The walk

The Walk

Every alternate Friday I join a group that walks along the river Thames from the King’s Stone to Teddington lock and back. I know most of the people who participate and we stroll along at our own speed chatting and occasionally swapping partners as we go.

The walk I’m going to describe occurred in winter, the ground was still a bit icy from the previous night’s frost, but conditions were perfectly acceptable provided we took a little bit of care.

Six of us started out, the first hurdle being the main road crossing from the King’s Stone to the Mediaeval Clattern bridge. You may know the spot, a set of steps lead down to the river level and in normal conditions although a little steep there are no problems. Unfortunately on this occasion I slipped on the top step. Fortunately there is a handrail provided which I grabbed firmly and managed to stop myself falling. Unfortunately I wrenched my shoulder doing so, but I said that I wouldn’t need to lift anything heavy and could well proceed with the walk.

All went well as we strolled along, until we reached a place where the path slopes as it goes round a corner. This was still a little icy in patches and being slightly unbalanced with my stiff shoulder I went down on my back. Still there were plenty of people around to help me to my feet and although I was slightly winded we all continued on our way.

Nothing out of the ordinary happened for a long time. Then as we were walking along a narrow path in single file I turned to make some comment to the lady close behind me. A few seconds later she shouted a warning. I turned and saw a low branch across the path about level with my eyes. I ducked just a little too late and the branch scraped across the top of my head. It didn’t hurt very much and we had a laugh about my clumsiness and carried on. Then after a little while I could feel something trickling down my face that proved to be blood. The scalp is well supplied with blood vessels and the smallest scratch pours with blood out of all proportion to the injury. The lady in front of me turned a moment later and very nearly screamed. Apparently the slight trickle I had felt was now covering most of my face. I must have looked like somebody in the middle of a war.

Being an organised walk, the leader had a small first aid kit and I was mopped up as well as possible, and told that I probably wouldn’t be dying just yet.

We continued walking, reached our turning point and began the journey back to Kingston. Rather than take the narrow path with its overhanging branches we climbed up a fairly steep bank to a metalled path used by both walkers and cyclists. Sure enough a cyclist approached from behind without ringing his bell. I don’t think many of them have bells nowadays, even if they have, none of them seem to use them. Anyway in my somewhat fragile state he made me jump, and as I was on the edge of the path I slipped and rolled down the bank. I think that particular area had been used by roosting geese and ducks, of which there are hundreds on the Thames. So in addition to my existing aches and pains my jacket and trousers were now covered with smelly green muck. This time nobody volunteered to help clean me down!

From that point on I paid rather more care and attention to where I was going than I had on the outward journey and we hurried along rather faster now that we were back on a laid path free from other traffic. Eventually we reached the same slope where I had fallen before without further incident. By now the frost had cleared in the early morning sunshine

Somebody must have had it in for me that morning! I found the only remaining place where the frost hadn’t cleared and went down on one knee with an almighty wallop. This time it really hurt and I found that I couldn’t walk very well. However there was only another hundred yards or so to get back to our starting point and I was escorted up the steps by the bridge and back to the King’s Stone.

I assured everyone that from now on I would be all right. “After all, the ground is flat and I can use the Zebra crossings to get across the road, then I’ve only got to get a bus back home”

My knee was rapidly feeling better and I arrived in sight of the road where the bus stop was just as the bus was pulling in. I didn’t want to have to wait for the next one so I hobbled along as rapidly as possible. All went well until my foot slipped on the kerb just as I reached the bus and down I went again, this time banging my head on the front of the bus. So there I lay semi-conscious, bleeding once again from the wound in my head, covered in bird muck and unable to stand up because of the pain in my knee.

The bus driver got out of his cab and came round to see if I was alright.

“Ambulance for you mate,” he said.

I suppose I must have been drifting in and out of consciousness, because the ambulance seemed to arrive at once. The next thing I remember was watching a nurse putting my smelly jacket and trousers into a large plastic bag.

“However did you manage to get into this state?” she asked.

I couldn’t help laughing. “I’ve just been out with a Kingston group called ‘walking for your health!’”

----OOOO----