Day 5 Tintern To Clun

Long day today. Great start at Tintern Old Station, a disused station that has turned into a cafe/attraction. I had been the only one camping there and did not see anyone either arriving or leaving which felt quite strange. Quick look at Tintern Abbey which is quite impressive, it's in a great tree lined valley with the River Wye meandering along the valley floor. While I was taking a photo, someone came up, their son has Crohn's, and like me has an ileostomy, he is about to do the three peaks challenge for Crohn's and Colitis UK and they recognised my shirt! The rest of the day was less interesting and tough at the end. It started raining about 2 and did not stop until the early hours of the night, although I missed the worst which was while I was shopping for food and while I was asleep in my tent, there is always an up side! May the gods of cycling curse Hereford's one way system (see the map to see why!). Tough bit was the end, I had not realised the place I had picked for wild camping was at the top of a 400m hill with a REALLY steep climb to reach it. I realised my error quite soon but all around were high hedges with locked field gates. In the end I found a layby on the high single track road near my intended place, it was quiet, never saw a car and ok apart from what I thought was a good bit of ground was actually encroaching earth on top of the tarmac of the layby: the earth was barely 2 inches deep and I had to put the tent pegs in near horizontal!