By way of Little Britain

Lots to hear today. "Hello? I got your number on Google?" she said with confidence as crossed the road oblivious to the bicycles. "When you said you wuz goin on oliday I thought you wuz goin sumwhere nice." said one hi-viz jacket lying under a tree among several others. "Nah, just Itly mate!" replied the guy with his head pillowed on an empty water bottle. "Thanks mate" said the policeman hurrying down the tow-path on his bicycle.

It was a beautiful day on which to walk beside the Frays River through Frays Park and on to Fassnidge Park and then all the way down to Packet Boat Marina. Across on the Slough Spur of the Grand Union Canal and back up along the London Loop through Little Britain and beside the River Colne.

Just over 10 km and then up 5 stories in 32 seconds. OK, I admit that was a bit extreme but I'm beginning to enjoy the odd celebration my new found fitness.

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Uxbridge Lunch Walk

A lunchtime stroll with Bashful and M, we noticed more butterflies than we'd seen before and how parched the golf course had become in just ten days. We saw several types of golfer; Brown Retired, Lunchtime Skimmers and several groups of Greater Well-fed Bankers, judging by the Bentleys and Ferraris in the car park. A kayaker lunching by his camp fire, an interesting counterpoint.

This 9 km walk took me through the psychologically significant 500 km barrier just after I learned FatBoy's diet had propelled us through the £4000 participation requirement. A BIG thank you to everyone who is sponsoring us. I was further comforted to learn that I would only need ten big macs to provide all the calories needed for the 60 mile Trailwalker (yes, that's just one big mac for every 10 km and without the extra salt and fat that fries add!). Of course, a cold big mac induces the gag reflex so I was eating a different lunch as I walked today - a few bananas, a trail bar and a couple of boxed drinks.

I saw a big shroom and discovered the mycologue as I was trying to identify it? Any ideas anyone?

Here are the walking stats with 150 km to go before the big day. I aimed at 650 km knowing I would struggle to find time for the extra 30 hours walking to match the Oxfam recommendation.

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No heffalumps?

A lap of the Dublin Zoo much changed since my last visit. A much fuller canopy and cover, the animals seem happier and more accessible. Despite being in a group too old to look for heffalumps, we had a very nice excursion that delighted a younger Grumpy than will walk the Trailwaker with me (in just twenty days).

Elephant, lion, rhino and giraffe always entertain. Fruits bats, tarantula and Burmese pythons evoked their usual paraesthetic skin crawl. The sated Sumatran and Amur tigers, the restive timber wolves and the scene stealing meerkats in the restaurant were the highlights for me.

A mere 4.5 km among the swan, mallard and tufted duck feeeding millieu.

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Three Walks

First, there was the unusual 250 m Heathrow T1 indoor event. Walking from gate 84 to 72 and back and back and back and back and back and back and back, about as boring a 2 km indoor walk as reading this description of it. I was finally stopped by the arrival of my plane and the closing of the security doors that prevent incoming and outgoing passenger exchanges. Sill allowed in the Gold Circle, I enjoyed a cup of green tea and some fizzy water after my 'workout'.

Then the Congo came into my day. All because the Dalkey Blue Bus from the airport (keep up, we're off the plane) was another 30 minutes so I hopped on the immediate Ballsbridge bus with WIFI. We got stopped behind a Congolese refugee demonstration. I think it was to highlight the consequences of war; the missing, the raped and the child soldiers but there were too few people and posters to be sure. I abandoned the bus and the nearby camouflaged Congolese security guards and walked 2 km to Holles Street where I was rescued and delivered home.

And finally, a delay in PM plans opened up the possibility of a two hour walk. Having felt poorly all week, I had dropped enough training that I grasped this chance with open arms. I decided to stay close to home and simply walked down and up to sea level a few times. I enjoyed seeing tots of trees and flowering plants that represent personal achievements in their gardens but add to a regional arboreal and botanical marvel. I picked up some bluish tinged beach pebbles that look like Ailsa Craig granite, brought two hundred kilometres south by long melted Irish Sea glaciers. One geeky improvement has been the release of the new iPhone operating system iOS4 that allows multitasking for the first time - now I can use the camera, the phone, text and Walkmeter apps all at once. I dropped down to see St Augustine but as ever, he wasn't there (The Dalkey Archive). I made it back in time for a shower, a burger and a trip to see Shrek in 3D where I ate ice cream and gummy bears - why not?

14 kms plus the 2 in Heathrow and the 2 in central Dublin means another 18 km knocked off the training challenge.

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Fray's River Rail

Feeling a lot better today, I headed straight out into Friday's traffic choked streets after work. Wrong move, wrong direction. I looped back to the Frays River where I'm pretty sure I saw a Water Rail for the first time. And then doubled back up to Uxbridge Common, round the back of a cricket match and up the former Hillingdon ski slope where the nylon bristle surface still pokes out from the overgrowth. Then back to the golf course and along the London Wildlife Trust Trail, around the lake where Black Poplar cotton littered the ground. A bird hide had a pencilled list of birds that was depressing because I identified more bird species in ten minutes than were listed after six months (and no, I didn't add my comments because someone had borrowed the pencil since the last comment by A. Bird last week).

An encounter with ten path blocking horses in the trees added a small detour. Another with a group of curious heifers gave me pause for thought.

I had covered just under ten km by the time I got back to Uxbridge. One item easily overlooked - the local paths have been trimmed passable again - thank you to whoever does this.

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Lunch Time Canal Walk

Bashful and I walked out to the Buckinghamshire Golf Course and back, about 10 km. Amidst signs advertising a corporate golf tournament, there were flights of four playing in the heat oblivious to the woodpeckers and other industrious birds trying to make ends meet. We saw the aggregate conveyor being fixed - this after months of inactivity despite all the adds about how road metal would go by canal not motorway. We talked about rambling things like blisters and sunburn while the new snatch-purse (Chancellor of the Exchequer) was elsewhere announcing how he would be picking rich pockets for years to come. It's funny how you buy spinach in a bag and it's ready to use but if you buy a bagged shirt you have to wash it to remove the creases. It seems to me that the roles of Treasury and government are similarly inverted. You might say the 'elect me again' Dracula of government gets to play with the sovereign's Blood Bank.

I seem to have lost (the plot and) a walk somewhere in the blogging past but no matter. This was the 39th (or maybe 40th) training outing and brought me to a grand total of 463 km or 71% of my promise. Time is running out: just 24 days left, 167 km to walk, so you can see I have a challenge.

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Tall Trees

From a bottlebrush in a Lyndhurst garden to a beefsteak fungus growing on The Knightwood Oak that survived Henry VIII hunting. Off with their heads cried the Queen of Hearts (a memory inspired by the tree's alternative name, The Queen of the Forest) and I thought the same about some of the litterers. A preserved WWII bomb crater reminds us that rambling is best done in peace time or when planes aren't littering.


Doc, Mrs Doc, S and I had walked the Tall Trees Trail and arboretum, part of the Rhinefield Ornamental Drive. Giant Redwoods and huge Douglas Fir dwarf pretty well everything else. A few more names on the trees would help but perhaps overload the school kids for whom this must be a regular outing.  

After walking six very pleasant kilometres we just had to have coffee and biscuits in The Rhinefield House Hotel. A wedding resort if you ask me but a very photogenic place to sit and sip on a glorious summer Sunday.

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New Forest

The (not so) New (not quite) Forest has seen action since before Guillaume le Bâtard left his calvados behind in Falaise to take up a new job overseas as William the Conqueror (1066 And All That). Our walking group had no such ambition as we set out from the car park across the moors in search of big adventures and perhaps some primordial forest. Sneezy, Doc and I had joined with C, C, S, S, S and N hoping to cover either 10 or 20 miles.

The first 11 miles was basically a loop around Burley Street, a village we never saw. We walked the disused railway for a while west towards Brown Loaf and then went north past a tumulus on Church Moor (they're easy to see on a map but I never saw any on the ground). On across Kingston Great Common where there were lots of New Forest ponies and up to Picket Post where we headed back south-east across the ford at Ridley Bottom. We had a section actually in trees in various Inclosures (sic) from Berry Wood through to Redrise Hill. We finished by passing between Shoot Wood and Spy Holms before walking up Holman's Bottom, looping back north into Cot Bottom and finally returning to the car park between Holmsley Bog and Goatspen Plain where we said goodbye to Sneezy and N, 2C and 3S until dinner.

Barceloneta Promenade

A convention in Barcelona. Such luck. A stroll from the Barcelona International Convention Centre (CCIB) to a reception in Barceloneta. Even more luck. There were raggedy kids playing soccer on the sand in contrast with gleaming white private yachts in Port Olimpic. The kids seemed to know more about tripping, diving and goal celebration rituals than football - maybe this is football?

I was enjoying a Magum ice-cream when two utterly naked men walked past me. Joggers, walkers, cyclists and tourists all looked after they passed, cameras capturing the safer image. It reminded me of a story from a colder place, The Forty Foot, once a nude men-only bathing place in Dublin, where my father as a child thought that being aware of pickpockets (an issue in Barcelona) meant keeping an eye out for a nasty type of fish.

Barcelona was a really nice place to arrive to. Six days later I was less enamoured. The freedom of expression in Gaudi-type architecture undermines urban planning and in conjunction with hideous Franco-era Stalinist style buildings, it feels disturbingly anarchic. Been there, done that, thank you.

A very pleasant evening stroll of 5.5 km on a balmy warm evening.

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Sagrada Familia

A walk from Me to Gaudi along the Avinguda Diagonal and up to see 60% of the unconsecrated Sagrada Familia. Love or loathe it, it is an extraordinary realisation. The tormented exterior figures invoke visions of the Inquisition. I wondered if the the column supporting turtles feel hard done by. The nave, the crypt and museum were all worth the visit. The light inside the nave was spectacularly pastel soft, abstracted and warm, in marked contrast with traditional concepts for stain glass. It somehow feels like it's growing slowly rather than being built. I liked it, a lot. And I loved the purple-blue flowers of the Jacaranda in front of the Passion facade.

This was just a four km walk in the heat of the day.

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Evening Stroll

A walk of duty to top up the mileage before a busy week. Set off down the canal through the evening haze of midges. Past the former Cowley Lock toll house, a photo of it from 1932 on a noticeboard letting us know it's a listed building. Around the coot-calling, parrot-screeching, cygnet-ringed waters of Little Britain and then across to the roaring M25 and north along it to Elk Meadows in Iver. Lots of water birds in plain sight. Songs of the passerines and others proof they were there too. Plagues of rabbits fleeing the threat of the lone rambler. The noise of the motorway wasn't as annoying as the mapped paths that led to private ends, forcing returns. But I shouldn't complain. The myriad venous rights-of-way allow remarkable access for which all wanderers should be grateful (and fight for their preservation).

Lots fragrant Black Locusts (false acacia), the white racemes of which transform even the Uxbridge High Street for a few weeks every year. Admittedly the fragrance has been hijacked by the air freshener industry but far better the airs of a clean rather than a dirty toilet while shopping.

The lush leaf-full canopy blocked the GPS and Walkmeter dropped a few km. Two and a half hours for 13 km. A bit slow but enjoyable and still bright at 2130.

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The 33rd Walk

The 33rd walk. The first in rain that pitted the canal waters. Showers really. Flags on cars, flags on barges, world cup fever. Elder in bloom. Older blooms blasted to confetti by rain. Shrew rippling like an insect to safety. Traffic noise and bird chatter between the showers. The boy standing in the street beside the magistrates court, holding up traffic, talking defiantly, perhaps unwisely, to his friends - They're going to charge John with burglary - I got away with it.

I'm disappointed with the level of fundraising. While the walking is rewarding, I'm not being encouraged by the response to the blogging effort. Maybe Oxfam are making it too hard to donate as some have reported. I note that PW is well short of the goal for his Ahoy Buoys cross channel rowing challenge this coming weekend (weather permitting). Maybe it's the recession. Maybe it's blog boredom.

Just over 6 km today, another 257 to go.

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Jack and Jill

Today was organised as a 20 mile practice team walk on The South Downs Way. We walked from Upper Beeding to Lewes, essentially stages 7 through 9 of the Trailwalker itself. A linear walk, cars were left at each end to allow options for most outcomes. As luck would have it, the foreacast was for the hottest  day of the year (until the next one, that is). There was a heat haze that traduced the scenic photo contrast. It was unusually still, if the number of windmills is indicative of prevailing conditions.

We were seven. Snow White, Doc, Grumpy, Bashful, Happy, me and a guest, S walked along the banks of the Adur under high factor sunscreen, discussing the different strategies to avoid blisters and worrying about water. We passed the Rising Sun pub and then the upended fishnetted legs of a manequin in a field - perhaps we were not the only mad folk in these parts - a thought that may have propelled us to the top of Beeding Hill.

Where do I go now?

Everyone else was busy but I needed to clear my head so I wandered out of the office with no real destination in mind. Uxbridge has history. The Royalists and the Parliamentarians spent a month in negotiations here in 1645 and produced the Treaty of Uxbridge which failed to end the first Civil War. As I walked past the Crown and Treaty pub used by the negotiators, I  remembered a path from a map that went near a moat and a coppice I'd never visited. 

Fate or coincidence, I found the path and I walked over a map. I mean that somebody had dropped a map, just one worn A4 page of this area. So I picked it up and followed their pencil ticked track. Nothing exciting but it reminded me of the man who travelled from place to place, working for his keep, staying only until he would ask 'Where do I go now?' This map took me along the Colne Valley Way, well overgrown, through fields with lots of horses. The moat was a bit far to the south and off the marked path. Another day perhaps.

At the intersection of the M40 and M25, the traffic noise replaced the crackling of the high tension cables I'd followed for a good part of the way. The 'water, water' in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner sprang (sic) to mind when I thought about all that power overhead and no way to charge my iPhone.

A 6.8 km walk that did more damage to my blisters so that I must let them heal. That's OK. I can take a short break. I've only 300 km left to walk in training.


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