In which we fix a historic hike error and completely fail to stay dry.

It was going to rain.

It’s all we’d been talking about all week. So had the news. Articles of the impending storm – Storm Austen, it was significant enough to have a name – were coming in thick and fast, threatening heavy rain, dangerous winds, and a significant threat to Britain’s sickly delicate transport system. Of the three, it was the third that troubled us the most, not wanting to jeopardise our crew’s chances of returning home. There’s nothing quite as miserable as trying to get home after 15-20 miles of hiking with knackered transport.

In the days before our wander I found myself mashing refresh on BBC Weather and hoping it would miraculously change the forecast. We even found ourselves on the Met office weather map looking at how severe the day was going to get in 15 minute intervals. We’ve done this before, but never quite so obsessively. (In case anyone’s wondering, the worst it got was yellow on the colour coding. No thanks).

Storm Austen. In Hampshire of all places. Seemed oddly appropriate.

Some rumblings from the group arose as the hike grew nearer. Nick decided to leave this one out, not wanting to subject canine hiker Flora to the adverse conditions. Questions came in. Was it happening? Were we changing anything? What’s the plan? Then the morning before, inspiration struck.

Back in 2024, Hike 19 was planned as Guildford to Alton. We ran out of daylight and decided to finish in Bentley (a controversial move at the time). The Alton-Bentley stretch remained a gap in our quest to complete the North Downs Way. Why not do it now? It was shorter and avoided Winchester where the worst of the weather was going to be. Personally I wanted to savour Winchester when we got there, it was the end of a seven year mission after all, and arriving in darkness in the driving rain wasn’t how I planned doing it. Max cobbled together a route amazingly quickly and it remained a viable option. It seemed fated.

Plans take shape. Evan, Johnny and Kayne arrive the night before and consume multiple pints.

The day arrives. Will and I reach the Station Cafe first and dig into (for me, anyway) second breakfast while we wait for the others. John appears. Then bit by bit so does the rest of the crew.

Once everyone finished breakfast and ruined the plumbing we get ready to go, accosting a passing railway worker into taking our photo.

Of course as soon as we set off as per hike precedent we stop for supplies. This was slightly more upmarket than the usual dodgy off licences, finding ourselves in an enormous Waitrose. After a fair amount of dithering, a couple of bottles of a particularly nice vintage are purchased and we finally depart, the slightest amount of rain just starting to descend.

An early feature of the route takes us across a rather treacherous A-Road, where we have to navigate four lanes of traffic. Lucky for us it’s still early enough for most people to be at home, but we still make a dash for it. (I have flashbacks all the way to Hike 1 where we sprinted across the A322, which was a near blind corner where cars absolutely ragged it).

From here the public footpath takes us through an enormous muddy field, the footpath only marked by the occasional post to stop hikers like us from getting confused and getting lost.

Leaving the field we wander through Binstead for a while. It looks like we’re making slightly too good time and realise we need to slow the pace down or we’ll be at the pub before it opens, which of course would be disastrous. This reduction in progress is aided somewhat by the fact Max has decided to go old school and navigate using an actual map (made of paper!) meaning we need to stop from time to time to make sure we’re actually going the right way.

Spotting a tree with enormous exposed roots, we do the only thing appropriate in these circumstances and recreate an image from a certain beloved fantasy franchise:

Our next distraction is the Holy Cross Church at Binstead, which is quaint, old, and empty inside, just like us.

We speculate over its age (12th century) and history for a short while and then it’s time to get going.

As we set off, walking through an area of pines that sticks out against the other foliage, the rain discreetly increases.  

Shortly after that we reach Bentley station.

A short hop across the river is The Star Inn – warmly referred to by some of the team as The Falling Out Pub as it featured on one of the hikes that contributed cracks to the fracturing of the original iteration of The Walking Idiots.

For reference, other falling out pubs include The Royal Oak at Knowl Hill, the Old Bell in Waltham St Lawrence and The King’s Arms at Sanford-on-Thames.

Historic beef aside, The Star is once again a delight. Decent beer and friendly staff.

We stop for a relaxed lunch (we’ve got time after all, we’re well over halfway there) and a few bevvies are consumed.

A healthy discussion kicks in about the definition of a pub as well as the range of cups to drink from (jars, flagons and steins, oh my) until finally we decide to resume. A brief glimpse outside confirms the rain we have been dreading has finally caught us up, so we get kitted up with waterproofs, for what good that will do.

Leaving Bentley the route is mostly fields, which is normally great but with the weather turning it becomes a bit of a challenge to cover.

Especially unpleasant is the sensation of leaving a wooded area to enter a field and suddenly being blasted sideways by the wind. The ground is also now treacherous enough for a few slips. Still, we handle this as best we can.

The rain decides it’s had enough of our optimism and beds in.

As the weather intensifies it becomes increasingly hard to see the beautiful English countryside and we slog on in the wet, our vision limited by our hoods (not to mention my glasses, which don’t have wipers).

Coming up next on our route is our second church, the Holy Rood Church in Holybourne. Unlike our first church, we stop here in the name of shelter rather than curiosity.

We enter. The church is silent, empty, and dark. Dripping all over the place, we expect someone to kick us out at any moment but no one appears, so instead we sit, and try to dry off if we can.

In a perverse way this was my favourite part of the hike, even wearing a soaked t-shirt that was never going to dry out again (although my waterproof socks were holding up beautifully). Sheltering there made me think this was probably how churches were used in the past by pilgrims needing respite from a storm.

Once people have changed what they can and tidied up after themselves (there were puddles) we got ready to get going for the final push. Tayo, the only one of us who thought to bring cash, kindly donates a tenner which hopefully covers any unfortunate wet patches we might have left behind.

The group departs in two instalments, the first assuming the second will catch them up.

This never happens.

For those of us in the second wave, we realise John has got cold. Like, really cold. As in, hands are working anymore cold. We realise this is going to be a problem and I catch up with the first group to see if I can convince anyone to hang back – from my own selfish perspective I’d like Max to stick around as he’s our navigator and I’d like someone to direct us to the end before John expires.

Once we finish admiring Tayo’s find we get John moving, getting some gloves on him and setting off.

So, sundered from the rest of our crew, we make for Alton with less than a mile to go. We aim for the first pub we can find so John can dry off, and find ourselves in The Station Arms, quite a charming boozer all told.

Unfortunately this was not the end point of the hike, nor where the others had gone.

Finally warmed, we rally the troops and head to the Wetherspoons at the other end of town. Either my legs were feeling it or it was further than we thought because it took ages to get there. Even after we arrived, it took a while to find the others in the labyrinthine and rather character-free establishment. (“There’s not two ‘spoons in Alton, is there?” we wondered at one point.)

Beers and pub food ordered, the two groups reconcile and conclude our evening, even starting to dry out a little. What had threatened to be a disaster of a day actually turned out quite good in the end, the route was longer than predicted (16.6 miles), with the rain adding a psychological extra four. It’s hike maths. Trust me.

Eventually the group disbands with travel plans in place, with the exception of those again staying in Alton who planned once more to tear it up, warmed by their glow of hiking victory.

Next time we’ll make it to Winchester, and maybe further still. Probably. Sometimes these things work out.