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So I decided to leave Arm after a little over six years. I had a few days holiday to use up so I spent one Friday continuing my walk from Newport where I finished up after the 48 mile epic.

I passed through the market town of Saffron Walden which was pleasant but unremarkable. The really straight bit at the end was once a Roman road along the hilltop which reminded me a bit of the Ridgeway.

Attentive readers may have noticed that my interconnected walks have ended back in Cambridge. More on that soon.

For my birthday this year I made another trip with my family to the Romney, Hythe & Dymchurch Railway in Kent. The weather was much better than two years ago but the downside of that was that it was very busy. Nice sunset at the end as we were leaving Dungeness.

It’s been nearly a year since I last adventured in the East Midlands and I’ve wanted to go back but travelling there becomes more and more troublesome the further I get from Cambridge. So to amortise this slightly I did a two day trip starting at Melton Mowbray where I finished last December, stayed overnight it Nottigham and then continued the next day along the Trent towards Newark.

This was my first visit to Nottingham and I expected it to be super sketchy but actually it seemed fine. I saw the famous Trent Bridge cricket ground as well as the castle and obligatory Robin Hood statue.

Anglers on the River Trent

I didn’t make it all the way to Newark though, as some combination of tiredness, darkness, lack of map, and unexpected absence of river crossings caused me to abort the mission at the hitherto unheard of village of Fiskerton.

It may come as a surprise to some but this is my fortieth year. I told a whole bunch of people that to celebrate it I was going to challenge myself to walk forty miles in one day. So far my longest outing had been just shy of 34 miles. I had meant to slowly build up to it, maybe adding one mile a month, but due to the hot summer and some other things I was dealing with I completely flunked the training regime. But I decided to have a bash at it anyway, having found a reasonable looking route from Colchester to Saffron Walden via Braintree.

I woke up at some ungodly hour and set off before sunrise.

Sunrise near Colchester

Here’s a top tip: if you measure a 40 mile distance on Google Maps using rough straight lines, the actual distance is going to be a lot longer. By the time I got to Braintree I was already two hours behind schedule and I’d only just passed 35 miles when the sun set in sight of Stansted airport.

Now I could probably have bailed out at this point but I was feeling quite energised and I’d brought a flashlight and a head torch so I just powered on and blasted through the 40 mile mark.

Sunset somewhere near Stansted airport

After about 45 miles I’d had enough. Everything was painful and I staggered the last few miles to the station in Newport (Essex) just short of my original goal. Total time was just over sixteen and a half hours with a brief break for lunch. The fiftieth birthday challenge seems doable now though, eh?

Continuing around East Anglia I found myself in Clacton again staying at this wonderful B&B called “The Chudleigh” run by a lovely woman named Carol. After I told her I was walking all the way to Colchester she gave me an extra muffin to take with me.

Along the coast I passed through Jaywick, infamous for being one of England’s most deprived neighbourhoods. Honestly it didn’t look that bad, similar to some of the small coastal settlements near where I grew up. Many of the houses like those below were built as holiday homes for Londoners and not intended to be lived in permanently.

Jaywick

I needed to make one last ferry crossing to get over the river to Brightlingsea. However instead of a ferry-summoning bat the Brightlingsea ferry runs on a strict hourly schedule and even has a dedicated app!

The unorthodox design of the Brightlingsea harbour app

I nearly missed the ferry and ended having to wave madly to get it to come back to shore as I ran towards it. After I got on board the captain asked me if I was “the one who pre-booked”. Apparently none of the other passengers were aware of the app.

River Colne near Wivenhoe

After that excitement I walked inland towards Colchester via the picturesque Wivenhoe. Not something I can say about Colchester itself unfortunately, which seemed to be a bit of a dump and was confirmed on a repeat visit two weeks later.

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I did a walk to Newmarket last year via a route north of the A14 so I’d thought I’d have another go with a more southerly route.

Once out of Cambridge it was equally pleasant. The highlight probably being the ancient earthwork Fleam Dyke which had this unexpected barrow on it.

A two part adventure this time, and my very first foray into Essex. Last Saturday afternoon I started with what was supposed to be a short leisurely walk along the River Orwell from Ipswich to Felixstowe.

Bridge over the river Orwell near Ipswich

I say supposed to because shortly after this photo was taken I strayed off the path into some sinking mud which absolutely covered my boots and the lower half of my trousers. This was doubly unfortunate because I was staying overnight in Felixstowe and didn’t bring a change of clothes, but I managed to do some emergency cleaning in the shower.

The next day I got up and walked to Landguard Point which has an amazing view of the Port of Felixstowe, Britain’s largest container port. I was lucky enough to see a mega-ship being unloaded while I was waiting for the ferry to Harwich. MSC Michelle for all you ship spotters.

MSC Michelle

I didn’t spend long in Harwich because I was worried about getting to Clacton in time for the last train but it felt a bit run-down compared to Felixstowe.

I skirted around the wild marshes and mudflats surrounding Horsey island and finally came to Frinton-on-Sea, resuming my walk around the coast. From there it was a short walk to Clacton-on-Sea.

I wasn’t sure what to expect in Clacton but the town was bustling. It’s definitely a bit tacky but in a fun traditional seaside kind of way. They have a great pier too which Hastings could learn a lot from as it actually has stuff on it, to you know, attract visitors. No sign of Farage.

Clacton pier

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What a silly name. But the place itself is not particularly silly: it’s the valley following the river from Stowmarket to Ipswich and made for a pleasant if uneventful Sunday afternoon walk.

Here’s a macro I came up with today using the C11 _Generic feature that I’m quite pleased with:

#define TYPE_MAX(x)                             \
   _Generic((x),                                \
            uint64_t: UINT64_MAX,               \
            int64_t: INT64_MAX,                 \
            uint32_t: UINT32_MAX,               \
            int32_t: INT32_MAX,                 \
            uint16_t: UINT16_MAX,               \
            int16_t: INT16_MAX,                 \
            uint8_t: UINT8_MAX,                 \
            int8_t: INT8_MAX)
 
#define saturate_add(a, b) ({                           \
         typeof((a)) __tmp;                             \
         if (__builtin_add_overflow((a), (b), &__tmp))  \
            __tmp = TYPE_MAX(__tmp);                    \
         __tmp;                                         \
      })

It does a saturating addition on any integer type taking into account that signed and unsigned types of the same size have different maximum values. For signed types it doesn’t handle the case where b is negative however.

My dad asked me why I walked to Stowmarket. To quote George Mallory, “because it’s there”.

Stowmarket is a pleasant but unremarkable market town in the middle of Suffolk. It’s a bit too hot for walking all day at the moment so I started in the late afternoon and arrived at half-time in the England-Spain match (a lot of people were standing around in pubs looking anxious).

A rather attractive path somewhere near Stowmarket