Day 57, 1st July

We set off on yet another beautiful sunny day and a little later than I usually like to as we apparently knew where we would be going and it wasn't going to be so very far. Our journey started on roads, first through Haworth, then through Oxenhope.

We went past a chippy in Haworth and I couldn't help asking what sort of fat they made their chips in – ugh, beef dripping! How can anybody want to eat them? Or what has animal fat got to do with cooking vegetables? I think I ate some non veggie chips by accident a while ago and they were really not nice at all. I couldn't finish the small portion... and that clearly means there was something not right; I usually finish a very big portion without any trouble. But I felt sick after those doubtful ones. In any case, the lady at the shop said there was a place in Oxenhope where they used vegetable fat, so we did a little detour to go there, found the place, checked the smell, got suspicious and, of course, they also used stupid beef dripping – yuck!

So we continued and were soon on the bridleway again climbing up and down stones, rocks and earth. By the way, anybody with a horse with weak legs and tendons might want to think twice about doing the Pennine Bridleway, it is very hard on the legs – mine, too.

When we got to the place where we had intended to stay, it looked a little strange and I knew the people would have only got back from their holiday that day, if indeed they were there at all, so we decided to continue, taking a slightly shorter route in the process. We were in luck; on the way north, there had been nobody in at the first place where we had wanted to stay, but this time it was full of life and we were made very welcome at once. The ponies got a field, the luggage could go inside a stable and Maggie and I stayed inside the stable that night instead of putting up the tent. Yes, I remember my vow to never ever sleep anywhere outside without the tent around me again, but it was a clean and possibly recently washed out stable, so it seemed harmless and we had a good night in it with the horse rugs on the ground underneath my airbed and Dino's saddle pad for Maggie. Luckily I didn't see the friendly spider next to the bed till the morning when I had already packed up most of the stuff.