Their story, in their words…
For our group’s challenge we decided to hike the perimeter of the isle of wight. Our end goal was to walk for roughly 60 miles in 4 days. Doing this for us was an extreme challenge as it pushed our group to our physical limits throughout the entire journey and showed off our perseverance through the hardships of it all.
On the first day we landed and hiked from ryde pier to our first campsite which was ninham country holidays camping site. The first walk lasted for around 6 hours and got us going for the start of our long journey.
We were hit with extreme weather conditions on the first day with extreme downpour and heavy winds causing us to go off our original route but it wasn’t too much extra time and we still made it on time for check in. The campsite was a very nice area when we got there and we managed to get set up for the night with relative ease. We ended up hiking a bit longer than we intended to but overall it was a positive first day.
For the second day, we started the hike at 8am in the morning. We were packed and ready to leave very promptly and were excited to start the second day. However a mix of landslides in the area had caused some of our routes to be cut off forcing us to go find different routes to go down to remedy this.
We managed to find a different alternate route to get to our location of grange farm however this ended up increasing the time from a 9-10 hour walk to a 14 hour walk. This made the journey a very difficult one for the second day however we stayed determined and upbeat for the whole journey all the way till we reached our desired destination.
We ended up arriving at 10pm and finished setting up camp for the night by 10:30. Thankfully for us this was the hardest day out of the 4 days finished and we felt a sense of relief when we finally were able to go to rest. The walk ended up bringing us much closer as a group and had us feeling very grateful to be hiking with each other
The third day started with us leaving the campsite at 9 in the morning after we had gathered all our belongings together. We started the day with a nice full english breakfast from a nearby stall fueling us for the day ahead. We had a 6 hour hike ahead of us and we managed to finish this one with relative ease due to feeling accomplished and energised after the day before.
We ended up reaching heathfield camping with much time to spare as we had a consistent pace the entire way there and this left us with much downtime to go to the shops and play a bit of cards in the evening as well.
The final day started with us waking up at 9 to have a prompt start for our ferry at 6pm. We managed to finish this final walk pretty easily and we made it to the final destination with relative ease and much time to spare.
Most of the final day was spent with us walking on a straight road allowing us to have a nice easy walk and not have to burn so much energy unlike some of the days before. We were relieved to see the ferry station after a long four days and finally be able to go home that evening to our normal beds instead of sleeping outside.
Overall this trip for us was a fun experience as a group as it brought us closer together as friends and closer to nature around us also. We saw this as a learning experience of how to navigate properly and manage our time correctly to reach destinations on time and as effectively as possible. It also helped our critical thinking skills as we had to reimagine the route a couple times due to landslides in the area. This was a good and helpful journey for us and one we will take skills from and apply for future adventures.
