5 Funky Llamas, 2 Hardcore 4-ers, 3 Sleeping Ponies, 2 Leaping Walkers, and a bit of climbing through some beach-side trees!

With Gubbs away at (another!) stag do, and Julie carrying out a 12 mile loop closer to home, remaining team members Josh and Jo decided to put in one last training walk, taking advantage of the 'winding down' recommended in the training guide in terms of distance. 

As both Josh and Jo suffer from hayfever, they decided a walk near the coast might be in order to avoid all of the pollen in the fields closer in-land, so they decided on a 5 mile loop at Lepe Country Park in the New Forest.  5 miles now seems like a stroll in the park compared to recent training walks (I did say we were taking advantage of the 'winding down' part!!).

On arriving at the car park next to the beach, Jo and Josh were met with a view of around 1800 yachts, sailing the Solent for the annual Round The Island boat race. This is one of the largest yacht races in the world, starting and finishing in Cowes on the Isle of Wight, so it was quite a sight to behold. The race is 63.3 miles long, coincidently almost exactly the same distance that we will be walking in Trailwalker in a few weeks time!!!

The walk route started from the car park and took us along the footpath next to the shore line. The wind was blowing quite a gail, which was good news for the sailors, but not such good news for Jo's hat which had to be removed within a few feet of starting the walk and safely placed in her rucksack for fear that it would be blown away without ever getting to experience the full trailwalker experience!

The instructions for the walk at this point gave two options, one for high tide and one for low tide. Noting that the tide was well and truly in, Jo carefully read the instructions through and instructed Josh that they should follow the footpath on to the beach and continue along here until they reached a road. It wasn't until they'd been walking for 15 minutes or so, and on noticing that the area of the beach not covered by the sea seemed to be getting smaller and smaller, that Jo realised she had been following the low tide instructions rather than the high tide intructions!! Oops! (No doubt this will get a laugh from support crew member Jeff!!).

On realising her mistake, Jo alerted Josh, but as we are coming to realise after his few team training walks so far, nothing seems to phase Josh, so rather than turn around, Josh decided that they should continue along the beach and see where they got to! This did mean that they had to climb through quite a few trees and marshy areas at some points when the shore line ran very thin, but eventually they made it to the road and headed in land in to farm land and away from the blowing wind.

The break from the wind gave Josh and Jo a chance to chat more about the up and coming trailwalker event, which seems to have snuck up ever so quickly in the last few weeks!  They talked about the food, enduring the challenge, and the effect that a few energy shots could have in the later stages of the trek!  It also gave the two team members a bit more time to get to know a bit more about each other, having only met each other once before Josh bravely stepped in to take the place of Gem in the Hardcore Four team.

The route at this point of the walk, passed a field containing some newly shawn llamas.  Jo and Josh were pleased to see that their owner had completely shaved their bodies, but had left them with some funky haircuts, obviously so they still looked cool to their llama friends in the next door field!.

Josh jumping puddle.
It was bigger than it looks in the photo! 

The route then took the two walkers through a copse which got a little boggy in places, and then further in to more fields. At this point, the pathway became very boggy and flooded and in one part was nearly impassable due to the huge puddles that covered the footpath and the surrounding field area. Jo carefully picked her way through this bit, leaping here and there to reach drier parts of land.  Josh however, decided that this obstacle needed a different approach in the form of a long running jump directly over the puddle obstructing the pathway. He went back a good 10-15 feet in preparation for his run up, ran as fast as he could and lept in to the air like a gazelle... and made it (sort of!!)!

At this point Josh and Jo were pleased to find that they were now approaching the end of the route - we could get used to these nice little 5 milers! They passed through a field of New Forest ponies with their foals, who were sleeplily laying on the grass chilling in the sunshine while their mothers kept an eye out for strange leeping walkers!

We soon found ourselves back at the car, completing the 5 miles in 1 hour 22 minutes. Now its time to bring on the real thing!!!

The Last Team Training Hike

This weekend we planned our last full team walk, dropping the mileage by almost half of last week's 31 miles. We also fancied a change of scenery after the recent weeks on the Trailwalker route, so we settled on the medieval route of the Pilgrims Trail, a route that takes walkers from Winchester to Portsmouth, and if you are really keen, on to it's final destination of Mont St Michel in Normandy.

It was a sunny, but chilly start in the car park at the foot of St. Catherine's Hill, just south of Winchester, at 7:30. We set off on our planned 16 miles walking through a valley named the Plague Pits to a crossing that took us over the M3, and then on to Twyford Down. We became quickly aware that the paths were to be wet and muddy. This was not a good day to ditch the gaiters, but ditched them we did.

This early part of the walk covered some of the same route that Jo & Julie did on their walk back in early March, where they experienced a range of all weathers. Today though we were thankful it was just sun with the occasional cloud cover.

We skirted around Hockley Golf course on to our first checkpoint destination today, Owslebury, a village that sits not only on the Pilgrim's Trail, but also the Monarch's Way (a 615 mile footpath that approximates the escape route to Shoreham taken by King Charles II in 1651 after being defeated in the Battle of Worcester), and also a Roman Road that works its' way to Portchester, which we were also to walk along for some distance today. It can also boast at being the highest village in Hampshire.

Here we met support crew Gem & Anna on the lawn in front of the medieval church for some snacks and stretches. On the menu today was Gem's pecan chocolate brownies and peanut butter fudge, very tasty.

Erm...which way?

After a short break we set out again, through the grounds of the church and on to a field that was home to a motocross track. This was a navigation test, as the instructions for the route did not specify a direction and so we crossed straight over said motocross track, which involved climbing to the top of the incline. With no sign of the path at the top, Gubbs remembered that he had a map as well as the instructions, which showed the path quite clearly that we should have followed the edge of the field. Opps, so we headed to the edge and that's when we saw the Bull watching us.

He was sitting down so we felt comfort that we'd have a little notice if it had decided to take offence of our presence. Also we were right by a fence we could leap over if push came to shove...

Turns out we weren't as interesting for him as he was for us and we left the field through the electric fence in the corner. Josh decided to jump over fence not realising there was a handle to open it up without the need for such athleticism.

Watch out for the caged animal

We survived the bull run and Josh decided to tell us about the time he peed on a electric fence, unintentionally of course (well the peeing bit was intentional, the on the electric fence bit not so much). He described it as painful. Ouch.

Shortly afterwards we entered a copse that was surrounded by a large fence and gates. It looked like something from Jurassic park. Julie begged the question, what are they keeping in... We luckily didn't find out as we made it out in one piece on the other side without seeing a single T-Rex.

Hardcore Four coming in to land

We then crossed over a field which happened to have a wind sock at one end of it. Yes, that's right, in-between the crop, there was a grass airfield. Lucky for us not in use while we were crossing it.

The paths became narrower and narrower and we got the feeling that perhaps this isn't a well travelled route. With plenty of scratches we made our way through. We did get a little lost on the way to Bishop's Waltham though. Crossing over another field - we were learning that open fields were not our best friend for keeping on route. We did find our way however with just a little extra distance.

Bacon rolls coming up

Gem & Anna were making bacon rolls and were asking us for a number of ETAs (after each one past). They had already had their own rolls and they were starting to get peckish. This was now a race against the hunger of our support team. If we were much longer we'd have to go without!

I am happy to report that we did make it and lunch was served up. The menu today was bacon rolls, potato salad, boiled eggs and chicken bites... as well as more of the treats from the first checkpoint.

With topped up stomachs, we set off on our final 6 miles of the day. Hay fever was taking it's toll again with a couple of the team suffering the effects of being through all these fields.

The final part of the walk was completed without the navigational issues of earlier. We finished the route in 100 acre wood near Wickham. No sign of Winnie-the-Pooh or Tigger though, but there were a number of groups of heavily laden DofE students, and families enjoying in the woods today, and most importantly our support crew which signalled the end of our walk.

We completed the walk in 7 hours 1 minute covering just under 17 miles. Next time the whole team will be together will be in three weeks on Trailwalker weekend. Looking forward to it.

A Fathers Day Yomp

This week was the big one, the longest we'd go before the Trailwalker event itself, 31 miles - half the Trailwalker distance.

We all met in Queen Elizabeth Country Park, at the start of Trailwalker, at 7:30 Sunday morning. Today we would be walking the first 5 stages of the route to Washington. We completed a 27 mile walk last week so this was only going to be another 4 miles.

Support today was led by Jeff, who was to have his first taste of the support crewing. He brought with him an abundant supply of meals, snacks, energy bars and rehydrating tablets, along with a gas canister for the cooker we weren't able to use last week because, em..., we didn't have any gas to run it on.

Gem would be riding shotgun with Jeff for the day to aid in the support, and also as it turns out provide that paparazzi feel that any good walk should have.

With feet all taped up, support car packed to the limit, and team in good spirits we headed into the country park for our first of the 31 miles. Today was Fathers day and it gave us some great weather.

We left the boundary of the country park as we discussed food for the event day and Julie informed us that her brother Keith, a Major in the Royal Marines, had been able to provide her with a number of ration packs, each with a 24 hour supply of meals and snacks, for which we are very grateful! If it can fuel an army then it's more than good enough for us! It doesn't look like we'll be going hungry on the day.


We completed the first stage in record time, arriving on Harting Down in 1 hour and 45 minutes. We obviously had fire in our bellies, and it wasn't long before Jeff was dishing out lots of other treats for our bellies while Gem was snapping profusely, in between filling camalbaks of course!

So, on to our second stage of the day towards Hilltop Farm at Cocking.  The sun was shining so the sunglasses came out and for the first time in his relatively short Hardcore Four history, Josh took off his fleece! We had been ribbing him a bit last week about how he had kept his warm fleece on while we were walking in the warmth, but he shrugged it off. First he said how he couldn't really be bothered to take it off, then the explanation was that it would help him acclimatise to the heat of July when it hits us, but we'd take a guess that the first of the two was the truth.

It was also the first time Josh had been introduced to our 'old friend' (as Julie put it), Beacon Hill. When Josh approached he said "It's not so bad, I'm going to run up it". Yeah, yeah, sure you are Josh.

Well he didn't run up it, but he didn't hold back.  He was the first member of the team to scale the height and by some distance too. We've found on these past few training hikes that once Josh gets going, it's hard to stop his rhythm! He shoots off and you have to call him back for he is in some kind of trance that enables him to go at almost superhuman speeds, usually when going up hill.

We continued on our path, steaming past the Devil's Jumps, there was no stopping for them today, we had 31 mile to eat up.

As we approached the second checkpoint at Cocking we were told by a walker heading the other way, "There are a couple in the car park that would like me to ask you to hurry up!"

We were not late by any means, we were early, again in record time, completing the second stage in a little under 2 hours and 4 minutes.

The support team, which at Cocking was bolstered by night-shift support team Tracy & Peter, had readied us a picnic! We had the blanket out for stretching, with each of our boxes at the four corners together with a camping chair each! This was the life.

We were each handed a bowl of pasta for lunch which Jeff cooked up for us on the camping stove, and we tucked in enthusiastically.

Heading off on stage three with more fire in our bellies, Josh was commenting on how much more he felt he had to give in this walk as opposed to previous walks. A sentiment that would be shared through the rest of the team. The supply of food was doing us some real good.

Stage three to Littleton Farm is is pretty short one really, and we were in the field of rapeseed at the end of the stage before we knew it. This week it appeared that someone had driven over the path we took last week. The creeping rapeseed had been pushed down so we had a better path to walk down.

We arrived at checkpoint 3 in 1 hour and 40 minutes, again a good time, almost the same as when we did the same stage last week. We were greeted with bunting on a nearby hedge (though I don't think that was the support crew's doing this time...) and the picnic set up again. However, this time Gem shouted as we went to sit down, "No, those chairs aren't for you, take away the chairs, you'll stay too long!"

It was like Jim Bowen on Bullseye showing us what we could have won... the chairs were out for the waiting support team apparently. Oh well.

We again stretched and stocked up on food, water and treats, taking some for the road this time to save time at the checkpoint.

We headed out on to stage four towards Houghton and Julie supplied us all with an energy shot drink that we would take together later on this stage to give us that boost we'd need. Josh didn't read the script though and downed it before he had even left the checkpoint. He's still new bless him.

It did provide the rest of the team with some entertainment shortly after setting off again though as Josh was saying how much he was "more aware of everything", and how his aches had vanished.

Julie, what's in those shots?? Did you get them from a special pharmacist?

Anyway the rest of the team took theirs a little later and the conversation moved on to our favourite 70s and 80s TV shows, with Josh and Julie trading quotes.

We were at the next checkpoint and arrived after 2 hours and 23 minutes of walking. This wasn't the proper Trailwalker checkpoint, but a little higher up the route at a convenient stop of the support team.

It was also our second cooked meal of the day, with sausages and beans! Yum... who wouldn't like beans..?? Well Jo apparently, as she had another pasta meal instead. Jeff was offering all kinds of treats again and Gubbs had a second helping of sausages and beans, a move he would shortly regret when we commenced the walking again.

After leaving this checkpoint Gem would head off with Peter & Tracy to show them the checkpoints that they'd be responsible for on the day, meeting everyone at the end in Washington.

We started stage five with the sun beating down our our backs, as the food sloshed around in Gubbs' stomach.

That sun soon faded as a thin veil of cloud formed. Julie commented on how much she enjoyed being on the top of these hills at this kind of time, early evening. The number of people dwindles and its time you can enjoy the scenery, etc. in quiet.

The aches on the feet were intensifying now. We were all feeling great, apart from that though. Much better than the week before, even Gubbs was agreeing now his dinner had gone down a bit.

When we came into the car park at Washington we were greeted to cheers, music and medals thanks to our support team!

That was it, 31 miles done. We were very happy with ourselves. We felt we had more to give, and we did it well within the 12 and a half hours time we had set ourselves. Total time including breaks was 11 hours and 16 minutes.

Walking On, Walking On Broken Sunglasses

The Hardcore Four with added sun.

We were given the good news this week that we had reached 19th in the top 20 teams on the Trailwalker fundraising leaderboard. There are well over 500 teams competing so we were really pleased to see our name up there.

We'd like to take this opportunity to say a big thank you to everyone who has sponsored us, or played in our pub quiz, you are all great people!

If you haven't sponsored us but would like to, there is still time. You can reach our fundraising page using the button on the top right of the web page (not shown on mobile), or you can use this link.

This week we planned to hike between checkpoint 2 (Hilltop Farm) and checkpoint 6 (Botolphs). Support team Gem & Anna were going to look after us for the second time, on the three checkpoints in between. So we all met in Cocking Hill car park at 8am.

Opps, those sunglasses won't last long.

The sun was out and so everyone decided to get their sunglasses on as we were getting ready. Unfortunately for Gubbs he found that his sunglasses had broken with one of the arms missing. Cue a walk with unprotected eyes squinting all day - great!

We set off on the way to Littleton Farm on stage three and the discussion turned to breakfast. Julie had the best breakfast for long lasting energy of the team; a banana and porridge. Gubbs had a bowl of bran flakes, Josh had a bowl of THREE Weetabix, and Jo had Belvita Breakfast biscuits, which the rest of us all suggested was not enough for a walking breakfast!

Erm...where's the path?

While we walked along we spotted a number of marathon mile markers and arrows pointing towards the start of our journey. We hadn't seen any runners yet so we presumed that the race may not have started yet. As we neared the end we had a call from Gem to say they had gathered a crowd to clap us in to the checkpoint! The checkpoint on the day, which is a field usually closed to cars, was open for a marathon relay checkpoint.

Prior to getting there we had to cross a field of rapeseed though and this is where the path closed in on us.

Ready for a run Anna?

The weather, although sunny and very clear, was also very windy in the exposed sections of the course.  We spotted a downed tree on the route and we were worried we may fly off in some gusts of wind.

At the checkpoint Gem and Anna were telling us that they started stretching when people were looking at them wondering where their runner is!

We set off on stage four towards Houghton, where instead of meeting Gem & Anna at the checkpoint we'd meet them nearer Amberley for a rest up on the edge of a field.

Do they know something we don't??

In this section we came into contact with a number of the marathon runners. Many friendly folk who were saying/shouting/wheezing 'Morning' to us as we walked by. With so many running past Gubbs mentioned that he was reminded of a Monty Python scene.

We left the runners at the Roman Villa path and carried on towards Houghton, with Josh informing us all that today he was wearing his thermals rather than the PJ bottoms of last week, under his hiking trousers, after a rummage in the loft. We wouldn't want him feeling too comfy in the later stages of Trailwalker.

We met Gem & Anna for lunch where a variety of foods came out and so did Gem & Anna's nice and refreshing slices of orange, as well as some chocolate fingers! What a treat!

After a 25 minute break, with the support team shouting at us with every 5 minutes that had passed, we got up and set off again on to stage 5 to Washington.

We had the full force of the wind up at the top of the hills as we were at maximum exposure, but the views were clear and great.

Towards the end of the stage you reach a fork where you can carry straight on towards the A24 or go off towards the left which will take you to Washington avoiding the A24. The team had not walked this section before with Gubbs walking it with Gem and fellow support team members Tracy & Peter back in February, and Jo & Julie with Support Crew Jeff in April, so there was some debate over the correct path here as in the instructions it says to avoid the A24. We headed straight though as the checkpoint is just prior to the A24 so we believe the instruction is to stop people skipping the checkpoint and taking a short cut.

Today though, to add to the confusion, we did cross the A24 to the small car park where Gem & Anna were waiting, as we walked up to the car park they put on the car stereo with some selected tunes for the team.

Our top support team for the day

As we bopped our heads along to Tom Jones and Michael Jackson we were also offered a surprise treat by the support team, YumYums and Almond Twists from a bakery they had visited earlier in the day.

Morale was high and one stage to go for the day!

We crossed the A24 again back towards the checkpoint and followed the path to the posh boarding school mentioned in last week's blog.

We climbed the path to Chanctonbury Hill which seemed to last forever on this day and when we reached the top the wind was up again as we actually had to fight it to stay in a straight line. Luckily for most of the way it was behind us.

By Chanctonbury Ring we spotted a bike pannier sitting on the path. We weren't too surprised that it's owner hadn't notice it fall off as the wind would shield any noise. A little further along the path we saw a cyclist on the path coming towards us with one pannier...a-ha...

He asked us if we saw his missing pannier and of course we pointed him towards it for which he was very grateful and we were pleased to see it reunited with it's owner!

Lambs-a-leaping

The path also takes you past some fields with grazing sheep and we noticed that some of the lambs were a-leaping around. We stopped a moment for a chuckle as they jumped over one another which was very amusing. Unfortunately we did not get a photo of such behaviour, rather just of them eyeing each other up very much like a pole vaulter prior to their vault...

We walked on past the pigs of last week and the whole team found their bladders weakening by the minute! We presume it must be all the fluid taken on throughout the day. We wonder how we'll be after another 15/16 hours!

That last section seemed to take ages and we were a fair bit slower than the same stage last week, although that was the first stage of the training last week to be fair.

We completed the 27 mile walk in 10 hours and 13 minutes.

The car back to Cocking was one full of sneezing and sniffing though as the whole team, apart from a luckily (for him!) immune Gubbs, had fits of hay fever! Must remember to take the anti-histamines earlier in the day next time!

Strong To The Final Furlong...

We had this Saturday marked in our diaries for some time. This was to be the biggest one to date (until it was prematurely eclipsed by Jo, Gem & Gubbs' walk along the Clarendon Way a couple of weeks ago). This was Stage 7 to the end, 25 miles.

With Gem still feeling some of the effects from the walk a couple of weeks ago, she decided to provide support team cover for us, and even managed to rope in friend Anna to assist and provide company for the day.

Our starting point was a lay by on the A283 relatively near the checkpoint in Botolphs. From here we were able to join the Trailwalker route by the river easily and proceeded on through Upper Beeding, before heading to the dreaded climb out of the village.

The hill that just keeps on giving

We knew what was coming after having done this stage previously. So we made ourselves comfortable, shedding the extra layers of clothes that we would no longer need for the climb, for this would really work up a sweat!

When you get to the top and look back towards the village, you see yourself how far up you have climbed.

We walked on after a quick viewing stop (aka breather). We were headed for Devils Dyke where our support crew would be waiting.

On this section we passed a number of 4 strong teams of young lads we presume were doing DofE, or a scout trip, or something. We passed many of them looking enviously at our light day packs compared to their heavy bags laden with camping gear. This was also when Jo revealed her competitive streak asking if it was just her or "do you just want to get past anyone who is walking in front of you?" We can only imagine the kind of pace Jo'll be looking to lay down on Trailwalker day with hundreds of teams out there!

Further along this section we were dodging the minefield of cowpats and cattle which led Julie to dub this Pat Land (though we thought there was no picture necessary for the blog...)

View from Devil's Dyke car park

As we approached Checkpoint 7 at Devils Dyke we called our support crew to let them know we were almost there, to find that they were not yet! This had us wondering what they have been up to the last two hours! Thankfully they arrived just before we did, apparently fresh from a hot chocolate at Marks & Spencer's and a stroll along the beach in Shoreham!

This is the first time we've had a support crew and we felt almost pampered at the service we were receiving. The car park at Devils Dyke was not too busy with just a group of motorcyclists riding up to catch some of the views.

Heading to Jack & Jill

After a 10 minute break we headed off again on the next stage, momentarily jumping out of the way of a group of cyclists heading down the hill. We had our revenge shortly afterwards though when tackling another incline. These boots were made for climbing, and their bikes (or legs at least) perhaps were better suited for downhill. We overtook the cyclists one by one (perhaps taking in some of Jo's competitive streak).

At the top of this hill we could see the Jack & Jill windmills which is the location for the next checkpoint. Gubbs' phone was chiming to indicate an email which turned out to be a notification of sponsorship! Thanks Elisa for the very well timed sponsorship which had us beaming as we walked on.

Julie's worked flint find

This downhill section towards the A23 crossing was also an unsuspecting place for Julie to make an archaeological find, but nevertheless, she picked up a piece of flint that had been worked into a tool. She explained how the shape on one side is only ever formed by the breaking by force and the claw like workings had also been worked out to form a tool. This was an exiting find, which required an excited picture at the checkpoint!

Unknown to us, Gem and Anna were watching from the windmills and they could just about make us out as we walked down the hill.

When we got to the checkpoint Gem and Anna had coffee and hot chocolate ready for us with a blanket laid out ready for stretches. What service! It wasn't a cold day but something different to drink from water and energy drinks was well received.

Nice view for a stretch

This was also our lunch stop and we tucked into the sandwiches and pasta made the night before and enjoyed the views from Jack & Jill car park.  We stretched a little and applied the sun cream at this checkpoint as the sun was quite strong.

We left our support crew after a 30 minute lunch break, probably our longest ever, and headed out on stage 9, the last unknown quantity for us on the Trailwalker course.

This stage's biggest issue is the distance and some interesting navigation when you get close to Lewes. Other than that it is mostly downhill, until a short sharp incline across a field after crossing the A27.

Say hello to my little friend...

Most of the stage covers open hill tops with some nice views in all directions, passing a couple of Ice cream vans on route, which proved particularly tempting, but we held off!

Part of the way through the stage we saw some horses being ridden around in a field and then we reached the racing stables, which is where we saw a great sight of little and large...

Going strong

We have heard many things of the Gallops area of this stage and so we kept a keen eye out for the sharp right turn that we'd need to take. Gubbs, ever ready, had taken to warning Jo and Julie that he had a feeling it would be very close, and this he claimed about 5 times in about 15 minutes, with no sign of it. In the end he decided to keep his feelings to himself.

As we headed towards the checkpoint at Kingston, which we could for most of the stage by spotting the white windmill without it's sails, we could see a couple of people in the distance with florescent jackets waving - this was Gem's attempt to embarrass Anna as much as possible.

Our support crew for the day

We stopped again for a snack, change of socks and chat, and the time just flew by. It was 25 minutes before we left again for the final two stages, which in total would be less distance than the last one we had walked.

It was also time to say good bye to Gem & Anna, for now, who would meet us at Brighton Racecourse to take us home.

Stage 10 we knew would be about an hour to complete, so pretty short. The only challenge with this one is the large hill on the way out of Kingston. This was a head down and pull yourself up it moment. With legs and feet a little tired after the mileage so far it wasn't fun, but had to be done. We know it will be worse in July after many more miles so little time to complain!

The sheds at checkpoint 10

After reaching the top there was time for another stretch and then onwards to the checkpoint. This we found though fields that were full of sheep last time but they were long gone looking at the growth of the grass. We had found the checkpoint from memory after completing this section previously.

Then it was the final stage which none of us are a fan of for the following reasons:

1. It seems to go on forever.
2. The scenery isn't as nice after about 3km following a track behind houses.
3. It goes on forever.
4. By this stage you are going to be knackered.
5. It really goes on forever.

We worked our way up the final hill of the day, conversation now was getting light, we were tired. There was some delight in seeing the racetrack followed by some confusion as we saw Gem and Anna drive towards us on not the road but the dusty track we were walking parallel with. Apparently they were just checking where we were, but they had no offer of a lift...

So as we watched them drive off towards our finish line we trudged on and on until we finally made it.

And as we did Gem & Anna were providing entertainment of their own giving commentary for the race to the finish!

Time for another stretch/flake, popping some ibuprofen tablets and then crowding into the car for the journey home with our semi-sunburnt faces.

Total distance 25 miles in a total time of 10 hours and 21 minutes, including 1 hour and 20 minutes on breaks at checkpoints (we may need to be a little stricter on that!)

History, Wildlife and Hamstrings

This week Julie went away for the long bank holiday weekend with husband, and support crew member, Jeff. So the remaining three of Jo, Gem & Gubbs decided to head for the South Downs again for some Trailwalker training... that was until we checked the forecast and decided that it looked a little drier West.  Jo & Gem found first hand last week that some of their waterproofs were not as waterproofed as they had hoped, so the idea of avoiding having to test them out again seemed like a good one.

Salisbury Cathedral

So a plan was hatched to hike the entire distance of the Clarendon Way, a 24 mile route starting at Salisbury Cathedral and ending at Winchester Cathedral.

Being pretty local we know that long stay car parking isn't cheap in the centre of Winchester so we left a car at the foot of St. Catherine's Hill (which featured on Jo & Julie's damp training walk back in early March) and headed for Salisbury.

We arrived at Salisbury just before 8am before any of the Saturday shoppers were out, so all was relatively quiet. We parked up, got kitted up, and headed for the Cathedral.

Salisbury Cathedral has the tallest spire in the country, contains the world's oldest working clock, and has the best surviving of the four original copies of the Magna Carta. Although there was no time for checking out all that history, we had walking to do.

We we set off from the Cathedral towards the main town which is where we'd follow the Clarendon Way East. We past the Saturday market in full swing and crossed a river on to a road which eventually ran into a track. Here we had left urban Salisbury behind us and could get into the full swing of our walk.

The remains of Clarendon Palace

Our first point of interest on the way out from Salisbury, are the ruins of Clarendon Palace, which sit in Clarendon Park. This is where the Clarendon Way get's it's name.

Clarendon Palace was once a royal residence and palace, these days though it just has the one wall of flint still standing above ground level, although you can see the foundations of the other flint walls. This is one that archaeology fan Julie would have loved.

We took some time here to read the information boards and walk around the ruins. To Gem's surprise when looking down on the Royal Courtyard she witnessed that it was now occupied by a pack of Llamas enjoying the lush grass. Cue photo opportunity...

Llamas at Clarendon Palace

We headed away from the ruins to the opposite end of the field, hoping to pick up the Roman Road path that would lead us towards our destination. As it turned out we realised had taken the wrong footpath forcing us to adjust our route.

We were a little distracted with the bluebells carpeted woodland and the yellow rapeseed fields. It was only when the map showed that we shouldn't be seeing yellow rapeseed fields at all, just the woodland, that we realised that we had our bearings a little out. We found the path again without too much hassle and moved on towards our first village of the day, Pitton.

Swings!

Here Jo & Gem took some rest time on the swings in a nearby park. Gubbs eventually got them off, reminding them that there was plenty of walking left.

The next village was West Winterslow, and as we approached we were met with loud calls from the crows sitting upon their nests in the trees overlooking the nearby Church.

We had struggled with the route between Pitton and West Winterslow. It seemed that we had been quite spoilt with the signage over the South Downs and we had come to expect the same quantity of signage on this walk too, but apparently this wasn't to be. Gubbs, today's navigator, had many map checking moments to ensure we were on track. The number of map checks probably caused a little anxiety for Gem & Jo, but Gubbs was keen to show the girls where we were on the map at every point. If nothing else it was to have someone else to blame when running off course.

The Church in West Winterslow

We reached Middle Winterslow and stopped for lunch. The route looked like we were supposed to be back on the Roman Road but the route we had been taking seemed a little too windy for a Roman Road, so we checked our phones to see our positioning using the GPS.

Where would we be without our smart phones?? ...probably Bournemouth as it turns out as we again were heading a little too South for this Easterly trail.

After getting back on track before leaving the village we found ourselves crossing the county boundary into Hampshire.

Now, we didn't get to a big sign saying 'Welcome to Hampshire' or anything, we just made some assumptions based on the signage. We can only assume Hampshire must have a bigger signage budget than Wiltshire. After moaning about the lack of signposts and arrow markers we were given more signposts and arrow markers than we really actually required.

A little further on in the path we hauled ourselves up a pretty nasty hill so we took a break at the top for some snacks and stretches. Unfortunately for Gem she threw her walking pole down on a patch of grass containing the only bit of dog poo lying around. Nice one Gem!

Time for soup

After cleaning off Gem's pole with a tissue and lots of anti bacterial gel, we headed on towards the next village of Broughton.

We then powered on to Houghton (a different one), crossing over the river Test and onwards to Kings Somborne, which contains some fantastic old cottages and houses. We stopped for some of Jo's delicious home made potato and leek soup (with added salt to replenish the stocks).

Onwards we went once more, this time knowing that the next sign of civilisation we would see would be the outskirts of Winchester.

The plaque at Farley Mount

There was plenty of walking to be done prior to that though. We climbed up up Beacon Hill (a different one), and reached Farley mount which is home to a monument for a horse. Yep, that's right a horse. But no ordinary horse as it turns out. That's right, this horse was special, for this 18th Century horse leaped into a 25ft chalk pit with it's rider still sitting on it's back during a fox hunt, and survived no less. The year later it won the Hunters Plate entered in the race with the name 'Beware Chalk Pit'. Nice touch.

...The strange things you find on these walks.

At the mount however the views were great, the sun had come out and we could get a good look to the South over Southampton, the Isle of Wight and our home town of Eastleigh.

Farley Mount

Anyway, this was now very close to Winchester, and after our mishaps with the navigation and also with the added walk from the car park to the Cathedral to start in Salisbury, we had already got to our 24 mile target. This and the fact that Gem's right hamstring was getting seriously tight (meaning she was using her walking poles almost as crutches!), meant that we made a change of plan to head straight to the car which was on the other side of Winchester, to the South, rather than go via the city centre to the cathedral. We had done the miles so we didn't want to anger our bodies any further.

The problem was Winchester had other ideas. Every time we thought we were getting closer, it seems like the city would move further away from us, the trek seemed to last forever on these last few miles.

Finally we got to the car on the edge of the river Itchen, after 28.35 miles and a total time of 11 hours 23 minutes.

Gubbs horsing around in the rapeseed field
(maybe he should concentrate on his navigation...)

All three of us have never walked as far or as long as this in a day, so we feel this was a real achievement, even if, it wasn't exactly planned on being as far.

We seem to have developed a knack of adding the miles when doing these training walks (especially when Gubbs is navigating, Jo & Gem are quick to point out).

We just hope we don't inadvertently add the extra miles on Trailwalker day.

Who Wants to Walk in the Rain Anyway?

Last week, with Gubbs off running around the countryside dodging paintballs on a stag day, the ladies of the Hardcore Four group headed off for some more training on the Trailwalker route.

The plan was to walk from Queen Elizabeth Country Park (QECP) through to checkpoint 3 at Littleton Farm, and then back to Hilltop Farm at checkpoint 2, where we had left our finishing car.

The weather was atrocious! The rain was teaming down and showed no sign of letting up.

Right is right.

Having walked these few stages previously, and having got quite badly lost on the first section, we were determined to get the route set in our mind so that we won't be likely to make any unnecessary wrong turns on the actual day.

The wrong turn we took previously is just on the route out of QECP and is marked by a fork in the path where you will find a bench on the right hand side which provides a viewpoint over the surrounding countryside, and a sign which warns mountain bikers to stick to the marked paths. Any fellow Trailwalkers reading this blog, please take note that you must take the right fork here, otherwise you'll find yourself heading off to the quarry which will add unnecessary time delays and extra miles to your journey - not something you want right at the start of the trek! The directions are a little confusing for this section, so just stick to the right fork, and you'll soon find yourself at the small car park mentioned on the directions on the edge of QECP.

The route briefly follows some metal tracks before heading off cross country again. The bluebells lining the path provided some colour on what was otherwise a grey, misty and dreary day.

Where did the path go??

When we walked this route previously we were able to have a clear view of Harting down, atop the hills in the distance, providing a guiding beacon for the first check point, however this time the hills were covered in mist.

The paths towards the hill were also more like rivers than the clearly marked nice dry paths that we experienced the time before! This proved to be a challenge as trying to skirt around the huge puddles without falling ankle deep in to the water or the sticky boggy mud was very difficult.

We found that our walking poles came in very handy here as extra props to balance ourselves on whilst we perched precariously on the sloping grass verges at the sides of the path.

On reaching the top of Harting down, we found ourselves surrounded by misty clouds.

Visability wasn't great

The rain still hadn't let up, and to give ourselves some sort of shelter from the continuous down pour, we crawled our way into a copse of trees, avoiding worms, creepy crawlies and low slung branches.  Huddled under the trees, we refuelled ourselves with some much needed chunky cookies and bananas (apart from Jo who hates bananas so topped up with an extra cookie!). We also knew that we had Gem's nemesis coming up in the next section of the walk... Beacon Hill!!  And even worse than that...Beacon Hill in the rain!!

We set off again on the route and soon found ourselves at the foot of the hill. After a few deep breaths and some motivating words, the team set off up the hill. And we made it!!! If we can make it up that hill in that rain, we can make it up there in any circumstances!

Hopefully this has helped Gem prove to herself that she can tackle her nemesis and it won't be such a hurdle in her mind on the day of the event!

The beautiful views from the top of Beacon Hill were sadly not as spectacular on a day like today as they will be be on a (hopefully!) sunny day in July, however, Jo did manage to take quite a dramatic shot of the stormy weather.

Onwards we plodded, getting wetter and colder and more uncomfortable. At this point, the thought of reaching the end of stage of two, and then moving on to stage three and back to stage two was a daunting and unpleasant. We had been trudging through the rain and mud for hours and our waterproofs we're starting to give out under the relentless lashing of the rain.

The view from Beacon Hill

It was at this point the team decided that rather than continuing on to stage three, and back to two, we would end our training walk at stage two where our car was waiting for us.

We knew that we were giving up on the target of that days training walk, however, we accepted that we had put in a good 12 miles in some awful weather and there was no point making ourselves more uncomfortable, pushing ourselves and possibly suffering an injury in the slippery conditions, for the sake of an extra 6 miles of misery.

So we admitted defeat, stripped off our wet clothes and piled in to the warm dry car and had some well deserved lunch!!