I love it when I get these surprises. In a moment – as I cross a stile – the town gives way to a field, its cloak of green a sudden refreshment on the eyes after the town.
As I’m listening to a song thrush do its repetitive high pitched peeping I’m trying to write it down when two dogs are running at me – a staffie and what the owner calls a sheppie. Barking loudly and snarling. I get a real shock. That spiky feeling in the chest and the adrenaline flying. I walk on as they get called back.
After ten minutes the owner asks me ‘do you mind if I go ahead of you so I can let him off? He’s a typical sheppie and can be a protect-y?’ A good excuse to stop for a rest. I love dogs but those two would have had me for sure.
The Slow Walker 