50 experiences and challenges to welcome and embrace the new decade of my life…
Running total (to week 44): 1,843
Miles walked in week 45: 23
Total walked so far in 2018: 1,866
Another below average mileage week as I was still in Grenada from Mon – Wed where I walked no more than a couple of miles a day. However I’ve just spent a weekend where I hiked around 16 miles up and down several peaks in the Peak District (Derbyshire) which has pushed up this weeks’ total a bit!
Running total (to week 43): 1,814
Miles walked in week 44: 29
Total walked so far in 2018: 1,843
Less than what has lately become an average of around 50 miles walked each week. This is because I spent most of week 44 on a relaxing holiday in Grenada where the only walking I did was around the resort hotel! With the exception of a short trek of the ‘Seven Sisters Waterfall’. The falls took around 20 minutes to reach although this was quite challenging being steep and muddy! And as we were not planning on any trekking I did this in sandals rather than walking boots!
This weeks figure is only boosted to 29 as I did 11 miles (walking and gym) on the Monday of this week, before I went on holiday.
Running total (to week 42): 1,762
Miles walked in week 43: 46
Total walked so far in 2018: 1,808
I had two days during this week where I did no extra walking at all… On Thursday I was working at home and just too busy with full-on back-to-back Skype meetings that I didn’t even have time for a lunch break, let alone a 4 mile lunchtime walk.
On Saturday, Chris and I had planned a 6 mile walk to a local pub for lunch and back but unfortunately his elderly father was taken into hospital so we abandoned this, drove to Norfolk, picked up his Mum and took her into visit him in hospital! Hopefully he will soon start to feel better.
Today in lovely sunny (but cold and crisp) weather I did a walk with a local walking group which focussed around the Wimpole Estate which is not far from Cambridge.
Running total (to week 40): 1,663
Miles walked in week 41: 48
Total walked so far in 2018: 1,711
Yesterday I returned from a weekend in Suffolk where I did a 12 mile circular hike around the historic Mediaeval town of Lavenham on Saturday and a 6 mile circular hike around Long Melford on Sunday.
Saturday’s weather was amazing for mid October with warm sunny temperatures of around 23 degrees. This changed literally overnight with Sunday being more typically rainy!
Both walks were rounded off in quaint little tea shops 🙂
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!
Chris and I have just returned from a brilliant week in Croatia with our family. Full details will be available in our up-and-coming travel blog post!
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!
Chris and I recently did a segway experience, a thoughtful joint Christmas gift from my lovely step-daughters Annabelle and Charlotte!
We spent an hour doing some initial training and then riding around a track while balancing on the segways. The concept was easy:
And it didn’t take long before we were both whizzing around on the segways 🙂
So, my husband Chris and I did do our 24 mile bike ride yesterday! While I am still up for a cycling weekend somewhere, as this is the longest bike ride I’ve ever done I’m going to tick this challenge off as being ‘complete’.
Much of the route was on dedicated cycle paths and bridleways and also fairly flat so the terrain was great for cycling. However as it was really windy we had to peddle hard! We set off in the sun but twice got soaked to the skin in a couple of heavy downpours! The second happened when we were only a couple of miles from home so we arrived back tired, hungry and soaking wet…
Note to self: take a rain coat next time…
We did both feel a sense of achievement and are keen to do more longer weekend cycling and continue our short evening cycle trips during the summer.
Having done a huge amount of walking and trekking this year I was keen to do some cycling and get some practice for a more lengthy bike ride later on. Chris and I hadn’t ridden our bikes for about 3 years and they sat forlornly outside under a cover slowly rusting away and getting covered in spiders webs!
We recently dusted them down, oiled them up and have spent some of the recent gorgeous summer evenings out and about exploring our local countryside. With our mountain bikes we always stick to tracks and try to avoid roads as much as we can.
One of our favourite expeditions is a 4 mile trip across the fields where we stop and dine in a fabulous local Indian restaurant before cycling the 4 miles back across the fields again!
We are hoping to go further afield later today with a 24 mile round trip to a larger town! I say ‘hoping’ because we are currently experiencing the first rain in about 3 months on this Saturday morning. In contrast to most years the UK has experienced an ongoing heatwave with many records being broken for example, the hottest London Marathon in April, the hottest May Bank Holiday and one of the driest Junes and July’s, as explained by Wikipedia.
I’m happy to hike in the rain but I don’t fancy riding a bike for a rainy and possibly thundery 24 miles not when more sunny weather is forecast for the next couple of weeks into August!
Fifty at Fifty 