Day 22–Wednesday, May 3. Ceibwr Bay to St Dogmaels (7 miles)

It was inevitable–we have to finish the trail and move on. Surprisingly, Pam and I slept well and woke up happy and refreshed. Not so surprisingly, George didn’t. When I stuck my head out of the tent to see if anyone was awake, George was sitting beside his pack all ready to go. His battery ran out on his CPAP and he couldn’t sleep.

We had Soreen for breakfast–the squiggly loaf that’s fun to eat. It’s really not as bad as their labeling makes it out to be. We only had 7 miles left on the trail and 2 of us were ready for it to be over. Only Pam and I were raring to go more.

We only had one big climb this morning. The bad news is that it lasted for about 3 miles. We climbed to our highest point at the head of the bay leading into St Dogmaels. There were some great signs indicating which way we should go to die.

When we rounded the point, there was supposed to be a car park (according to the map in our book) but it wasn’t on George’s iPhone, so we blew on by keeping the party in “ready to explode” readiness. I practically ran the last 2 miles into cafe near Poppit Sands to get to some porcelain. I’ve made it 21 days without digging a hole and I wasn’t going to start today.

After a late lunch and ice cream at the cafe, we started the final 2 mile road walk into town. It was really kind of a disappointing finish to the trail. After a spectacular route almost continuously on the coast, we end with a road walk where we cant even see the water. To top it off, the band that was scheduled to play when we crossed the finish line didn’t even show–they must have gotten the dates confused.

At 15:43:17 on 22-May-2017 we completed the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path.  An incredible 1:46:43 ahead of schedule.  Pam and George didn’t use all of the whine cushion provided.

Arriving at the park where the north terminus is, we met some couples from Liverpool who took our pictures documenting this historic event. To make sure they get their due in history, we also took their pictures (but forgot their names in our euphoria).

Having hiked nearly 200 miles, camping the majority of nights, we had one last task before our trail can considered complete–we headed to a pub for a celebratory pint. We bored Sammie at the Ferry Inn with our exploits. She gladly looked up the bus schedule for us to get us the hell out of the pub before the regulars showed up.

Two buses later, we were back in Fishguard where we had been just 3 days ago. We tried to stay at the same hotel we did before, but they were completely booked (some heroes welcome). We headed to a hostel and accidentally walked into the wrong one and found Steve sitting upstairs in his home watching TV.

Steve used to own the hostel next door but has since sold it. He bought an old school house and remodeled it into a vacation home rental. Tonight, he had no plans and no guests, so he welcomed us in to the John Hamilton Hostel. It’s a lovely 4 bedroom home (all 4 rooms en suite). He allowed us to do laundry and made us feel completely welcome. This house is an amazing treasure filled with artwork and history. A further coincidence is that his father wrote guidebooks and we actually had seen one of his books for the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path. He gave us a copy of his dad’s book.

We went out to The Royal Oaks Inn for supper and met another Kylie behind the bar. George asked if that was a common name because she was the second Kylie we’d met. She said it wasn’t and that the other Kylie was soon to be her sister-in-law. We’ve only been in town 2 days and we’re tied into the local network.

Paying the bill and leaving, we recognized another couple from the trail. They were from Cambridge. Somehow, we got to talking about politics and economics (it must have been Pam because I usually avoid such hot topics). Bottom line is that real estate prices have so ballooned in their area that their children can’t afford to move out and they have great jobs. They were doing the coastal path to have some time alone. We all agreed this is an amazing trail and a hidden gem.