Thread 4: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

The Observer The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...

Second article in the Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-whats-in-the-book-and-what-the-observer-has-found

Third article in the Observer
https://observer.co.uk/news/national/article/the-salt-path-the-truth-behind-the-blockbuster-book-video

Thread One ^www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5368194-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?^

Thread 2 Thread 2. To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet

Thread 3 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5369425-thread-3-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement Raynor Winn

She is evidently one of those people who can't bear to be wrong and can't resist clapping back. Hasn't shelled out for a copy of Let Them, presumably.

That made me laugh too.

I have to admit I've never read any of her books but I'm now wondering if she really wrote the other 2/3 or just took the Salt Path template and changed a few locations!

I would now leave the medical stuff alone. It is out there. Everyone knows that any diagnosis of that condition was AFTER the walk (thanks Sally) and that there is no clear evidence that he has the condition because it is impossible to diagnose before death. Given that fact, what condition he may have, and what it's progression / presentation is, are both entirely irrelevant. The "memoir" is a lie on that point. Attack the lie, not the illness. He most certainly didn't have a terminal diagnosis until long after the walk, so other than losing their home is the only aspect that is true there, and the reason they lost it is also a lie.

The point has been made and "upheld" on Moth's apparent illness, we all know it was a lie, but continuing now to press that point risks turning the tide of sympathy. Unless or until someone with medical evidence comes forward and proves it a lie, he is ill and has been ill since about 2015 or so. Beyond that we know nothing certain.

They’ve been prescribed pregabalin for his nerve pain & leave packs behind. They say these meds definitely worked but the anti depressant properties meant he ‘seemed slower’ to Ray. If Dr said he needed it for pain post terminal diagnosis & withdrawal very bad the Doctor had said ‘whatever you do don’t stop taking the pregabalin’ I’d have packed these first as a priority. Easy to say perhaps & I’d have halted trip until we had supplies & found nearest pharmacy as a priority. Raynor thinks coming off a good idea pretty much.

If I was a journalist I’d perhaps be thinking - is there anything here to suggest an investigation into a wider web of criminality - rather than ‘what else in the memoir isn’t true’.

Of course there may not be. But given what has been unearthed so far, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility.

Not that any more speculation of authenticity is needed at this point BUT...

I came across a review of The Wild Silence that mentions the last section is about a trip to Iceland as winter approaches (I've not read the book). What struck me is this review says something to the effect that people they met were "funny" in an odd way with RayMoth and it eventually transpires this is because they've been recognised as RayMoth of Salt Path fame.

What's odd for me is that RW posted images of a trip to Iceland in Feb 2017 on IG, which is before SP published in 2018. Could be a previous trip to Iceland, of course. Or could be THE trip to Iceland and RW simply did what she does best and reimagined an old trip as a compelling narrative device to write about Moth's ongoing health troubles in whatever timeline TWS purports to represent. I reiterate, this is just speculation and even if correct, it only serves to add another example of how RW re-orders the truth of events to fulfill her truth of events.

Has anyone here read TWS and know if any of this could be questionable?

An alternative hypothesis: The symptoms he is experiencing can also associated with previous and long term drug abuse (and often times the only "viable test" undertaken / possible is "Have you used drugs?"). Just reading the meds insert will tell you not to take pregabailin if you have a history of drug abuse. Which could be a very good reason to forget to pack them.

If you don't do it already then I'd highly recommend a career in PR/issuing statements on behalf of famous people's misdemeanors!

The Observer CH article mentions that local officials still think taxes are due. As they're local am inclined to think they would know – it's not like a central bureaucracy thing.
"When I visited Le Village du Dropt last week, it was clear that the property – a stone house and pigeon tower at the edge of a village – had been in an uninhabitable state for a while. Local officials said the Walkers still owed taxes on the property. Villagers told me that the Walkers never stayed in the house but they used to visit and stay in caravans on their land."

You're also not advised to stop taking them abruptly. So the situation described in the narrative could actually have been dangerous.

I'm thinking of doing my own middle aged version of The Salt Path.

It will go something like this:-

About half of my rucksack will be made up of chocolate. I will, however, pack copious amounts of suncream and a sunhat. No way my pale Irish skin is getting sunburnt.

I have a woeful sense of direction, so I will get lost after about two hours.

At the first sign of rain or my tent giving me problems, I will hightail it to the nearest luxury B&B.

My dodgy knee will start playing up on Day 5. I will soldier on for another hour day or so, and then graciously throw in the towel.

I notice this is still on the Wiki page

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Salt_Path

Also, I note he got the diagnosis 2 years after doing the walk and going through the withdrawal, some people have long term neurological problems after using pregabalin long term then abruptly stopping it.

It's actually banned now in some parts of the country such as Northern Ireland due to being so addictive and the side effects.

Just catching up on the Independent article by Rowan Pelling linked upthread (published yesterday) and this is intriguing:

“Even as I write this, I’ve been tipped off that a major scandal might blow over another “nature-adjacent” memoir by a woman author.”

I wonder who/which book that is!?

Very much agree. Perhaps they are, and it's a lot deeper. There may be an obligation to hand over to police to investigate: it could be out off press hands for now. Don't want to be told off for 'straying into fantasy ourselves', but it now wouldn't surprise me that much if TSP's dodgy past revelations is the tip of an iceberg. Their fame might be the worst thing that happened to them!

No, you need to keep going otherwise how will your knee miraculously get better? Lightweight!

Thankyou.

Can you install a caravan or mobile home in your garden? | Service-Public.fr https://share.google/lgGq6uR9oOMvt46ly

Sorry! It was in English before I posted it but seems to have turned itself back into French!

It sounds like we need to fire up the ancient Mumsnet charabanc from when all this was fields and head off on a <whispers> group not much walking holiday.

@Redheadedstepchild - have sent you a PM.

@Redheadedstepchild Edited to amend details as believe OP has probably messaged about same thing

I screenshotted that from the Observer video for future reference.

I would think the Observer would want to show the better option if that’s what they were doing, to make it look like they have as much as possible, second home wise.

You mentioned in a previous thread about a James Walker - the nephew - who had posted in LinkedIn about them. Would really like to read it but the link is broken. Maybe it was taken down after his Aunty spotted it! What did it say?