Far below, the sea beats itself into a white froth against the shores of Devon. There is a narrow beach, off which a sailboat bobs at anchor. I'm on the quay with my fellow hikers in the river port of Dartmouth, waiting for a ferry to carry us across the harbor. There are boats everywhere. Launches, keelboats, sailing dinghies, ferries.
Graceful swans move between the anchored yachts, coaxing handouts from sunbathing sailors.
Behind us, lines of houses stairstep up the hillside. Above them are green meadows where sheep graze, and cultivated fields that glow in the morning sunshine. Our ferry is a small barge, lashed to a tugboat and capable of carrying eight cars, and our group of stalwart hikers. He's been pushing these barges back and forth across Dartmouth harbor for eighteen years. An eerie wail sounds across the harbor, and I look up to see a coal-burning locomotive pulling into the train station.