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?

[DisappointedReader]

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:

• 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:

• 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
• Ask Me Anything thread MNHQ here: AMA with award winning investigative journalist Chloe Hadjimatheou, Weds 28th Jan, 7-9pm | Mumsnet

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

It could be like the First Form at St Trinians when they attack, only (much) older. Equally fearsome though.

@SalrayRocksandtheCharabancsucks I love the lab coat, it makes you look like a 1940s spiv, especially when you open it and all the silverware falls out! Bravo!👏🏻

I suspect it didn’t happen.

Well, according to TWS, a neighbour alerted Bill Cole to the vandalism and he texted SW, so presumably there are at least a couple of witnesses -- though in the kerrazzzy world of RayMoth, I get that that doesn't necessarily mean much.

I think I've vaguely assumed some drunk, bored kids probably did do bit of spraypainting (because the neighbour may well have taken a photo to send to BC), but that the glued locks probably were fictional, as was anything that suggested the Walkers were being targeted, because the neighbour is unlikely to have closely examined the whole exterior and the door locks, so it would always be possible to say 'Oh, you mustn't have noticed that...'

I mean, the 'They must have read my book! And know we've been homeless! That's why they wrote 'scum'!' thing is hilarious. How many people given to painting ten-foot-high penises on uninhabited farmhouses do so as a response to reading earnest, prize-winning walking memoirs about homelessness and terminal illness and the healing powers of salty sea air?

Hi all,

Will have to read back a bit as not up to date. Locally, there's been an increase in all 3 books in charity shops and they're not selling well. Perhaps readers are tiring of the con - it will have to be 50p manager's specials to get rid of them now.

Hi @AzureStaffy thanks for the update on the books mounting up. I noticed that there are 140 on Oxfam online - but some of the shops are still trying to sell them for £40 or £50. There are so many special editions for independent shops, the film, signed, etc. I suppose if the 5th book had come out in October it would have triggered sales for the other titles.

That is the big news, if you haven't been reading this for a while, On Winter Hill is postponed until January 2028 - and Chloe has been able to get a copy of the first book How Not to Dal Dy Dir. There are 7 podcasts with the findings - available, at the moment, for anyone to listen to:

The Walkers: The real Salt Path | The Observer

Thanks for the update and link. That's brilliant that Chloe got a copy of 'How Not to Dal Dy Dir.' What a great journalist she is - I long for the days of proper investigative reporting instead of so-called journalists sitting at home typing opinion pieces. I hope she gets an award.

Not surprising the next book is postponed. It all keeps coming back at the WWs.

My sense, based on what i mentioned earlier, is that the graffiti was completely invented with the idea coming from a recycling of Sal's HNTDDD cover.

And there are numerous reasons why Sal and Tim might have 'scum' graffitied on their house by someone which would have nothing to do with reading the books! Any of the people defrauded by them, anyone who'd had money stolen from them just for starters.

So I wouldn't conclude 'they must have read my book' so much as 'they must know us'.

I would concur. Sal has a habit of accusing others of doing stuff to her and Moth which makes them look like victims (ie having graffiti painted on Haye Farm) when the exact opposite probably took place.

The same thing appears to have occurred with the "glue in the locks" episode mentioned in the Marshwood Vale magazine:

"I ask her, somewhat nervously, whether the farmhouse is now habitable—for when they moved in it had been vandalised, with glue in the locks and a cacophony of mice living in the attic. “We’ve still got a few rodents,” she says cheerfully, “but at least it’s now got a bit of paint on the walls—and it’s dry!”

However, the reality seems to be the opposite of what is alleged above- it seems that when the Walkers suddenly left Haye Farm it was they who put glue in the locks as an act of revenge against BC and the previous tenants of Haye Farm before the Walkers have no memory of there ever being any glue in the locks!

The Wild Silence » Articles - Marshwood Vale Magazine

Indeed. Though I'm inclined to think that if the graffiti actually happened and was seen by locals then the SalTim probably did it themselves in to gain local sympathy. I wouldn't put it past them.

They put glue in the locks when they disappeared?? Awful.

Just been catching up, I hadn't thought too
deeply about the style of graffiti, so I had a look to see how common it is. Apparently quite common, usually the word scum is combined with a penis, sometimes just the word scum or conservative scum. It has become synonymous with political protest. In one article which talked about an area where the graffiti was prevalent, they jocked that local people thought scum was the name of the conservative party. If the graffiti did occur I should think it was directed at the property being empty, it's interesting that Salray wanted people to think it was directed at them, rather than the government.

Thanks for the article @YourMoneyforFrothingandYourChipsforFree

This struck me

"....And it’s meant that it’s been just me and Moth; which allows me to be my normal self—not really talking to anybody but him.”

i.e., " I don't have to worry about sticking to the pack of lies I've been peddling for years now. Such a treat."

I don't believe a single word she says about Haye Farm, the state of it when they moved in, obviously not the frankly rude account of Bill, the graffiti, any of it. I think by this point her dissembling skills were honed to a point it came pretty easily and the book was very much the mixture as before, the one that had sold TSP. Offered an idyllic farmhouse and a job virtually gratis? Grateful? Noooo, pass the glumwash, for we are Victims, the most Victimy Victims who have ever been Victimised.

She could win the Euromillions jackpot and find a downside very quickly.

covering over giant penises and swear words with artwork featuring inspirational women throughout Cornish history

Now this is where the Cornish are truly imaginative!

Redruth street artist fuelling town's revival by covering over giant penises - Cornwall Live

I think you are right @Uricon2, Sally got a break from being Raynor, Chloe said at the end of her podcasts that Sally had rewritten herself and Tim, but they are still intrinsically the same people, when they are together they are themselves, not the characters that Salray has created, also your observation about how Sally has perfected the art of glumwashing, she can instantly transpose optimistic to glum, the glass is always half empty.

Thank you for the article @BrandyAndLovage, it looks like a really great project, good graffiti can enhance an area and people's enjoyment.

That wasn't the worst of it. They nicked all the carpets as well apparently!!!

@ThompsonTwin : Thank you for this article. I got as far as "Writing with such honestly is a trademark of her style", then gave up.

Omg omg… 😦 🤮 thank you for the article @ThompsonTwin … I’m reading it fir the first time After Chloe….
This:
… the earth was starting to rejuvenate—just like Moth’s wellbeing.
“I do feel we’ve stumbled upon something,” she says. “Some doctors say it’s Moth’s own version of ‘something’; others point to the restricted diet or endurance training he experienced during our days on the path. Personally, I’m still looking for what the answer is; partly because CBD is still so under-researched.
“One of the things I’m particularly fascinated by is that most plants, to some degree or other, emit something called a secondary metabolite—it’s like a chemical that it puts out into the air, and is the thing that you see as a blue haze on a hot summer’s day when you look across a forest or woodland. Plants use it to protect themselves: from the heat, predators, pests or disease.
“There’s only been a small amount of research carried out, but it’s been found that the human body reacts positively to these chemicals, so it’s something I’m really interested in. For, just like the Japanese believe that the practice of forest bathing has the power to counter illness, I believe that Moth interacting with nature has tangible physical benefits.”

“Moth’s own version of something.”
Ha!! You got that right!!!
The last chunk of this quoted piece is not the reason he is cured of CBD. All of that is brilliant and fairly obvious to anybody with common sense but it doesn’t cure CBD, especially his CBD because he doesn’t even have it!!

@ThompsonTwin where are you finding the information about them glueing the locks and stealing carpets?!

Sally got a break from being Raynor

What a relief that must have been! This has been the cosplay of a lifetime!
Going back to the article… she states that her parents were venomous towards Moth.. the saintly Moth who sits quietly in supportive silence at his wife’s literary dos. Jeez. They didn’t look at all venomous in the photos. She says this to justify stealing from them.

Sources....

Let's put it this way, the rewilding/Ray@Haye story in TWS/LL is even more of a con trick than the alleged 630 mile SWCP walk on a shoestring/miracle cure for CBD and homelessness schtick of TSP.

Pathological liars who leave a trail of destruction in their wake....

Thank you. They were given the most amazing gift from Bill but of course he was unaware that they were not Moth and Raynor. It’s so terribly sad. Their 🤬 book of 🦇💩 cost Bill so much, physically, mentally and financially and they have done nothing to put it right. They can’t. I still find it really difficult to comprehend how anybody could make up such serious claims and exploit so many people on so many levels. They thought it was ok because CBD has so little awareness.

Bill looks as if he has a much happier business partnership:

A Smuggler's Spirit | Cornwall Living

That is lovely @BrandyAndLovage