Thread 24 : To feel disappointed - and now disgusted and vindicated too - after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

[DisappointedReader]

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The Observer's original exposé: The real Salt Path: how a blockbuster book and film were ...
First thread: To feel disappointed after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film? | Mumsnet
Links to threads 2-16, the other 20 Observer articles and videos to date, Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's statement, our timeline and sources can all be accessed in the OP and first few posts of Thread 17: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5403285-thread-17-to-feel-disappointed-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Links to threads 18-20 can be found in the OP of Thread 21: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5460943-thread-21-to-feel-disappointed-and-now-disgusted-too-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 22:www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5470952-thread-22-to-feel-disappointed-and-now-disgusted-too-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?
Thread 23:www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5475246-thread-23-to-feel-disappointed-and-now-disgusted-too-after-reading-this-in-the-observer-about-the-author-and-her-husband-from-the-salt-path-book-and-film?

Most recent:

• Salt Path: A Very British Scandal, available on Sky Documentaries and NOW TV, 15th December 2025
• ‘Don’t look for the money. I’ve taken it all’: Salt Path author Raynor Winn’s ‘confession’ that she stole from her family | The Observer
• Observer Newsroom: The Real Salt Path Story, Thursday 8th January 2026

New posters joining us in the genuine spirit of our civil discourse are welcome. It would be helpful to get the background from at least some of the Observer exposé items before posting.
To all - Please be extremely cautious when it comes to naming or implicating people and addresses not in the public eye or with no direct connection to the story, and around the understandable health speculations, especially where details are unclear or still emerging. Remember, even Hollywood rabbits attract the odd flea. Please do not engage with drive-by scolders and ploppers who seem to have their own agenda and seek to derail. Avoid @'ing and quoting them as - from experience - this will only encourage them back to the threads. For over 6 months we have done amazingly well together for 23 very interesting, very serious and very silly threads so far. I can't be here as much as I'd like so all help with keeping our discussion walking along in our usual reasonable and respectful fashion is very welcome.

After 23,000 posts there are still new things to look out for on the path:

• Podcast series (7 episodes) from The Observer's award-winning Investigative Journalist Chloe Hadjimatheou (and including a shoutout to our threads), 13th January 2026:

The Walkers: The real Salt Path | The Observer

• The Observer, 18th January 2026:

The Salt Path scandal: a hunch, a hint and six months of ... and Publishers agree The Salt Path crossed a line | The Observer

• BBC Podcast, 28th January 2026 (to be confirmed)

Please start each post with the podcast episode you are commenting on, for clarity and to help others avoid spoilers if they wish to do so. Many thanks.

After listening to of The Walkers: The real Salt Path podcast episodes from The Observer my thoughts are even more with the victims. I also believe that the publishers, agent and prizegivers must now act and be seen to act.

As always, keep to the path, no saltiness, eat fudge and drink cider.

NO POSTS PLEASE UNTIL THREAD 23 IS FULL

Do you still think her fourth book will be published?

I was expecting to hear more about the house in France. There was a brief reference to it, at the start of the documentary, but no further mention of it. Do the Wynns still own it? I think someone looked it up and discovered that it's basically uninhabitable. But the Wynns could probably afford to do it up now, even if that was just with a view to selling it. Am I right in thinking that another family member owns the house next door?

I think they got fed up of being mistaken for Moth.

Well I've no intention of changing my user name (although I could I suppose replace it with the 2nd line of the song, viz - "Where the Cider Apples Grow!")

Had another look at TSP, the film version that is, and noticed quite a few features which I missed in the cinema - also not spotted when we were actually there in person last summer. For example, clearly visible near the giant-sized hands holding a map, (erected on Quay Street near the harbour and marking the start of the SWCP) are the letters SWCP and an arrow, on pavement in white paint. But there is also an arrow pointing in the opposite direction which reads "West Somerset Coastal Path". It's directed up the Bristol Channel towards Weston-s-Mare and I imagine was thought up by the local tourist board to encourage visitors to stay in Somerset. Mentioned because it illustrates just how easy it is to miss the obvious - in the case of TSP, on first reading it all seemed to me somewhat odd, but plausible. And of course all the many utter impossibilities (like living on pot noodles and fudge!) which the reader's brain "glosses over" before simply reading on.

Hi @Taytocrisps I can see you are keen to know a lot more. You may not be aware of the 7 podcasts put out by Chloe? The first 3 are free and you can subscribe for £1 to hear the rest. Here is the link:

The Walkers: The real Salt Path | The Observer

Thanks @BeachcombingBrandy. I'll check out the podcasts. Like I say, I was on some of the earlier threads but then dropped off them. The documentary has renewed my interest in the story.

Anytime is chips time for me too @HatStickBoots, not a lot of encouragement is needed :)
I really dislike this supposed rejection of material things, while accumulating as much cash as possible, isn't this another instance of deflection.

I have been nearly as confused by the username changes, as the Salray story line, @BeachcombingBrandy, I did try to keep track, even making a little note if someone announced a change, but I haven't succeeded. Thankfully lots of posters have kept the same username, I'm glad you have kept with your Brandy theme.

Tim's brother owned the property next door to the French house @Taytocrisps, as @BeachcombingBrandy says, the podcasts will bring you up to date :)

Yes, the podcasts are good, and detailed. Some of us have taken out a month subscription for £1 and then chosen not to auto renew, so you then get an email to say when your subscription expires. It depends what you already have an account with, etc.

I think she’s quite big boned apart from the wedding photo where she looked slim. When photographed with Gillian Anderson she looks chunky. I would have expected the weight to fall off if they’d actually walked TSP on their meagre rations.

I really dislike this supposed rejection of material things, while accumulating as much cash as possible, isn't this another instance of deflection.

I think is is longstanding too @Freshsocks , given the fact the prediliction for Landrovers/French 'chateaux'/duck egg Agas/designer clothes etc predate losing PYM. Perhaps the fact they were quite probably bought with other people's money means they don't really count as 'possessions' in the minds of Raymoth?

I wonder what they are driving these days, @Uricon2 ?
Not that they seem to be going anywhere at the moment :)

I'm also imagining @Vroomfondleswaistcoat reaction to finding their book, as a bestseller in the horse care catagory :)

Hey, it got me a 'bestseller' flag, I'm not looking a ...err....gift horse in the mouth.

There is a dearth of photos on the supposed walk of course, but she and Timoth always look the same sort of size to me during and after, neither dramatically fluctuating in weight. I lost at least 3 stone in the summer because I could only manage about 400/500 calories a day for a couple of month(ish), and that was being virtually immobile. Throw in strenuous walking and it would have been more, obviously.

We've all said before the lack of protein would have been a real problem when it came to keeping muscle, even with the exercise.

Afternoon all. I hope you are well today. I'm gradually catching up again.

First things first, a warm welcome back to @Uricon2. I noticed you were conspicuous by your absence when I did the charabanc register. Just to be clear, absence without leave won't be tolerated. Uricon2Esquire will be popping on next to tell us you've been diagnosed with CBD! Get ready for the knock on the door from the bailiffs a crocodile of charabancers ready to take you on an extreme wellness walk.

@ThompsonTwin As discussed on these threads previously, over the last 12 years,
I read this as our threads have been going on for 12 years! Sometimes it feels that way...

I sometimes wonder why Sal feels the need to blatantly lie about even relatively insignificant stuff...So why does she do it? Is it a compulsive inability to tell the truth? I just don't know.
Scott's oft quoted 'Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive'. The thing is about telling lies, you have to remember them. When you tell so many lies, that becomes particularly difficult and complex. There is some truth in what she says, but most of what she says appears to be not grounded in truth. The books, film and interviews are, in the main, her made up stories, her fictions. Half the time she can't remember what she has said. I don't believe for a minute that she ever imagined her deceptions - the little and the large - would ever be scrutinised, and certainly not by an Investigative Journalist and a gang of pesky kids charabancers..

Their photos are as ridiculous as everything else. @ThompsonTwin has shared before how they look younger at Poole - I've thought this should be their next mega-bestseller. The Walkers on Walking Yourself to Eternal Youth.

Because Tim can't resist showing off and she can't resist indulging him - there are a couple of him, near the beginning of the walk, where he has climbed on various walls (this is where he supposedly can't put on his backpack). And then the famous planking that is put in with the collage so we think it is the miraculous recovery at Gold Cap - but is really unrelatedly at the Snowdon trig point.

They really have obtained millions for old rope.

Oh Lord, I can feel the Devil's Avocado tapping on my shoulder...

and it doesn't account for all of it, but I am short and look chunky. People are often horrified to find that I am right down at the lower end of my recommended BMI and I only really look slim in skin tight clothes. Bigger boobs and short legs mean that I can easily look a good two stone more than I actually weigh. Now I'm absolutely certain that Sal lied about how far they walked and how much they ate, and that she is a fibber, fibber, garden dibber - and that she didn't lose weight as might be expected, but I had to lose three stone before anyone noticed, because of the way I'm built.

When shall we three (x100?) meet again?
In thunder, lightning, or in rain?
When the hurly-burly's done,
When the battle's lost and won.

On Burn's Night, appropriate to enquire whether there is appetite for a meet up 'in the flesh' some time, some where for charabancers to debate and discuss and draw a line in the sand on The Salt Path?

Sky Doc luminaries could be amongst the invitees.

Location somewhere deep in Cornwall or in Gweek?

And we could all come in disguise (to keep our MN anonymity intact) - all tres chic and glam in headscarves and big dark glasses.

I'm feeding Uricon2Esquire (TM @DisappointedReader ) haggis and neeps tonight, as he insists he has Scots ancestry (he really doesn't, any more than the mythic French gypsy line is true)

NB he does actually like haggis. And neeps.

We should have thought to check under the stairs for @Uricon2 as you say @DisappointedReader !
After @BeachcombingBrandy ’s post about the photos of Tim showing off at times when Moth struggles to put on his rucksack make me wish I had a scrapbook version of TSP into which I can paste the photos where they were said to be but show the correct information as well.

Perhaps @DisappointedReader could award prizes for various contributors and make a long speech having trod the red carpet.

Bit like the Oscars!

Surely walking boots and cutoff shorts would be de rigueur? And perhaps lemon suits for the males (are there any males on these threads)? With pot noodles as our secret signal.

That made me laugh out loud! I suggest a pair of 1940s woollen tweed trews cut off above the knee, a spotty red bandana and don’t forget to gel the hair into tufts either side of the head. We’ll either resemble a Venezuelan poodle moth or Keith Flint from The Prodigy.

How about Poole - that may be easier for a lot of people to get to? We could have a group photo near the end marker, pointing triumphantly to 630 miles.

I can just about do neeps on Burn's night ( being half Scottish) but swede still sends me into a lather.

Throwback to my prep school days, when as a seven year old boarder I was forced to consume swede, lumpy porridge, spotted dick, tapioca pudding. liver and onion and 'shark infested custard' with great gusto!

Pot noodles, fudge bars and pasties would have been a walk in the park!

Or a linen lab coat ala Dr StrangeRay, hair carefully draped over one shoulder?