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Thread 25 : To feel disappointed - and disgusted and vindicated now too - after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?

1000 replies

DisappointedReader · 03/02/2026 23:59

NO POSTS PLEASE UNTIL THREAD 24 IS FULL

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?

After 24,000 posts there are still recent, new and up-and-coming things to look out for on the path.
Recent:

New: Up-and-coming:
  • Our Chloe's short video about Raynor Winn/Sally Walker's first book How not to Dal dy Dir - date to be confirmed.
  • BBC Podcast - date to be confirmed

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. The Observer's new podcast series The Walkers (link above) covers most things.
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 7 months we have done amazingly well together for 24 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.

If you are posting about a podcast, please start your post with the episode number you are commenting on, for clarity and to help others avoid spoilers if they wish to do so. Many thanks.

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

As we enter our quarter century thread riding the community charabanc, as always keep to the path, no saltiness, eat fudge and drink cider.

NO POSTS PLEASE UNTIL THREAD 24 IS FULL 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? | Mumsnet

OP posts:
Thread gallery
105
SableGules · 04/02/2026 14:00

Oh, first here!

The charabanc feels rather empty, but I suppose I get my pick of seats...

(I was @RueMouffetard on the last thread.)

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 04/02/2026 15:00

Oh good, I get the whole of the back row to myself!

HatStickBoots · 04/02/2026 15:01

Thank you @DisappointedReader 👏🏻🤠🪧looking forward to some more revelations and insights regarding the Kerching Chings! Sorry, Winn Wyns! 💷💷💷🤑🤑 “don’t look for the money! I’ve taken it all!”

LibertyLily · 04/02/2026 15:06

Thinking about what @UpfromSomerset was saying at the end of the last thread re: 'what ifs', I wondered if SalRay knew that her thefts from the Hemmings would be noticed anyway (or at least that money was missing, possibly focusing attention on her, finally) when the wages were due to be paid from the business bank account. I mean that even with the additional £600 she was supposed to deposit, there might have been insufficient funds to cover the wages, iyswim, so she thought she 'might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb' (not that she ever was 🤬) and pocketed that too?!?

I'm probably wrong (and haven't made myself terribly clear!), but - however lackadaisical he was at running a business - at some stage you'd think Mr Hemmings would have spotted a discrepancy or questioned the lack of funds, and perhaps SalRay had bled the business so dry, she knew her time was up.....or (more likely!) she just couldn't stop herself as the thefts were a kind of addiction/obsession....

SableGules · 04/02/2026 15:13

LibertyLily · 04/02/2026 15:06

Thinking about what @UpfromSomerset was saying at the end of the last thread re: 'what ifs', I wondered if SalRay knew that her thefts from the Hemmings would be noticed anyway (or at least that money was missing, possibly focusing attention on her, finally) when the wages were due to be paid from the business bank account. I mean that even with the additional £600 she was supposed to deposit, there might have been insufficient funds to cover the wages, iyswim, so she thought she 'might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb' (not that she ever was 🤬) and pocketed that too?!?

I'm probably wrong (and haven't made myself terribly clear!), but - however lackadaisical he was at running a business - at some stage you'd think Mr Hemmings would have spotted a discrepancy or questioned the lack of funds, and perhaps SalRay had bled the business so dry, she knew her time was up.....or (more likely!) she just couldn't stop herself as the thefts were a kind of addiction/obsession....

It does sound as if it was a rather chaotically-run and only marginally-profitable business, though obviously it's hard to know how much of that was down to SW's embezzlement and, presumably, her cooking the books to hide her thefts, as she did when forging bank statements for her mother's bank account.

Freshsocks · 04/02/2026 16:01

Scrabbling aboard all sticky with fudge, thank you @DisappointedReader for firing up the charabanc for another adventure :)

YourMoneyforFrothingandYourChipsforFree · 04/02/2026 16:32

One thing bemuses me little, which someone discovered many threads ago, is the fact Hemmings was the agent/project manager they hired for their barn conversion in late 90s / early 2000s, as shown in council planning documents.

ThompsonTwin · 04/02/2026 16:54

YourMoneyforFrothingandYourChipsforFree · 04/02/2026 16:32

One thing bemuses me little, which someone discovered many threads ago, is the fact Hemmings was the agent/project manager they hired for their barn conversion in late 90s / early 2000s, as shown in council planning documents.

Pwilheli was a small town with a limited number of agents qualified to project manage a barn restoration. It may have been a means to draw him into their confidence....

Uricon2 · 04/02/2026 16:55

Hwaet! Just caught up on the excellent posts at the end of 24 (perhaps we do really need the gruesome twosome to be interrogated by Jack Bauer...)

@ThompsonTwin those pictures of Supermoth are so enlightening, as well as obviously enraging, as is the fact the Glenthorne House posing with gatepost was hastily deleted when OC's expose broke, almost as if the penny dropped with Salray that there might be a compare and contrast incoming by more people than OC. Too late was the cry.

I didn't recall the earlier Iceland trip and also wonder exactly where the money was coming from for this. Even if they were camping and it looks unlikely, it is not a cheap country.

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 16:57

Afternoon, hauling myself onboard the charabanc for the next excursion. Thank you @DisappointedReader for making this happen.
Have there been any sightings of the Walkers since July? Does anyone know if they’re still holed up in their rented Cornish mansion and if any journalists and photographers are camped outside waiting for a glimpse? Presumably they’re getting their comestibles delivered and not venturing to the shops. Must be miserable for them…
And concerning the OWH book blurb quote “wrecked with fear” shouldn’t it be “wracked with fear”?

ThompsonTwin · 04/02/2026 17:01

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 16:57

Afternoon, hauling myself onboard the charabanc for the next excursion. Thank you @DisappointedReader for making this happen.
Have there been any sightings of the Walkers since July? Does anyone know if they’re still holed up in their rented Cornish mansion and if any journalists and photographers are camped outside waiting for a glimpse? Presumably they’re getting their comestibles delivered and not venturing to the shops. Must be miserable for them…
And concerning the OWH book blurb quote “wrecked with fear” shouldn’t it be “wracked with fear”?

I understand that they are still holed up in their rented Cornish mansion and are rarely if ever seen by locals. Where they live is an estate near a very small village (600 people live in the parish).

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 04/02/2026 17:01

@CatsOfDoom Yes, it should be wracked. The whole blurb is massively overwritten and dreadful (which makes me wonder if Sal has been let loose again to write her own blurbs, because this seems like a mistake she might make).

If I were the Walkers, I would have lighted out and moved somewhere terribly obscure by now, rather than sitting in a very expensive rental when everyone knows where they are (and therefore Tim daren't even step outside for fear of being 'papped' while enjoying a nice turn around the gardens.

Uricon2 · 04/02/2026 17:08

It was suggested many threads ago that while the rent on the last known gaff couldn't be cheap, they may well be able to afford it from interest on whatever money they have made, thus leaving the capital untouched. Untouched capital would be very useful in the eventuality of needing to flit abroad, although given past financial decisions it seems a bit unRaymoth in terms of involving actual forward planning. Could have had advice though based on some 'for instances' I suppose.

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 17:08

ThompsonTwin · 04/02/2026 17:01

I understand that they are still holed up in their rented Cornish mansion and are rarely if ever seen by locals. Where they live is an estate near a very small village (600 people live in the parish).

Edited

Thank you @ThompsonTwin I wonder how long they’ll last before breaking cover. The longer they hide away the more difficult it will be for them when they do emerge. But they’re going to have to style it out at some point.

MargaretThursday · 04/02/2026 17:21

Might the publishers have public appearances in the contract if they publish the last one?

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 17:37

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 04/02/2026 17:01

@CatsOfDoom Yes, it should be wracked. The whole blurb is massively overwritten and dreadful (which makes me wonder if Sal has been let loose again to write her own blurbs, because this seems like a mistake she might make).

If I were the Walkers, I would have lighted out and moved somewhere terribly obscure by now, rather than sitting in a very expensive rental when everyone knows where they are (and therefore Tim daren't even step outside for fear of being 'papped' while enjoying a nice turn around the gardens.

Thanks @Vroomfondleswaistcoat I did wonder if her purple prose was rearing its ugly head again. Yes. I don’t understand why they haven’t moved somewhere more remote. I do wonder about the quality of any advice they might be getting. I’m very curious as to who their legal team is because if they’re sensible (I know!) they will have engaged a top firm that deals with high profile defamation cases like Carter-Ruck or Thomson Heath Jenkins. Law firms such as those don’t mess around and I’d put money on them stoping SW’s amateurish and sloppy rebuttals and her publication of bits of TW’s medical letters. The legal team would draft any statements and lead with publicising them. Even though they have very little exonerating information to work with for the WWs I’m sure a good firm would have been handled the rebuttals better than they have been and would have spun them in a conciliatory way rather than doubling down. And of course the very fact that The Observer has not been threatened with lawyers taking them to open court speaks volumes. But I guess SW can’t help herself.

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 17:44

And those law firms are masters at media law too.

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 04/02/2026 17:59

MargaretThursday · 04/02/2026 17:21

Might the publishers have public appearances in the contract if they publish the last one?

I suspect that OWH is not going to be met with quite the rapturous applause of the last two books, so if PRH are wise they won't schedule any public appearances. I'm not sure Sal would agree to them anyway, she's not quick enough of thought to be able to answer off the cuff questions from people - and there will be many angry people who have a lot of questions to ask. She will probably plead either Tim's failing health or her own mental health for not setting up signings etc.

TheBookShelf · 04/02/2026 18:19

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 17:37

Thanks @Vroomfondleswaistcoat I did wonder if her purple prose was rearing its ugly head again. Yes. I don’t understand why they haven’t moved somewhere more remote. I do wonder about the quality of any advice they might be getting. I’m very curious as to who their legal team is because if they’re sensible (I know!) they will have engaged a top firm that deals with high profile defamation cases like Carter-Ruck or Thomson Heath Jenkins. Law firms such as those don’t mess around and I’d put money on them stoping SW’s amateurish and sloppy rebuttals and her publication of bits of TW’s medical letters. The legal team would draft any statements and lead with publicising them. Even though they have very little exonerating information to work with for the WWs I’m sure a good firm would have been handled the rebuttals better than they have been and would have spun them in a conciliatory way rather than doubling down. And of course the very fact that The Observer has not been threatened with lawyers taking them to open court speaks volumes. But I guess SW can’t help herself.

For all the reasons you mention @CatsOfDoom , I have wondered in passing whether SW genuinely has a 'legal team' at all; as her website rebuttals suggest that she is either not getting, or not listening to, good legal advice. This is someone who allegedly forged bank statements, invoices etc, as part of various thefts. What's to stop her creating a solicitor's letterhead, writing to OC as if from a solicitor, and writing across the top 'not for publication'? I do hope OC has checked that SW's legal advisers really exist, and that they are on the Solicitors' Regulation Authority register....

HatStickBoots · 04/02/2026 18:29

Uricon2 · 04/02/2026 16:55

Hwaet! Just caught up on the excellent posts at the end of 24 (perhaps we do really need the gruesome twosome to be interrogated by Jack Bauer...)

@ThompsonTwin those pictures of Supermoth are so enlightening, as well as obviously enraging, as is the fact the Glenthorne House posing with gatepost was hastily deleted when OC's expose broke, almost as if the penny dropped with Salray that there might be a compare and contrast incoming by more people than OC. Too late was the cry.

I didn't recall the earlier Iceland trip and also wonder exactly where the money was coming from for this. Even if they were camping and it looks unlikely, it is not a cheap country.

Edited

Jack Bauer! 😱 🤩 We’ve been watching this on itv+ and have just started the last series.

Following on from @LibertyLily and @SableGules , yes, unbeknownst to the Hemmings, Sally Walker was making a mess of their business and it probably did seem chaotic. If you could see that your business was losing money, it would drive you to distraction. I really do think she is evil. Taking other people’s wages and livelihoods, gifting expensive holidays and vehicles to her own family on stolen money. Every time we stop and spell this out in full and really contemplate it, it’s obvious that they were thrilled with TSP success and Moth becomes a cash cow. Can you equate the heartbroken, innocent woman in the books with this quite heartless, greedy one in real life? And Moth of course, the supposed storyteller and Peter Pan. The mention of the rented mansion once again reminds me of all the dialogue that was invented between the pair of them in TWS. On the page they very much come across as noble, hardworking people who feel frightened to fall in love with “the land” that they are nursing back to life. Any moment it could be taken away from them because it is only rented. This dialogue goes on for pages, really rubbing it in. Why is it that these contradictions between page and reality seem to go unnoticed by those who defend them? I suppose some just have not heard what the real people have had to say on this matter and that is a terrible shame. This is another reason why Penguin should act, because it’s only fair to those who are still oblivious to the truth to know what they’re buying and whose lifestyle they’re funding. I can’t believe that they have any objection to renting, in reality or they wouldn’t have been. It’s been pointed out many times that they could have bought their own place by now and we’ve also seen that they don’t seem to have a real ‘sense of place’ as much as they would like their readers to think they do, or her especially. They can never stay in one place because they have this pattern of taking everything and then leaving. They are the epitome of everything she preaches about hating. She supposedly looked around at Haye farm and wrote that the sheep had grazed it down to mud, nothing was growing, all life had been eked away by over consumption etc etc it had nothing left to give. She writes of themselves as being nurturers, giving, healing, having a relationship with the land and the Earth in general. They’re special and have healing powers. She writes a lovely message but it’s not true of them and by taking away the truth like that, the reader can only see Bill and the farm, his business in a very bad light. She robs him in more ways than one here and she does this with everyone she meets and uses, especially the readers. On the page she writes of herself as being humble and very undeserving of anyone’s attention. On camera she puts on an act and struggles to remember her lines sometimes. In reality she is ruthless and completely in denial as the rebuttals show. There really should be a rebuttal from us to address her rebuttal, one that takes each of her claims and shoots it down with evidence to back it up. Pity her website doesn’t allow comments. She can’t have much confidence in her “truth” because otherwise she’d be quite happy to engage with her public. Perhaps she hopes her silence gives the impression of her being dignified and unaffected. To us it means guilt.
On Winter Hill would have tapped into the same formula as the others. It should have been the last one, a goodbye to Darling Moth, a tribute to their lives together. We know some of what that has really looked like. She has a different version. If these books had been marketed as fiction, Moth would have likely died in the final chapter and she could draw their story to a close. She could have written the book with alternating accounts of her present reality while out walking, very grounded and mindful, her thoughts and flashbacks of caring for him but being torn apart with grief, flashbacks across their life together and snatches of conversation. Her realisation that she must hurry back to him because she should never have left him in the first place. So much angst. Back to Moth, his further deterioration and her flip flopping between acceptance and denial. Moth dies. Raynor screams and becomes a human hurricane before giving in to a deep silence as she stares blankly into space and the world stops.

ThompsonTwin · 04/02/2026 18:41

This is what you are up against!

Thread 25 : To feel disappointed - and disgusted and vindicated now too - after reading this in The Observer about the author and her husband from The Salt Path book and film?
GogleddCymru · 04/02/2026 18:50

Pah. Over-simplistic bollocks.

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 18:58

TheBookShelf · 04/02/2026 18:19

For all the reasons you mention @CatsOfDoom , I have wondered in passing whether SW genuinely has a 'legal team' at all; as her website rebuttals suggest that she is either not getting, or not listening to, good legal advice. This is someone who allegedly forged bank statements, invoices etc, as part of various thefts. What's to stop her creating a solicitor's letterhead, writing to OC as if from a solicitor, and writing across the top 'not for publication'? I do hope OC has checked that SW's legal advisers really exist, and that they are on the Solicitors' Regulation Authority register....

Yes @TheBookShelf my first post on these threads back on number 12 was also sceptical as to whether she has any actual legal team advising her because of the hamfistedness of her rebuttles. But according to Chloe H in the recent AMA about her Salt Path podcasts she confirmed that the WWs legal team had been in dialogue with The Observer but have not threatened any action.

Uricon2 · 04/02/2026 19:07

Jack Bauer! 😱 🤩 We’ve been watching this on itv+ and have just started the last series.

I see it now. Jack stands and leans over them across the interview table

" I wanna talk about Polruan and how you ended up there . And Anne. You remember Anne, dontcha?"

"Well Moth is really, really genuinely ill with this..."

Jack "DO NOT TRY ME!"

Have I got it @HatStickBoots 😂?

CatsOfDoom · 04/02/2026 19:09

@TheBookShelf Any legal letters from the WW’s team wouldn’t have gone to Chloe they would have gone to her editor and the legal team at The Observer. Chloe wouldn’t be dealing directly with them negotiations would be through the paper’s lawyers so they would know pretty quick if the firm didn’t exist.

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