The Salt Path is Raynor Winn’s memoir of walking with her husband the 600+-mile Salt Path from Wales around the tip of Cornwall and back to Devon. This may not sound extraordinary or appealing to everyone, but the circumstances that initiated the walk were difficult.
It must have been the worst few days of their lives to date. For years, Raynor Winn and her husband Moth had been fighting a lawsuit that, through no fault of their own, threatened their home and livelihood. They went to court having found a document that proved they owed nothing, but because they didn’t follow the proper procedures, they were not allowed to admit it as evidence. They lost the farm they built up from nothing and were homeless.
As if that weren’t enough, a few days later some pain Moth had in his arm for years was diagnosed as a terminal illness that would result in the degeneration of his muscles and end with him choking to death.
The Winn’s reaction to these circumstances was unusual. With a very small income and almost no ready cash, they decided to walk the Salt Path. And although Raynor wanted to walk it the easy way, from the southeast westward, because the best guidebook went the other way, they went that way.
This book is compulsively readable, as the couple deal with grief, bad weather, physical problems, lack of food and water, poor equipment, difficulty finding camp sites, and general bad treatment of the homeless. It is vividly written and although I tripped over some misplaced modifiers, impels you along with them on their journey.
whatmeread 