Thread 6: 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 item 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?

Thread 4 https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5370609-thread-4-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Thread 5 Thread 5: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet

Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement Raynor Winn

NB Please be careful when it comes to naming or implicating people who aren't in the public eye or have no connection to the story, especially where details are unclear or still emerging i.e. DON'T DO IT.

Keep on the path. No saltiness. Thank you.

New posters welcome. It would be helpful to read at least the three Observer articles before posting.

Latest from the DM. Nothing very new, just some more details about the £64K embezzled from the Hemmings.

My father was defrauded out of £64k by The Salt Path author Raynor Winn, it destroyed him and he never fully recovered from the heartbreaking loss | Daily Mail Online

Just reread the Guardian article about TSP from Apr 2025. She mentions to the author of the article that she read her book (Extreme Sleeps) just before she set off on the SWCP in July 2013. The book only came out on 1 April 2013 when the Walkers were fighting tooth and nail to prevent their house being repossessed. More fiction or evidence that the walk was planned some time in advance? Who knows.

‘The Salt Path gave us back our life’: walking back to happiness on Cornwall’s South West Coast Path | Cornwall holidays | The Guardian

Not sure if anyone's said this but; taking a sick man who is in pain on a strenuous walk carrying a heavy backpack far from medical help, is irresponsible, uncaring and not brave at all. The council offered emergency accommodation and they could have been inside and not exposed to the elements. That some of the other residents might be drug users is irrelevant when you're desperate. From that initial housing, they'd have a good case for permanent council housing, probably on the ground floor due to Tim's condition. Why would council housing be 'soul-destroying' when it would be life-saving? Why would they care about gossips when one of them could be dying? The cruelty of the council woman's words: "Well, if you're not going to die soon, like in the next year, then you're not that ill, are you" seen unlikely. Anyway, you'd challenge it and get your doctors to back up your application.

For those wanting to see TW and SW together talking on camera, came across this BBC interview from early 2018

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-cornwall-43546949

That is a very illuminating quote.

Only what Sally wants matters. Tim being in pain? She doesn't care. Tim not being the version of himself that she likes best? Terrible.

She's an absolute self centred monster.

Otherworldly piles of sticks are dotted around the orchard – a rarely seen, centuries-old technique for drying out wood he’s brought back. They’ve become such sites of ecological interest that academics from nearby universities have been studying them.

Rarely seen? Those academics would go nuts if they saw the countless piles of drying timber my OH has created in our woodland.

I mean I’ve never even heard of a bug hotel as creating a pile of twigs for wildlife is such a unique thing to do.

After recently attending a talk by a river warden who spelled out in no uncertain terms exactly what is legally allowed to be pumped into our rivers by sewage companies it's not OTT at all, it's extremely dangerous. He advised not even swimming without extreme caution.

The article on the Penguin site it says 'This spring, they will walk the length of the UK – from the top of Scotland back to their new home.'.. article date 21 May 2021.

As they leave the farm in the first week of May 2021, they plan to have their son collect them from.Fort William .. it iis only when they reach Fort William, that they decided to carry on.. according to the book.... and at the end of the Pennine way, they said 'Let's walk home.' It took them 4 months.. At the outset, they only planned to walk the Cape Wrath Trail..

Agree.

I learnt that lesson the hard way myself when we went Tintagel.

I was feeling ok, I paid to use their land rover service. I got up there ok but then my symptoms started flaring on the way down and I realised it's an utterly irresponsible type of terrain to walk on it you have a neurological condition. I was so cross with myself as I felt so unsafe.

Erm...Exeter University and its Penryn campus?? We do now have a university in Cornwall you know!!

There's Falmouth as well, although that may not have sciences.

It's notable that despite Sally posting those letters that she claim are evidence Moth has CBD, the Mail has restated the doubts about the veracity of this

I highly suspect that RW in conflating memory loss with the fact that multi-day walks where you see and experience different things are far more memorable than the hum-drum of everyday life and routine living in the same house and place. I said somewhere earlier I have done many long walks and I can remember fine details of each day, but in normal life often I can't even remember what I did one or two days ago!

There's not necessarily a pathology behind that, I think it applies to us all. RW talks of Moth not remembering aspects of their walk, which could be genuine memory loss. But as far as I'm aware she has never written anything serious about Moth's memory loss (I.e. continually misplacing things, not finding the right words, forgetting names, harming himself etc).

Salray's IG posts in 2021 shows them packed for the trip on 14th May, starting the walk on 21st May at Cape Wrath, and finishing the trip on 21st Sept in Plymouth (latter image since deleted, I assume because it featured a family member).

[Edit: sorry I now see you were getting at the inconsistency that the plan all along was to do the 4 month walk while the book tells it differently.]

Shocking to see them telling bare faced lies like that. They're very convincing

Absolutely nothing in their body language (imo) to suggest that they are lying. As you say, very convincing.

Isn’t that the satellite Exeter Penryn campus, though? Just outside Falmouth?

Which is where I first assumed Moth was studying, but it was Plymouth.

I feel the opposite and did even before all this came out. She's so breathy when she talks,I find it very irritating.

They've convinced themselves by this point. I still think Tim looks a bit shifty.

Looks shifty as all get out!!

Being educated, middle class home owners and creative types probably adds to their credibility.

Appropriating homelessness for financial gain is another despicable act and slap in the face for the many real homeless people in the UK

I’m not sure I see the ‘middle-class’ thing (neither sounds particularly middle-class to me). Sally’s parents were tenant farmers in Leicestershire, and Moth seems to have had a father in the building business.

I don’t think we know anything much about their level of education, do we? They met at college, but it’s not clear whether either actually finished whatever course of studies they were on (lots of references to skipping classes). Some interview credits Moth with a botany degree in the past, but if he already had a degree, presumably he wouldn’t have been eligible for the student loan for the degree he’s doing during TWS? (And wasn’t that an botany degree?) And Sally refers several times to being ‘unqualified’ for jobs. Would a bookkeeper for a small business when she did it need formal qualifications?

And isn’t the whole point of TSP that they weren’t homeowners, or even renters, which is why people were shocked they owned property in France? I assume they are now, or that, if they aren’t, it’s a choice.

The thing is the public lapped this stuff up.

I couldn't get past the explanation of homelessness, but many people wanted to believe that if things get tough you can just go for a walk.

From a financial (if not moral) point of view, it's still not clear whether Penguin and the Winns made the wrong choice to write/publish the book.

‘Otherworldly’. In that ‘whole new universe of gobshite way’ - yes, agreed.

Hitlerjungend made me smile @MrsKypp but I can confirm that is a very "New Romantic goes hiking" outfit. Keeping up the style even on rough terrain

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14897783/father-defrauded-64k-Salt-Path-author-Raynor-Winn.html

Nothing new I don't think think butRos Hemmings daughter, don't think it's behind the paywall.