50 experiences and challenges to welcome and embrace the new decade of my life…
Week 17 walking progress:
A fairly average week of walking to and from work, a bit extra at the gym and 10 miles with my local walking club on Sunday.
Week 16 walking progress:
A milestone in week 16… yes, I’ve completed over half of the 1050 miles I had pledged to walk in 2018 already 🙂
Some of these miles were walked in and around Oslo city centre. On Saturday my daughter and I clocked up 9 miles and a further 8 on Sunday. It’s surprising how many miles you can walk by spending a day in a city!
Week 14 walking progress:
Another super effort! 10.5 tough miles were achieved by climbing to the summit of Carnedd Llewelyn, the second highest mountain in Wales. And on Easter Monday I did a 15 mile walk in the Chilterns which boosted this weeks’ total.
Week 15 walking progress:
Oddly the same total for weeks’ 14 and 15 but very different miles walked! Most of week 15’s miles were walked in and around my local town including a walk that Chris and I did to a local village pub and back… it took slightly longer to walk back…
Week 13 walking progress:
So, the first three months, or 25% of 2018 has gone already and I’ve achieved over 50% of my target for the year. This means I have been walking over twice as many miles on average each day to meet my target of 1050 miles.
I seem to be walking more and more miles each week which I think is partly because I am recording them in this blog. Counting them up and putting updates on here is inspiring me to walk even more…
I’ve got a big 16 miler coming up tomorrow, Bank Holiday Monday, with a semi-local walking club that I haven’t walked with before. I’ll be exploring the rolling hills of the Chilterns with 20 other people I haven’t met. It’s like a mini, or micro adventure!
The great thing about these walking groups is that you also get to meet loads of interesting people and even though the weather forecast is for rain tomorrow, walking 16 miles with random strangers is better than sitting on the sofa!
Starting weight: 10 st 7 lb
January weight: 9 st 10 lb
February weight: 9 st 0 lb (weight on 1st Feb would have been around 9 st 4 lb)
March weight: 8 st 12 lb
April weight: 8 st 7 lb (119 lbs or 54 kg)
Total weight loss: 28 lbs
I’ve gone quite a bit under my original 2018 target weight of 9 stones! The recommended weight for a 50 year old medium build 5′ 3″ woman is actually 8 st 10 lb so I’m slightly under the ‘normal’ weight for my height. I’m happy with this and would like to be able to keep my weight at around 8 st 7 lb rather than 9 st. The reason I originally set my target at 9 st was because I didn’t think I would be able to get below that weight!
Yesterday I sorted through my clothes and was delighted to find a size 10 holiday skirt which fitted beautifully! I haven’t been able to wear this for a few years and thankfully its one that never really goes out of fashion.
I’m consuming around 1200 – 1300 calories a day and still doing a huge amount of exercise most days. I’m anxious not to regain any of this weight and concerned that if I indulge in chocolate or cakes that I will lose my focus and the weight will pile on again…
A typical week of exercise for me at the moment is:
This is more exercise than I’ve ever done so I’m probably fitter now than I was 10 or even 20 years ago!
A typical day of eating goes something like this:
The calories are estimated and rounded to the nearest 100!
Having received some helpful advice from my best friend (who is the same height as me and has had a similar yo-yo diet pattern over the years), in order to try and maintain my current weight I am going to do the following:
And monitor my weight each week to keep a check and ensure it doesn’t start creeping upwards again!
Today I start my vegan month…
Today is the final day of my month as a vegetarian and tomorrow I switch to vegan.
I’ve spent the whole of March on a diet which has excluded all meat and fish products which according to the Vegetarian Society is a lacto-ovo vegetarian diet. This is the term used for vegetarians who eat dairy products and is the most common type of vegetarian.
Firstly I can say I found it very easy to lead a vegetarian lifestyle which is probably because my husband has been a pescatarian for a number of years, that is, someone who doesn’t eat meat but who does eat fish. He also occasionally has chicken but it has to be free-range organic chicken.
Rather than cooking separate meals, I’ve also tended to follow this diet too. So the main difference has been the lack of fish or chicken for a month.
As I mentioned in the previous ‘mid month‘ update, our dinners have contained meat substitutes such as Quorn which I still have mixed feelings about due to it being processed. Also, if you substitute lean meat such as chicken or turkey for say a cheese flan or cheese pasty, this has to be the more unhealthy choice too.
My conclusion?
In my view a vegetarian diet is easy to follow although, unless you limit the processed meat substitutes, cheese and pastry, I can’t really see the health benefits.
In addition, I would think there is greater suffering for cows if you consume larger amounts of cheese and milk. Rather than being slaughtered at a young age, cows have to go through multiple pregnancies throughout their lives to meet the demand for human consumption of their milk. So which is worse?
As mentioned, I’m starting ‘Vegapril’ (instead of Veganuary) tomorrow to experience a month as a vegan. Although the increase in people choosing a vegan lifestyle is rapidly increasing, I’m anticipating a few more challenges…
Week 12 walking progress:
Wow! Massive effort this week! Am I becoming obsessed? I’ve been in the office 4 times this week which, given that I walk over 5 miles a day (to and from stations as the walking element of my commute) every time I go into London to work, this has pushed things up a it.
In addition, I decided to walk through Central London instead of getting the tube during the working day (on top of the daily London trek from and to the station). For example its nearly 2 miles from one of our Central London offices to another one. And meeting my daughter in the West End after work racked up another couple of miles. So one day I actually walked 14 miles just by not taking the tube! (And burned off a huge 1200 extra calories too)
And on Sunday I did 12 miles with my local walking club…
Posting these updates every week or two is certainly helping to keep me motivated and look for ways of walking extra miles!
Week 11 walking progress:
Throughout the last couple of weeks I’ve been making a really conscious effort to push up my walking mileage. This has included going for a short walk at lunchtime (when in the office) and putting extra miles in while at the gym. I’ve now started to include the extra gym miles in my weekly total. I’ve also been walking ‘the long way round’ for example when walking to the Post Office just to add more miles.
We’ve had yet more snow in the UK throughout the last weekend meaning another snowy walk on Sunday. This time we went walking with a few friends before going back to theirs for a warm bowl of chilli. We’ve had more snow than usual this winter and I’m looking forward to spring time!
Book number 5
Book read: Balancing on Blue by Keith Foskett
A fantastic account of the authors incredible 2,200 mile journey as he made his way on foot the entire length of the Appalachian Trail. This makes the recent 632 mile South West Coast Path book I read look somewhat tame although both are amazing achievements…
Both books, and also the Kamikaze Kangaroo book which had a section where the author trekked Australia’s 623 mile Bibbulmun Track are really starting to inspire me to do a long distance walk. My feet are getting itchier by the day…
At the moment the UK’s South West Coast Path is probably the most realistic to aspire to (no bears or rattlesnakes to contend with) although I don’t think I would get another career break from work any time soon… And I haven’t actually done anything more challenging than a weekend of hiking… maybe I should try a week of daily hikes first?
This was another of those books I got through fairly quickly as it was hard to put down… I loved the way Fozzie effortlessly weaved his feelings, experiences and connections with the harsh facts of what it’s like to experience life as a thru-hiker on the trail.
Again, much of this book resonated with my constant desire to travel and explore… “the desire to roam is all I dream of” says Keith. This is me. I am always dreaming of exploring but the difference is, Keith is out there doing it while I’m spending far too much time dreaming while in the office…
I found many more inspiring quotes in Fozzie’s book and another was from one of his trail buddies, who, upon his return back into civilization said:
Page: 261
“I had no desire to own anything other than the crappiest car in existence. It also acted as a people-filter. I had little time for anyone who judged me on the basis of my car, and you would be surprised how few people that left.”
I can definitely identify with that too!
I’m keen to read more of Fozzie’s books… I’ve been thinking that maybe I should expand my literary horizons and read a book that isn’t a travel book but I haven’t quite managed to do that yet… I’ve now started following the adventures of a family travelling the world in a camper van…
While I’ve completed many treks through the UK’s Lake District, Peak District, coastal paths and quite a few abroad, I don’t have a huge amount of mountain experience. I have, however, been fortunate to have climbed the following UK mountains:
The last mountain I climbed was Ben More in May 2017 which is the highest mountain on the Isle of Mull, Scotland. Due to being unfit and at least a stone or so overweight I really struggled with this. We were fortunate to have perfect weather conditions yet I found the whole climb daunting and difficult as I tried to haul my weight up the steep slopes towards the summit. This frustration at being so unfit was actually one of my real driving forces to get much fitter in 2018.
I have a weekend in Snowdonia coming up and while I’m not yet sure which mountain we will climb I am hoping that with my weight loss and increased exercise routine (gym, swimming and walking) I won’t find the next mountain climb to be quite as much of a struggle!
Fifty at Fifty 