Experience: I walked the length of the UK with a donkey

I’ve always had a keen sense of adventure. During the summer holidays, my parents would push me and my sister out of the front door and tell us only to come home to eat. I went from roaming the streets of Hackney in east London as a child, to trekking, wild camping and hitchhiking the length of the Americas in my late 20s.

After returning to my home in Liverpool, I worked as a photographer and got into a relationship. When we broke up years later, I was distraught – but it led me back to the life of exploration that I’d put on the back‑burner. In the summer of 2016, I embarked on a solo 1,000-mile (1,600km) route through Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. Not wanting to feel sealed off from the wondrous environments around me, I did the majority of it on foot.

Slow travel has allowed me to have amazing encounters with people from all walks of life. When I tried to recreate these experiences in the UK, I struggled to make connections. Abroad, my foreignness attracts people, whereas in the UK I blend in as a 43-year-old white man. Plus, I’m not a natural at striking up conversations with strangers. So when planning my next trip, a walk that would see me spend five months traversing the length of the UK, I landed on the idea that being accompanied by a pack animal would make me look intriguing enough for people to approach me.

I found a donkey from a local farm called Alwood Donkeys. After a few visits, they were incredibly supportive of him joining me. Unlike the rest of his close-knit herd, my donkey was a bit of a loner. They let me name him, so I called him Martin after a friend. After seven months of training, we set off on the near 700-mile adventure from one lighthouse in Cape Wrath, at the top of the Highlands, to another in Dorset.

Very quickly, I realised that walking a donkey around suburban streets in Wirral does not in any way prepare you for walking across the west Highlands. It’s an extremely challenging landscape: hilly, mostly moorland, with all kinds of biting insects. For the first six weeks, I felt extremely out of my depth, and constantly questioned whether or not I should be doing the walk and whether Martin was enjoying it.

There were lows where I would sink to the ground in tears. Once, I attempted to take Martin across a bog but he wasn’t having any of it. His feet turned out and he became unmovable, which was deeply frustrating. I got angry at him, and felt immensely guilty afterwards.

The walk was one of the hardest things I’ve done, but I don’t like quitting. We walked along trails, canals and roads from Glasgow, Lancaster, Leeds and Liverpool to Gloucester, Bristol and Dorchester. Everywhere we went, we put smiles on people’s faces. They were overjoyed to have encountered Martin.

People would fall over themselves to help us – letting us camp on their farms, giving me hot food and coffee, cheering us on. Nobody ever turned me away. Having Martin as my partner definitely opened doors – my new girlfriend calls it “playing the donkey card”. My conclusion was that people want to be friendly, but sometimes they just need an excuse.

The walk helped to restore my faith in people and taught me that incessantly worrying – like about where we were going to camp each night – doesn’t solve anything.

I also discovered that a relationship between a human and a donkey is built on trust. When I started putting Martin’s needs before my own and letting him dictate how the day would go (to an extent!), the whole thing became much more pleasurable. I was surprised by how affectionate he became. After each day, we’d have a cuddle, and his head would get heavier and heavier in the crook of my arm.

I felt that this wouldn’t be the end of our relationship. When I returned home, I bought him. He still lives on the farm, but I pay his keep and see him at least twice a month. We’ve done a few walks since – one from Liverpool to Blackpool, and soon a month-long walk in Scotland. Not only did I walk the entire length of the UK, but I made a lifelong friend in a 15-year-old donkey called Martin.

As told to Jordan Page

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