Firstly, did I mention I’ve sent Roger my route? I know I’ve a few weeks before the deadline, but I decided to take the plunge and tweak no more.
This has lead to a surprising progression on the practice pack packing front.
During the route planning, I hit upon a minor inconvenience with regards to bed and breakfast accommodation. I really resented the single person supplement which bumped up the cost to the price for two, so I’ve opted for wild camps or camp sites all the way. This has the advantage of saving money, but there’s always ways to do that.
It seemed fair compensation for having no comfy bed to have a comfortable crossing, in other words, a lighter backpack. Extreme perhaps, but fair.
So, now have a Golite Pinnacle (Womens) in Coriander/Thyme winging it’s way to me from backpackinglight. (With a friend. A lightweight hipflask.)
Me? Impulsive?
A tad.
But it’s all progress!
Step one: Go for your usual three miles stroll
The swelling on my knee has gone and now it’s just a beautiful shade of black/purple/blue. It’s no longer painful to move or walk, but I do still occasionally catch myself out if I kneel down. Or turn over in bed (apparently, I’m crying in my sleep every time, but my sleep isn’t being disturbed, so that’s good…) so I went for a walk.
I knew it would be tricky getting out of the estate to the cycle path and back, but was disappointed to find the cycle path itself somewhat slippery and bearing in mind recent events, I decided to shorten my walk and take the marshes path. This wasn’t much better, as it turned out. In fact, the only moment of ‘hairy arm-waving’ (just so that’s clear!) was on the muddy path, which turned out to be sheet ice, not wet mud. Ooops. However, no one was around to witness and I didn’t hit the deck, so I continued. The cycle path, when I returned to it, was a mixture of frozen, partly defrosted snow and sheet ice, but not thick enough to wear my microspikes (which I’d left at home) so I gingerly made my way home.
Step two: Practice packing your pack
When I got home, I’d only covered two miles and was bored with a couple of hours to kill before darling hubby came home for lunch, so I decided to practice packing the pack.
It’s amazing where you can shave a few grams off here and there. All those useful packets suddenly become redundant, map covers carefully unstuck (this felt like vandalism to me, I can’t even write my name in the cover of a book, in pencil).
Then came the great weigh in. Oh grief, 22lbs. Only to then remember I hadn’t counted my Platypus, with water. Or the full amount of food, only having ordered a couple of meals to try so far. Then I noticed the sun cream and midge repellent sitting on the shelf. I’d left out the matches too!
More shaving required.
I’ll probably have nightmares tonight, as well as pain.
Regular readers (there may be one or two) will know I walk a regular six mile route on a Monday with a couple of friends during term time. The term started on Thursday this week (a Thursday, I ask you, what is that all about?!) so we walked on Friday. That was maybe my first mistake.
My second was holding the lead of The Other Louise’s (TOL) dog, a beagle called Ailsa, so that she had free hands to perform a necessary dog-related task. It became tricky for some reason when handing the lead back, one of those strange extending jobs, and the lead was dropped. I went to grab the handle as it dropped to the floor, I felt responsibility for dropping it, but I must have put my foot on the only miniscule patch of ice on the pavement because the next thing I knew, I was lying face down with a sore hand and an exploding knee. Ouch.
Of course, I immediately scrambled to my feet and exclaimed, “I’m fine, fine, let’s go!” whilst feeling a *little limp inside. The pain in my knee was raging, but I distracted myself by surreptitiously checking my hands to discover the heal of my right hand was cut and bleeding, a tissue and pressure were duly applied unnoticed by my companions and as we walked on, the pain in my knee lessened.
Towards the end of the walk, TOL’s new boots were giving her grief, so I was glad to slow down a bit as my knee had begun to get sore again.
When I finally got home after collecting David for lunch, I checked my knee to discover swelling and bruising. Arnica and paracetamol were taken and an ice pack applied, but I felt very sorry for myself for the rest of the day. I shall have to rest it for a few days, so the start of my training regime is on hold, again. Pants! I have discovered, however, that the most excellent dressing for a cut in such an awkward place is a Tesco blister plaster! Snug fit, water tight and pain relieving.
*I have a habit of going into shock at the drop of a hat, a Reynaud's attack is a regular cause and I usually feel so rotten I have to sit before I fall. I decided to ignore the beginnings of the feeling and luckily managed to walk on.
We didn’t manage to break out on New Years Day, but Sunday saw us beetling off to Glenmore for a short walk around Loch Morlich. I had planned a five and a half mile circuit of the loch, but in reality, those of us who don’t have any Kahtoola Microspikes were finding it very slow going, so the route was shortened to around four miles.
It was a grey day and quite chilly, around freezing all day with the odd lonely snowflake floating down, but there was now wind to speak of so it only felt cold if you stood around too long not doing much, (which the one of us with Microspikes did from time to time.)
I had expected the track to be compacted snow, as it was, because this is an extremely popular area to enjoy a little winter sports, cross country skiing and the like, or even just to enjoy the view whilst taking the dog for a stroll.
We still managed to stop for a snack en route, a few sandwiches were consumed and some experimental trail mix was nibbled. Ciara wasn’t impressed with salty Smarties, but the boys, well, they eat anything, don’t they?!
There were lots of people around and some were even brave/stupid enough to make their way across the loch. We stuck to the path.
We even had time to pop into the cafe at the end of the walk for a hot chocolate, but it was getting too dark by this time to enjoy watching the local bird or squirrel population and too early for the pine martin to put in an appearance, so we supped up and crossed the road back to the car.
A nice little stroll, making on average two miles an hour, obviously slowed by the conditions. I was glad of all my merino (MIMF) layers, I didn’t get too chilly whilst waiting for less well equipped members to catch up.
Total Falls
Aedan 1
Conall 2
Ciara 4 (bless her, just like her mother!)
