Day 9: Transit & hiking

This morning I got off to a later start. Let me back up a bit. Last night I started a batch of laundry at about 9:00 and when I moved it to the dryer I discovered the washer had leaked on the floor. I told this to the lad at the deskk and went back to looking at bus and train charts trying to find the best way to get to the trail, then water started pouring down from the kitchen ceiling. The laundry room had flooded. I recovered my still wet clothes and distributed them on bedrails around my room (meanwhile having a nice chat with a pair of scott's who are biking across the country and had come in to get warm and dry) I went back to working out travel arrangements and repacking. By the time I got to sleep it was 2:00am. With this in mind it is not unreasonable that I did not get out of bed at 7:00 like I had planned. I got up about 8:40, I think, and found my clothes had not dried at all overnight. So I put them in the drier and 40 minutes later concluded that I was dealing with the world's least effective drier.
Skipping to the good bits, I finally boarded my train at 10:30 and sat next to a local girl, and I must admit to just a little bit of flirting as we went to her stop. (I have worked hard at not flirting here but it does happen.) I went onto Darlington where I caught a much slower, older, regional line train to a place called Bishop Auckland. For this stretch I travelled with a very friendly older gentleman named Tim who is a railroad buff from York, his accent was wonderful and when we arrived he helped me find a post office and then the bus stop I needed. He was great. Now it is 1:00 and I am on a bus driving through countryside straight out of a postcard, with rolling green hills, grazing sheep and hedgerows. Oh look a castle, that is my stop.
It is now 9:20 and I am in my sleeping bag, more or less waiting for it to get dark. The above mentioned castle was not my stop just more random norman era ruins. But my stop came 10 minutes later and I didn't have a chance to get a good look at those ruins before catching the transfer to middleston on tees, the village I am sleeping at tonight.
After I got to town, I dropped off my gear packed a day bag and hiked for the first time on the pennine way. My hike had everything you could ask for in an outing in the English countryside. Hillsides swarming with rabbits, sheep pastures, old stone house, a babbeling river, and a waterfall. (High Force on the river Tees is the tallest above ground water fall in the UK coming in at just over 100 feet.) The hike to the falls was a 10 mile round trip on which I crossed stone walls on a number of different types of stiles (or is that "styles of stiles") crossed brokes, and frightened a number of small creatures including some phesant.
I just ate thai ginger noodle soup for diner along with a yorkie bar, and got my camp set up, they say it will rain tomorrow and I think I am ready. Right now I am being eaten by bugs and am wishing I had a better Avon Lady.