Walking to All England’s Cathedrals 4 January 2021
Speaker: Barbara Foster
As part of coming to terms with the loss of her husband Richard in 2007, Barbara Foster decided to do something they had always enjoyed together and took up long distance walking.
First some ‘easy’ walks: 50 miles along the Lea Valley; then the Thames Path, 184 miles from its source to the Thames Barrier, including a visit to Kelmscott, the home of William Morris, who rode upstream all the way from London. Next came the Norfolk Coast Path, the Dales Way, Wainwright’s Way from Lancashire to the Lake District, and Hadrian’s Wall.
By 2014 Barbara was looking for something bigger. She had already visited five cathedrals: St Paul’s, Southwark, Oxford, Carlisle, Durham and Newcastle (located appropriately enough in Amen Corner) then that spring she was inspired by a TV programme on England’s cathedrals to walk to all 42 of them – 2,000 miles.
Before she retired, Barbara was the headteacher of Benington Primary School. She also runs the props department at the Barn Theatre in Welwyn Garden City, where her husband used to act, and plays the organ in Benington church.
Persuaded by church friends from Benington, she decided to make her cathedral pilgrimage a sponsored walk-in support of the charity Freedom from Torture, which help asylum seekers and refugees who have survived torture rebuild their lives in the UK and campaigns for change in the UK and across the world.
Instead of doing the pilgrimage in one fell swoop, every year Barbara set aside several weeks between March and October. She walked in all weathers, dividing each section into roughly 12-mile chunks at an average pace of two and a half miles an hour. The longest stretch in one trip was Truro to Exeter – 135 miles in 12 days, including a 15-mile detour to St Pancras church, the ‘Cathedral of the Moor’, on Dartmoor. Overnight stops were booked in advance. She usually took the train to the start of each section or drove, carrying a small rucksack with clean clothes and leaving the dirty ones in the car.
At each cathedral Barbara took a photo and looked for something special to remember it by: Carlisle’s tiny nave, the rest having been pulled down due to fear of Cromwell; Oxford cathedral, tucked away in Christ Church College; Canterbury with its special pilgrims’ gateway; Exeter’s astronomical clock; the hearts in the stonework at York Minster; Leicester and the statue of Richard III in the car park; Worcester’s memorial to a medieval pilgrim, found under the floor when it was dug up in 1987; Lichfield, unique for having three spires; Birmingham’s windows by its native son, Burne-Jones. Birmingham also saw Barbara’s longest day’s walk: 24 miles since she needed to go to the dentist! And at Salisbury Barbara added her own to the wonderful flight of 2,500 origami doves in the nave, each bearing a message of hope.
By late 2015 Barbara had visited 11 cathedrals and walked 560 miles. At the end of the following year, she had been to 23 cathedrals, walked 1,000 miles and raised £1,000 for Freedom from Torture (no mention of blisters, though she had had to buy a new pair of boots).
From Chelmsford, with its modern mural of an oak tree containing many biblical figures, Barbara headed for home via the Henry Moore sculpture park at Perry Green. Her last day was to her husband’s grave in Benington, after which, on 25 July 2019 and the hottest day ever recorded in England – 38ºC – she arrived in St Albans in time for Evensong accompanied by a large group of friends, many of them connected in some way with her pilgrimage. By now she had raised £4,762 for Freedom from Torture, the final figure being £7,000.
Several friends helped Barbara with transport to the start of each section or accompanied her on her walk, including one, Tina, who sadly contracted cancer, and a young friend in East Anglia who struggled with health problems but happily recovered. But although the walk showed how interesting Barbara found the cathedrals and their different ‘personalities’, it is clear how important her friends are to her and how much she cares for them.
She didn’t say what she intends to do next 😊.