Page Turners – March 2024 review

In March the Page Turners met to discuss ‘The Salt Path‘ by Raynor Winn. This bestselling book was published in 2018. Raynor Winn and her husband Moth lost their home and source of income in 2013 after a financial investment went badly wrong. Days later they learnt that Moth has a rare neuro-degenerative disease. With few choices available to them they decided to set off walking the 630 miles of the South West Coast Path from Somerset to Dorset with just a tent, sleeping bags and a few clothes in their rucksacks. The book tells of how they coped with this epic journey. It describes the scenery, the people they met and the help they received along the way and tells how the healing power of nature helped them come to terms with their losses.

We enjoyed the descriptive writing but were disappointed that there was one particular part of the path that they did not walk.

Within the book reference is made to the poet Simon Armitage who was walking the path at the same time prior to writing his book ‘Walking Away‘. A couple of us have looked at this book too in order to contrast the two very different experiences.

‘The Salt Path‘ affected us all in different ways. For some it mirrored personal circumstances, others thought we might like to walk more of the path ourselves and several of us felt it challenged our perceptions of homeless people. This gave us plenty to talk about. Our discussions included how we personally might have coped in a similar situation. Whilst we could not imagine ourselves wild camping and existing on a diet of noodles, we could understand that it was definitely better than being homeless in a city centre. We admired the resilience of Raynor and Winn and their strength as a couple.

We were keen to find out what happened to the couple after the book ended. They are currently living in Cornwall and Raynor has published several further books about long distance walks they have undertaken. We hope they have now made recompense to the campsites where they snuck in and used the facilities without paying and the shop where they admitted to theft!

In April Raynor and Moth are walking the Thames Path and the London Marathon in order to raise funds for research into neuro-degenerative diseases.

We recommend this book to you. Some of us have bought copies which we would be happy to share so do get in touch if you would like to swap our page turner for one of your own.