Following in Norman’s Footsteps

Earlier this week my friend Alex and I went on a historical adventure through the Sussex county, following in the footsteps of the Normans in 1066. This is the extent of the historical knowledge I have about the event.

We arrived at Norman’s bay and, as any person acquainted with the British Aisles would, went straight to the pub.

“Bonjour Monsiour!” I said, impersonating William the Conquerer to the bartender – an old man wearing a rather disorientating McDonald’s Hawaian style shirt – “two of your finest English Ales!”

We sank a couple of pints of Madri, avoided getting roped in to a meat raffle and made haste to Pevensey Castle.

We had a look around the ancient fortress, remarked that some of the ruins bore resemblance to the skull of Bart Simpson, then went to the pub again.

We both ordered cheese and bacon burgers – Norman style. Luckily, they were generous with the bacon, as this would turn out to be our only meal for the next 24 hours, and 12 miles of walking in blazing heat.

We found signs for our route and got going. We were in the country, long grass and cow shit.

The aim was to arrive at Herstmonceaux Castle by sunset, a grand estate recently converted into a college. Hopefully, we thought, we could sleep on the castle grounds, there was a mischeiviousness to this prospect which excited us. It didn’t look too far on the map, but our journey would turn out to be long and winding.

We couldn’t have been walking for longer than ten minutes or so when I began howling with laughter. A swarm of flies had formed above Alex’s head. Combined with his disheveled appearence, he looked like he had been ripped out of a comic strip and placed in the field in front of me.

He looked back at me, confused at why I was laughing at him. I told him there was a swarm of flies hovering over him and he looked like he was in a cartoon.

Noticing the swarm, he started walking away from it backwards, straight into a steaming pile of cow shit.

His shoes turned white to brown instantaneously. I howled harder.

Then I realised I was stood in cow shit too. My laughter stifled slightly.

My shoes were less damaged than Alex’s by the stinky substance that seemed to surround us, so I got away with wiping mine off on the grass. Alex had to wash his in the river, then used our water to clean them further.

Surprisingly, he had brought a spare pair of shoes with him, so he didn’t have to continue onwards in his sodden stinkers. A worn out pair of Clarkes Wallabees was produced from his rucksack, and we made haste toward Herstmonceaux.

It was a hot day. The sun blazed on to the river beside us and the wheat fields glimmered gold. For now, the landscape was relatively flat, large farmers fields which looked like they had been left alone for the summer grew into the horizon. You could feel the earth in the air.

We trundled along footpaths and over briges. The flies still hadn’t left Alex’s airspace.

Soon enough, we were the only people for miles around. There were only cows, sheep and bugs. I gave a herd of cows a friendly “Moo,” they just looked back at me solemnly.

The sheep were chirpy enough though – “Baah”, “Baah”, “Baah” one after another. I gave a “baah” and they would respond passionately. I was getting delirious.

“Let’s have some water.” I said.

“There’s none left.”

“What? How?”

“I used it to clean off the shit.”

“Oh you fucking moron!”

After a while the footpath melted into the grass and we became unsure of which direction to head in.

I looked at my phone and realised we were in the wrong place.

There were no shops around for miles and we were getting thirsty.

We made our way towards the closest road, planning to rejoin the footpath at a cross-section.

But before the road was a curious group of people, the first we had seen in miles.

They were Jews, highly orthodox by my estimation, not that it counts for much. All of them were together, fifteen or so, playing with a ball in a field, girls, boys men and women, few older than 40 or so. It could have been a scene from 200 years ago.

We sat watching them for a little while, wondering if we should cross their land.

Every few minutes or so we heard the pop of a shotgun, probably a pigeon shooter, but they sounded close.

In the end we decided to cross. We climbed a gate and got on to a path.

The Jews turned their heads all at once, mechanically. They stared at us blankly, their faces slightly deformed.

“Can we go through here?” Alex asked.

There was a pause. They kept staring.

“Sure.” Said the eldest. We shrugged our shoulders and walked on to the road.