Week 38 walking update

Running total (to week 37): 1,512

Miles walked in week 38: 48

Total walked so far in 2018: 1,560

46 of these 48 miles were walked in Croatia this week, mostly in and around Makarska, our base for 7 days. We stayed in an apartment and while close to bars, restaurants and the sea it was about 1.5 miles to walk into the Old Town and marina. Some days we did this 3 or 4 times which soon racked up extra miles! And most mornings I got up an hour or two before the rest of my family and went for a 3 – 4 mile walk.

The above photo was taken during one of my early morning strolls where I could see the sun rising above the mountains behind Makarska. This was a lovely time of the day before the resort became busier with holidaymakers!

Week 37 walking update

Running total (to week 36): 1,459

Miles walked in week 37: 53

Total walked so far in 2018: 1,512

Good effort this week! 53 miles is an average of 7.5 miles walked each day 🙂 As a little snapshot, this was my mileage for this week:

Monday = zero (quite unusually these days for me not to walk anywhere)
Tuesday = 11 (walking to and from work and the stations and using the treadmill and cross trainer in the gym)
Wednesday = 11 (same exercise as Tuesday)
Thursday = 13 (same as Tuesday and Wednesday but I had an extra walk into our local town and back this evening)
Friday = 4 (walk to retail park and back)
Saturday = 2 (walk into town and back)
Sunday = 12 (walking with local walking club)

Preparing for a sober October…

Or that is the plan!

I often have difficulty in sleeping which is usually worse after a few glasses of wine. (Probably an age thing… ) Also, having had several recent trips away and lots of excuses for a few drinks I’m starting to get concerned that maybe I am exceeding my safe drinking limits?

According to drink aware, to stay within healthy limits, an individual is supposed to consume no more than 6 glasses of wine or 14 measures of spirits a week!

A quick estimation of my alcohol consumption last week reveals:

Monday: 1 glass of red wine
Tuesday: 2 glasses of red wine
Wednesday: (In Liverpool on work trip) 2 glasses of red wine
Thursday: (Liverpool) 2 x Margarita cocktails and 2 x Baileys = 8 spirits
Friday: (Liverpool) 1 glass of white wine
Saturday: 2 glasses of rose wine
Sunday: 2 glasses of white wine

Oh dear… this equates to 10 glasses of wine and 8 measures of spirits. And I mostly don’t have any days without having any alcohol…

I am determined to look after my health and give myself the best chance for a healthy ‘next 50 years’ and drinking too much alcohol isn’t going to help…

So, on the basis I can’t really see myself getting my fortune told this year I’ve swapped this challenge out and have set myself a new ‘Sober October’ challenge. Although this is also a ‘Health’ category, this is going to be potentially a bit tough so I’ve put this in the ‘Challenge’ category.

A little bit of a tweak however… I’m just going to do this for 4 weeks rather than the whole month… so will start on Monday 1st October and end at midnight on Sunday 28th October.

The term ‘Sober October’ comes from the MacMillan cancer fund raising site. I’m happy to give a generic donation related to money I’ll potentially save during October but I’m not keen on sponsorship… in fact I’m against the idea of asking people for sponsor money. It can put them in an awkward position and it feels like a form emotional blackmail i.e. people can feel guilty if they don’t actually want to sponsor you or give their hard earned cash to charity. And I haven’t signed up as I’m concerned about getting bombarded with emails…

Gym update

A short update to confirm I am still doing 2 – 3 gym sessions each week! So far this year I have been to the gym on every single day that I’ve been in the London office. As I work from home a couple of random days a week, have the odd flexi day and occasionally work away from London I never do more than 3 days in the office.

The gym is often quiet and there is usually no more than 4 or 5 people using it at the same time. We have TV screens with subtitles which helps to relieve the boredom of 25 minutes on a cross trainer or tread mill!

My routine is still fairly similar:

25 minutes on the cross trainer
10 minutes of weights (focussing on arms and shoulders)
25 minutes on the treadmill

I haven’t done as much on the rowing machine lately as these are not located near the TV’s… so they are boring…

And I am still burning off around 450 calories each time.

This morning there was nobody in the gym at the end of my session so I took the opportunity to take the above photo!

Weeks 35 and 36 walking update

Running total (to week 34): 1,371

Miles walked in week 35: 51

Total walked so far in 2018: 1,422

13 of the 51 miles I walked during this week were completed by hiking the Seven Sisters coast path where I was fortunate to have amazing weather for this. I also boosted this weeks’ mileage up by doing 20 miles on the Wednesday! I walked to and from work; walked around Central London (rather than taking the tube for meetings); did 5 miles in the gym and another 6 during the evening with one of my local walking clubs!

View from the top of the Bridgewater Monument

Running total (to week 35): 1,422

Miles walked in week 36: 37

Total walked so far in 2018: 1,459

Not quite as many miles as usual this week mainly due to going away to Liverpool with work for 3 days (although on both days I got up early and did 4 – 5 miles each day before breakfast) and also being busy with lots going on at home! I did manage to fit in a 9 mile trek with another walking club today, around the scenic Ashridge Estate which is a National Trust which is part of the Chiltern Hills in Hertfordshire.

Hiking the Seven Sisters

Challenge number 19 now complete! I was inspired to do this when my friend Jas first mentioned it over a year ago. I was lucky to have experienced perfect weather conditions, unlike the torrential rain from last weekend’s camping trip in the Peak District!

The Seven Sisters are the 7 chalk cliffs you can see in the picture below. The total distance was 13 miles and despite hiking up and down the 7 peaks it wasn’t too difficult. I’ll shortly produce a blog post on my travel blog where full details can be found!

September weigh-in

Weight today… 8 st 5 lb! Oh dear…

For the first time this year, my weight has increased…

I think this happened during last weekend, August Bank Holiday where I was camping in the Peak District. Despite 2 mountain hikes this also involved a 4 day binge of alcohol, crisps and snacks, curries, cakes, cream teas and ‘taking my finger off the diet pulse…’

So it seems the moment I stop tracking my calories my weight creeps upwards…

Thankfully I haven’t lost my focus and I am still in the mindset of taking care of my weight and fitness levels and aim to be back at 8 st 3 lb in October!

Another camping weekend for 2018!

Early morning tent view at Coopers Campsite

Our second camping weekend of 2018! Last weekend we stayed in Coopers Campsite in Edale, a quaint village nestled in Derbyshire’s Peak District. We climbed Kinder Scout in lovely sunny weather on Saturday and somewhere near Derwent Reservoir in torrential rain on Sunday!

Coopers is quite different from our previous wild camp weekend… this time hot showers were available, the campsite had a cafe where we had a cooked breakfast each morning and the Old Nags Head is just across the road! Coopers is also at the end (or beginning…) of the Pennine Way!

Kinder Scout… hill or mountain?

As the highest point in the Peak District in Derbyshire I had always thought of Kinder Scout as a peak or a hill rather than a mountain. However, as Wikitravel and other websites classify Kinder Scout as a mountain, I’ve added it as the third mountain climbed in 2018! (And at 636 meters it was actually higher than Slieve Tooey last Saturday which is a mountain…)

Chris and I had a great weekend with 5 of our friends where we camped in Edale and climbed Kinder Scout last Saturday in lovely sunny weather.

By complete contrast we climbed another two peaks the following day in torrential rain, temperatures not much above freezing and high winds!

Week 34 walking update

Running total (to week 33): 1,312

Miles walked in week 34: 59

Total walked so far in 2018: 1,371

A good effort this week with quite a few of these miles completed during a fabulous hiking and camping weekend in the Peak District in Derbyshire.

With another 18 weeks left in 2018 and a new target of 2000 miles walked I will need to keep the pace up and walk an average of 35 miles each week for the rest of the year!

(2000 – 1371 = 629; 629 / 18 = 35)