thoughts about my adventure

This is what I call my "mud avoidance" strategy.

I think I wasn't anticipating just how difficult this walk would be. I had done a few 10-15 mile walks, but never multiple days in a row. I had been putting in a lot of miles around town, but walking in a city is different than walking up and down hill and through muddy fields.

Despite all the training I put in, my body was just not ready for what I put it through. After I got home Friday night and showered, took care of my blisters and got in bed, I laid there for a couple of hours freezing. My skin was hot, but I was cold inside. For me, this is how I know I have a fever. This lasted pretty much all day Saturday, and Saturday night I took some Tylenol PM to help me sleep. I got up Sunday morning feeling pretty good, so attempted to go to church...big mistake. As I was sitting and waiting for the service to start, I felt like I was going to pass out, so I had someone drive me home. I slept all day, and the fever came back so I took more Tylenol, and by Monday it had finally broken. Thankfully Monday was a holiday, so I just took it easy most of the day. I made it to work for part of the day Tuesday, and every day after that felt a little better than the day before. My knee, however is taking a long time to heal from overuse, and is still a bit sore sometimes.

People would ask how the walk went, and all I could think about was how horrible I felt right then. Its amazing how the pain we feel in the moment can overshadow all the good things about the experience. Like despite the first day of torrential downpour, we had great walking weather for most of the week. The sun even came out a bit, and it wasn't too hot or too cold. Sure, its not beach weather, but for walking it was great! I was tired, my knee was killing me the second half of the walk, and the last day I developed huge blisters...but I still really enjoyed the amazing scenery! We walked along flat coastline, through fields and rolling hills, and up in the crags. I just loved being able to spend all day outside in God's creation and see the calves and lambs frolicking. And, I feel such a sense of accomplishment for actually pushing through all of the bad stuff and finishing.

So despite all the physical difficulty, I can definitely say that I would do this again. There a few things I would do a bit differently, however.

1) Shoes. I will get some that are actually waterproof. The ones I wore said the were, but were in fact, not. I did stuff them with newspaper the first night when they got wet (great tip, thanks Dad!) and they were about 95% dry when I put them on the next day. But then they got wet again, and they weren't able to dry out properly that night so by the time I wore them for the third day they were pretty damp...

2) Food. I would try and eat a bit healthier. It was so easy to have the mindset of "I'm burning a bajillion calories, I can eat pretty much whatever I want". Which was true to a certain extent, but my body was already hating me because of all I was putting it through, and by the end of the week my stomach and, ehem, other digestion, was really not happy with me. So I think having less fat is a must, which is difficult since we ate at pubs. Like, a lot.

3) Rest day. I really wish we had planned an actual rest day in there. Oh well, now we know.

4) Accommodation and luggage. This isn't something I would do differently, but I definitely want to mention it because it is something I would do again, no doubt! We booked with a company who booked all our B&Bs for us, and took care of moving our luggage from one place to the next. It was one less thing we had to worry about, and is the only way to go, in my opinion. I would suggest looking over the itinerary and making sure that the mileage you're doing is ok for you. We didn't have any problems, but we ran into one couple who were doing 5 miles one day and over 20 the next because of the distance between their accommodations. Um no thanks!

Next adventure: Transform 2013 El Camino outreach! 74 miles in 6 days with a few days of outreach right after. Yes, I am crazy.

84 miles. 7 days. 2 feet.

Warning: this post is long!

Just thought I'd update ya'll on my latest adventure: walking Hadrian's wall path (84 miles) in seven days! (well, actually according to the GPS we did 89 miles...)

What an experience! It feels so strange that I've been training and getting ready for this event for over a year...and now I've done it! When I first had the idea, it was hard for me to walk one mile, let alone 84. I'm so glad I did it.

So here's kind of a break-down on every day, with some nice photos (thanks to Christine, who took so many pics of me) to go along with it!

Day 1: the rainy day.

The first leg was from Bowness-on-Solway to Carlisle, which was about 14 miles. I had done this walk before, and its basically flat the whole way with a lot of walking on the road and some walking through muddy fields. The day Christine and I started, it rained. Well, maybe I've picked up the British tendency to understate things, so what I mean is, it poured. Within the first 30 minutes of walking, we were pretty much soaked. It did eventually stop raining that afternoon, and the raindrops looked lovely on the wild flowers along the side of the road.

I think there's only a small dry patch on my trousers, right by my hand.

We made it to Carlisle and stayed at C's house, which happened to be pretty close to the path. We had some great pizza for dinner, dried our clothes, and rested up before...

Day 2: which was only a little muddy.

We started off moving pretty slowly, as C had some pain in her leg and knee. I was feeling pretty good. This day's walk wasn't too hard as there weren't many hills. The ground was a bit muddy still from all the rain the day before. We did see some pretty country and lots of cows and sheep! Well, actually, I guess we saw cows and sheep every day...

Sheep, by a lake that's not usually a lake.

We made pretty good time that day, and made it to the farm where we were staying in Walton by about 6pm. There was a large group staying there, so they actually put us up in the farm house in the guest room. It was a really cool place to stay!

Day 3: the longest day.

The next day we had a good cooked breakfast in the impressive dining room, and were on our way. C was still in some pain and moving slowly, so we knew it was going to take us longer to get to the next place near Cawfields quarry. The landscape gradually changed as we continued on - the inclines becoming a bit steeper and more frequent. We kept a slow pace, being so tired. By this point my shoes were pretty damp and my feet had been in wet socks for too long, and it was becoming painful to walk from the blisters that had formed (on my pinky toes, of all places!). Luckily, C's leg and knee were doing ok, but we were both tired and ready to be finished…but had a ways to go still.

The best part of that day was when we finally reached Waltown crags around 6:30 as the clouds broke and the sun shown through. We climbed to the top and enjoyed the view, and realized that if we had been faster, we would not have seen it when the sun was out. We still had to hurry though, as we still had a ways to go.

A beautiful evening up Walltown crags

Earlier in the day, a couple from work texted and offered to meet us at a pub at the end of our day and treat us for dinner. How could we say no to that! We had told them 7pm originally, but by this point I texted back saying we'd be late. Not too much later they called to see where we were. I told them, explaining how slowly we were moving and that we would be later than expected. As we ended the call, they said "ok, see you soon!", which was a bit puzzling as we had just told them we would be a while.

Well, as we climbed the next crag, we heard some laughter, and to our surprise, there the were! It was so good to see them at the top of that hill, as we were feeling extremely exhausted and a bit down that we still had a long way to go. They walked with us the last hour to the B&B and treated us to a lovely pub dinner. It was such an encouragement and a treat, and we felt so supported and loved! It was a wonderful way to end the TEN HORUS of walking we did that day.

Day 4: the hard part's not over.

We awoke on Day 4 and seriously questioned weather or not we could actually do another full day of walking. C's knee and leg were painful, and my feet were very tender. Things look less bleak after a good breakfast, however, and we decided to push on. The day's walk was from Cawfields to Greencarts farm, near Walwick, and still had lots of strenuous up and downs. I wrapped my blisters and potential blisters in bandaids, put on my spare shoes, and off we went, the mission being to keep the feet dry for as long as possible!

The ups and downs had the most beautiful views, but after the second "down" my knee was seriously screaming at me.  Ibuprofen to the rescue, which helped take the edge off. We paused for lunch, and continued slowly up, slowly down, slowly up, slowly down…just plodding along, alternating aches and pains. The path gradually started going more down than up, and eventually leveled out to miles and miles of flat and straight away.

At the highest elevation along the path. Woohoo!

By the time we got to the B&B it was late (at least it wasn't as late as the day before), tired, and hungry. We were again questioning if we could make it another day. But again, it's amazing what some good food and some sleep can do!

Day 5: the "rest" day.

After breakfast the next morning we decided to give it a go, after all it was a "short" day of only 8 miles from Greencarts to Portgate. The weather turned out to be especially lovely, a really nice temp and mostly sunny with white, fluffy clouds coming in and out all day. The strenuous climbing was over, the landscape calming down to gentle rolling hills. We just took it easy, and even finished a few hours before dinner!

Proof that it was a beautiful day!

Day 6: almost there.

That morning we got a lift out to where we left off and began the walk to Heddon. This day was a bit tedious, as the path was pretty much a straight shot next to the road. We did go through some pretty country, but it starts to look the same after a while, which makes it a little harder to not focus on how tired and sore you are. The weather had also gotten chilly, with intermittent clouds and a bit of rain. We were just really glad when we made it to the accommodation that evening.

yeah!

Day 7: the home stretch!

So close to the end, yet so far away! We thought this was only 15 miles…but according the GPS we actually did closer to 17 this day! We had left all remnants of the actual wall far behind, and now we were walking in civilization again. Gone were the days of walking through fields - this day was all actual paved footpaths. The first half of the day we were able to move along at a good pace, just plodding along through the city.

It was a really rough day on the feet…walking on soft grass is much nicer! At about mile 10 my feet were starting to rub really bad and within a mile I had blisters on the balls of my feet which got progressively worse as we went. By the time we made it to the end, I was seriously struggling and hobbling like an old lady! We were so happy to see Heather at the end of the path, who came to take us home! We got some food in us at Wallsend, and made our way back to Carlisle. Its amazing to me that what it takes a little over an hour to drive, it took us a whole week to walk! I got home, showered, took care of the blisters, and got cozy in my bed.

Unfortunately, it took me the same amount of time to recover from the walk as the walk itself…but that's a story for another day!

Forgive the radio silence

Sorry for the radio silence everyone! For being in communications, sometimes I'm not very good at communicating!

Let me explain: no there is too much, let me sum up. Christmas was good. I had a nice, relaxing time at home with my family and got to see a few friends as well. Church was interesting, as I didn't recognise most of the people there and it was my first time seeing the new building. Very strange indeed!

The weather here since arriving back from holidays has been pretty bleak. The days are longer though, so that is a blessing. We had a week or two of actual spring weather at the end of Feb/beginning of March, but then Spring decided to turn back to Winter and its been cold and windy ever since. Praying warmth comes soon. Its amazing how much weather can have an effect on one's mood.

Despite the weather, I've been pretty happy lately. Maybe its more daylight, but I think it has a lot to do with my health. I've lost 25 pounds over the last year and a half, and I'm really starting to notice. I've been able to walk farther and up hills, my clothes fit better, and I feel better. A little confidence and a smile can go a long way.

What are things that make you happy when the weather is bleak?