Conclusion
I don't think that this is a difficult walk at all. Most of the route is on some sort of hard surface. The distances aren't all that great and there's only a couple of places where it gets anything like steep, the Pennines being generally fairly flat, or, at best, rounded. The adventurous part is the Cheviot Hills, where things get a bit remote for a while. I suspect that Wainwright's Coast to Coast walk might well be harder to complete. You could probably do this walk in lightweight trail shoes without much of a problem. Navigation is mainly pretty easy with the exception of Cross Fell, or some of the more intricate field paths such as those in Calderdale. I've sort of been mooching around the Pennine Way for about 25 years, and its certainly much easier nowadays and, for the most part, its been tamed. I suspect, though, that this taming is one of the reasons I enjoyed it so much. There was very little of the desperate struggle about it. Some areas - specially Black Hill, the bit just after the M62, Ickornshaw Moor, Sleightholme and so on used to be each one a sloppy maze of deep, black peaty runnels and channels and out-and-out bogs. Progress was by a series of hops, jumps, false starts, retracing of steps and the occasional desperate fight for survival. After a day of this, you'd be peaty from your socks to your collar. Not any more. All of that is in the past.
In other ways, its got harder. Shops and pubs have closed and Youth Hostels don't seem to want customers any more and B&Bs only ever have vacancies if there's two of you, or you want to stay for a week.
Yet, where it matters, in the countryside in general, things are much much better than they were in the 1970s. There are, for a start, many more trees - Longdendale in particular has vastly more deciduous trees than it had 40 years ago. The Aire Gap is also better wooded, with new strips of wild land amongst the cattle pastures and Tynedale North of Alston has improved. Those damned flagstones have also allowed the moors to recover, and even Black Hill isn't quite as Black as it once was. The only areas where there are modern problems are Penyghent along the limestone rock band, which is gradually being worn away and the Cam Road which has deep damage caused by off-roaders. The Pennine Way should never have got any further than Thirlwall. The Pennines end at Tynedale. On the other hand, the Pennines don't start at Edale, but much further South. The Pennine Way should be slid South a bit, and in so sliding, have a shortish first day of 8 or 10 miles. For historical reasons, it should, though, still go through Edale, and finish at Brampton. Anybody wanting to walk to Scotland could then go along Hadrians Wall and take the Cheviot Way (old Pennine Way) up through Bellingham and Byrness to Jedburgh along Dere Street or Kirk Yetholm along the Border fence.
That's what I think anyway.
Me? - I'm in smug mode thanks very much. It was great.
