Where Saxophone Players Meet

Sorry for the delay in posting this, I hope you didn’t all think the traing had got the better of us. After last week, I must admit I was nervous about being about to do 2 eight hour walks on two consecutive days. It was quite an achievement to do 8 hours, but to come home exhausted and aching, then get up the next morning to do it all over again is the only way to know we can do the trek in the Andes for 5 days.

Well, it all went quite well. Started off yesterday in the good old New Forest. First intereresting thing was an adder. Unfortunately it was roadkill but brought home to us how close to very wildlife we are. And I was careful where I trod for the rest of the day.

We got lost (seems to be feature of recent walks), but finally found a pub for lunch after being misdirected up a very steep and long way round, but it was probably the biggest ploughman’s lunch in the world with about 10 ounces of cheese. Rest of the day was long, loads of hills (see picture – of course once again I had to run a head to get this shot) but we got home tired and aching, but not as bad as last week.

Next day was fine! The first half hour was a bit achy, but we went on a very hilly walk in the South Downs. Towards the end the aches turned into pain, but you just endure it and put one foot in front of the other thinking of how nice it will be when it’s all finished.

And it was – 36 miles of hilly trekking in two days. And the morning after we both felt that we could do it all over again for another two days, albeit with industrial quantities of moleskin and Compeed. We’ve progressed from ramblers with the Hampshire Teashop Walk Guide to trekkers with Ordnace Survey map and a compass (even though we’re not always that good at using it). And that’s the end of our official training, we “rest” a bit for the next two weeks, just a couple of mere 6 hour walks now and again to keep the muscles in shape.

It’s not all exhausting but somehow enjoyable walks round the countryside that get more and more exhausting, we also have to do weekday walks. Just when you thought you could give the calves, knees, thighs and blistery bits a chance to recover, there are also several weekday walks. Not so easy when you also have to carry on making an honest living, but I manage to do this by walking round Southampton common for a couple of hours. It’s very flat, but I make up for its lack of resemblance to Machu Picchu by walking very fast and doing arm-stretching and breathing exercises at the same time. Does wonders for your lack of self conciousness.

Compared with last weekend, this might have been a bit easier. We walked along the Pilgrim’s Way from Winchester to Upham and back, a round trip of only about 14 miles. No, no, no. It turned out to be either walking up hill or downhill. Even the level bits seemed to be hills (see photo – and yes, once again I had to run ahead to get the picture). So quite good preparation for the Andes (although I imagine the air isn’t quite as thin on the North Downs), but what with some very rugged and slippery slopey terrain undefoot we were beginning to feel we were progressing from ramblers via hikers to trekkers. But then you have to respect our predecessors the pilgrims who used this very path without Scarpa boots, Goretex or Compeed.

We managed to get lost again just before lunch (becoming a bit of a theme). This time we ended up in a field where a bunch of cows suddenly formed a line and stared at us menacingly. True to walking mythology we suddenly realised they didn’t have udders. Luckily they weren’t actual bulls, as Laurie pointerd out, they were steers and in a sort of macho adolescent kind of way were doing their best to be aggressive, nudging each other and saying “go on, you gore them to death”, then realising they didn’t really have the balls for a fight they moved off sideways. Later on we met a deer suddenly right in the middle of a field.

Apart from the foot pains (which I’ll discuss separately), we both got home feeling completely exhausted and aching from head to foot, on account of the amount of gradients involved. We also woke up feeling the same which was a bit disheartening: the trek is only 3 weeks off now. However it seems that this happens: you wake up thinking you can’t possibly even move for a day, but once you haul yourself out of bed and stretch a bit, the aches sort of subside. (But only “sort of”). I feel I could have gone on another walk today, but it wouldn’t have been easy. Next weekend is the 2 x eight hours. Aaagh, still I’m very grateful we are keeping up with the prescribed training schedule. And it’s great to see some of the best bits of rural England. Here are some pics of just a couple of the sights that helped the Pilgrim’s feel it was all worthwhile:

Especially this after a long walk uphill getting lost in the rain:

We started off walking round North Kent (not all of North Kent, just a bit of it). It was raining quite hard so it was good to test out not only our waterproofs (never without them since that disastrous time a few weeks ago), but our spirits as well. Luckily both held out so we blasted fearlessly and defiantly through the damp and dripping Hayes Common with typical British pluck – stiff if slightly wet upper lip. Then it stopped raining after 2 or 3 hours. (But still with scattered showers of course).

I had decided to try the new pair of boots, but thought it best to wear the old ones for the morning and break the new ones in during the afternoon, but just in case I carried the old ones in my backpack. As it turned out by lunchtime the old ones were still causing some pain, I put the new ones on and it seemed the one area that would probably need the most breaking in was right where the most pain was, however they were brilliant – my worst nightmare (ending up in the Andes with the wrong boots) is now laid to rest.

The afternoon went well, lots of hills (see picture. Please note that to get this picture I had to run ahead up the hill).

After the 8 hours we didn’t feel too bad at all, Laurie had a slight blister) however the next morning there are plenty of aches and pains, so we’re quite glad the traing schedule has a couple of single 8 hour walks before the double 8 hour (in two weeks’ time).

NB, looking the photo you might think it’s a flat field with a vertical field behind. That’s my bad photography. It’s actually an (almost) vertical field with a flat field behind (honest).

The big one. Two six hour walks one day after another. We did it. Not easy.

Saturday was an easy morning as Jim and his grandma were with us so we just did a two and a half hour amble along the Itchen from somewhere to Ovington where there is probably the best pub in Hampshire.

But then the afternoon was long and hot and exhausting. Laurie’s new boots had been causing problems (she thought they were run in but no) so we went home for the old boots and decided to walk round Southampton. Not sure if it was the mundanacity of walking up and down hills in Bitterne or the annoyingness of Itchen Valley Country Park only letting you have UHT milk with your tea (“Sorry you can’t have real milk with your tea, we need that for milkshakes” – and so I paid an extra 45p for a “glass of milk” to put in the tea), but this was a hard afternoon.

Next day we thought we would take it easy so six hours round the reasonably flat New Forest seemed a good option. The first half hour was a bit scary as I was aching from the previous day anfd thought I’d never make it, but that soon wore off and the beautiful surroundings soon took over. (The New Forest is a pleasing combination of treeishness and open savannah).

However things got a bit tricky when we got lost in the woods, I won’t go into detail as it would involve blaming Laurie’s map reading skills, but it was very very scary when we thought we wouldn’t make it to the pub in time for lunch. Vultures were soaring overhead and wolves were getting closer, but finally we got to a place we’d been to before (yes we’d done a complete circle) so we got our bearings and made it to the pub just in time. Lunch was not as good as the pub in Ovington, but memorable for our exit. We accidentally let a very enthusiastic New Forest Pony into the pub garden as we left. A big pub garden full of chavs.

So onward and unexpectedly upward as we discovered a very nice bit of the New Forest (up north) that is very hilly and probably previously unexplored. A long long long long but nice end to the dual 6-hour marathon.

Except I realised that I really needed shock absorbers in my boots as I had some quite considerable pain in the balls (of my feet) – see 2nd Weekend. This means buying not only shock absorbers (i.e. another type of expensive odour eaters), but also new boots as there is not enough room in the old nicely run in boots for the shock absorbers.

This weekend we almost reached the extreme limits of human endurance – 6 hours walking the South Downs Way without a cup of tea. At one stage late in the afternoon we arrived at the top of a very steep hill where there was a lane. All we had to drink was two teaspoons of water in the water bottles (we’d frozen them but they hadn’t thawed out as it wasn’t as hot as expected so they were still mostly ice). “I could really kill for a cup of tea right now” I said. At that exact moment a car pulled up right next to us and 3 old ladies started pouring themselves cups of tea. I looked at the old ladies, then at my stout and sturdy trekking pole (aka stick). Then back at the old ladies slurping their tea without offering us any and back at the stick. Their lives were saved only by the arrival of a couple of miserable boy scouts. (Walkers in the country usually say “morning”, these ones just scowled and looked down at the ground).

This walk was basically the one we should have done last weekend if our boots hadn’t filled up with water. Except we did it backwards. (The route, not the walking). After a brisk 3 hour walk in the morning with lots of “up-hill-and-down-dale”, we stumbled across a very dead deer. Knowing that Jim (our 6 year old) would appreciate it, I packed its skull (complete with antlers) into my rucksack and headed on to the pub for a ploughman’s. (Hoping the deer’s head didn’t smell too badly). We’d actually seen a ploughman earlier so it seemed to be appropriate to eat a Ploughman’s. I just hope it wasn’t the last one as he might have been hungry.

We then set off for the afternoon. Laurie, feeling brave, thought we should also do a hilly walk in the afternoon so back up old Winchester Hill, but the steep route. It started to rain and of course this time we had our waterproof gear. Just as we almost got to the top of the hill we both realised how tricky this trekking malarky can be. Laurie’s feet swole and she realised that she should probably have bought some bigger boots, and my knees started to hurt. Blisters were there on the soles of my feet but a pain in the knees can be a real pain in the a***. Luckily Laurie had some anti inflammatories and I made it down the long long descent in one piece. I expected the worse and thought I’d wake up the next day needing crutches, but surprisingly I felt fine. Can’t wait for next weekend which is two 6 hour walks. That’ll be the real test.