Back to the hills

Guess who got lost!

Nearly two years since I last did a fell race. Sixteen years ago I ran a couple of back to back fell races on Dartmoor, on the Saturday was the 11 mile Sticklepath Horseshoe which was followed on the Sunday by the Sourton Tor race, a 14 minute up and down quickie. This year, being in the vicinity, I spotted the Sourton Tors race - not quite the same as it started further away. This was a thoroughly enjoyable tramp on the hills, a traditional style fell race with registration and prizes out of the back of a car in a pub car park. Not that either of us won anything but it won't be two years until my next one.

A wet morning in Ulster

Recent park runs completed include Penistone in Yorkshire where we followed the flattish West Pennine Trail on an interesting surface - it looked like tarmac but was springy, nice to run on it must have had some ground up tyres mixed in. Also two in Northern Ireland - a sunny jaunt round the grounds of Stormont Castle and a very wet morning in Wallace Park in Lisburn. The latter is an undulating three loop course in a lovely park with a fine example of a band stand - I spotted myself in this photo of the race briefing - must have been about 200 runners under cover there.

Heading for Devon

Taxi!

Trundling down to our new house in Devon with all our worldly goods in a transit van, (well three vans in a row) we've been pitstopping halfway at Droitwich staying at the Chateau Impney (see post from May). This particular hotel is a popular wedding venue especially with wealthy Asian families from Birmingham. We spotted one wedding where 5 brightly coloured brand new Ferraris were revving up in the extensive and beautiful hotel grounds. On another occasion we spotted a stretch Porsche - here's Vicky trying to persuade the driver to let her go for a spin in it.

Just a quick one!

On arrival in Devon we fairly swiftly repaired to the Bell Inn, our nearest pub. We knew that a selection of real ale was on offer but this time we were delighted find Otter Brewery's OPA. The regular at the bar told us this stands for Old Peoples' Ale but of course Opa is Dutch for Grandpa so Vicky took to this quite rapidly. Other ales from local breweries were also tasty! Plenty of parkruns to go at down here and we soon ticked off several including Exmouth and Teignmouth both going up and down the sea front. Haldon Forest was a pleasant parkrun through the woods on the fringes of Dartmoor. However on August bank holiday we thought we'd better have a go at the Lustleigh Show 10K just 3 or 4 miles up the road - well this was almost a fell race with getting on for 300 metres of climbing mostly off road. And a hot day it was too. However Vicky was very well prepared and was equipped with most of the gear required for running the Marathon des Sables.

Where's my camel?

Midsummer running

Puffing bit here

Here's the new parkrun in Derby, described as flat - it wasn't quite! It's on the course of an old railway line, but I don't think an express train would have coped with the ups and downs, more likely it was an old industrial branch line. Derby may be a long way from the sea but but you may be interested to know that in the middle of the 19th century the MP for Derby was Samuel Plimsoll who gave his name to the Plimsoll Line  the indicator on shipping worldwide that shows if they're overloaded! Plimsoll's efforts to get parliament to pass legislation making his line a compulsory item were initially thwarted by lobbying from powerful shipowners but in time the law was passed and became an international standard.

Swag!

We seem to have been park running and not much else this year but Vicky had a very good go at the Denbigh Triathlon. Starting off the swim she was disconcerted to find that she was in the same lane as our friend Tony who had announced that he was using an unconventional swimming stroke. Sure enough there he was all six feet two of him swimming the back stroke! She got comfortably ahead of him and managed to avoid colliding as they passed, had an excellent cycle and run and then went on to win the ladies over 60 award - here's a photo of the haul of goodies she was presented with: a nice medal, a super trophy, useful buff and a rather odd star prize (for June) a woolly bobble hat!

Cruising along

Meanwhile I had a crack at the Ruthin evening 5K, I'd done this race three years ago and despite all the shenanigans with my health issues since then I managed 21:51, less than a minute outside my previous time - so smiles all round, that's me in the blue with the fancy shades with Paul G on my left, he's been running very well lately but with about a K to go I got past him as he blew up a bit. More parkruns to report on include Conwy a couple of times, Conkers (down in south Derbyshire in the National Forest no less), Conyngham Hall in Knaresborough and a parkrun in one of the loveliest of settings at Fountains Abbey - the slightly undulating course goes right round the abbey twice. And here it is:

What's this doing in the middle of our parkrun course?

Jet setting on the Riviera

It's that Riviera Touch

Busy a lot lately and I've been trying to get in a blog entry at least once a month but - whoops - totally missed June! There's a lot been going on, I saw an ad for a trip to the the Polish Riviera and followed it up with a booking. We flew from Liverpool to Gdansk and found ourselves a few miles up the coast at Sopot a seaside spa town. This was the place to be in the 1920's and rich tourists flocked from all over Europe to be seen in the riviera of the north. Spot boasts the longest wooden pier in Europe plus some fine old hotels and a very good pedestrianised town centre. It's on the up and up and although there were very few foreign visitors when we we there there's obviously a big rejuvenation effort going on, with lots of construction etc.

The Sopot Lighthouse!

In anticipation of rising sea levels (and seemingly against local opposition) they're raising the height of the sea walls - we encountered a group of labourers from Cornwall enticed over by the prospects of €400 per day wages! We were particularly taken with the railway system and senior citizen tickets to the middle of Gdansk and north to Gdynia were cheap as chips. Gdansk was full of old churches and other attractive medieval buildings and, as in Sopot there were plenty of tourists, just that they were mostly Polish and mostly large groups of schoolchildren come from all over Poland to learn about their heritage. A week here was just about right, we found an excellent brewpub in Sopot with some fine ales, a larger brewpub by Gdansk railway station was a bit more prosaic with less exotic beers but the food was fine.
And, what a stroke of luck, we found a parkrun! Parkrun has been going on in Poland for several years and there are maybe seventy park runs in various locations in the country - we ran twice round a very pleasant park to add another country to our list.

Heads of the Valleys

Twice round - no short cuts!

Difficult to believe that this lake at Parc Bryn Bach was once a desolate industrial wasteland. They filmed alien landscapes for Dr Who and The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy here! It's now a lovely leisure park with plenty of activities such as fishing, kayaking, walking and...guess what! Park running. Twice round the lake on a gorgeous sunny morning and we were set for the day. The park is at Tredegar very close to the Heads of the Valleys road which runs perpendicularly to the north of all the well known South Wales valleys such as Rhondda, etc.

Our next parkrun was at Worcester Woods a pleasant gallop round another well wooded park - we didn't stay at Worcester but found something a bit special over at Droitwich - this was the Chateau Impney, a fantastic French inspired palace of a hotel in beautiful grounds. A good price as well if you want a fairy tale weekend away!

And then came Storm Hannah, this calm peaceful lake at Bala in mid Wales was transformed by howling winds and pouring rain into something else! Just about all the park runs for miles around were cancelled, but not Bala! We made it down from Denbigh to find a paltry total of 30 runners there - and what good fun it was battling against the storm and getting drenched - highly recommended - this includes the very nice cafe which I'd award ten out of ten for their sausage sandwiches!

Back to some limited running!

Up we go!

This is what I'd rather be doing. This is our Mary at the top of the climb at the Ilkley Moor fell race. Not sure I'd manage the big grin though. I haven't done a fell race for nearly two years but I'm hoping that the latest cardiac tweaking will get me to the point where I can be up there again - maybe something to aim for for 2020.

You'd better be quick!

In the meantime I'm marshalling at Bodelwyddan Castle parkrun watching Vicky sail past with a big grin on her face. Still it was good to get involved and to get a slightly different perspective. Just one week later I was back in the fray albeit tail walking at the back of the field - at least I figured in the results and clocked off another parkrun.

A finish with a view!

Clocking off another country wasn't as difficult as all that. During our recent visit to Northern Ireland we sneaked over the border into the Irish Republic to find the Castleblayney parkrun. And what a glorious setting with a friendly crew of runners and organisers. We ran two laps round the wooded Black Island which weren't quite there yet with the bluebells, only a small number of runners and Vicky got her highest position for many months with a good time to boot.

Translate that!

Here's Vicky at the causeway onto Black Island at Castleblayney. It's not really an island but it is almost an island in a lake in Ireland. In the far northern wastes of Canada is the largest island on a lake on an island in a lake on a island. Figure that one out - I've seen this on Google earth. In fact here it is - this is all on Victoria Island and there's not much there! Victoria Island itself is slightly bigger than Great Britain, has a population of just over 2000 and is pretty inhospitable. Don't think there'd be much call for a parkrun there do you? Certainly no lady of the lake!

The blue is all part of an unnamed lake!  

Winter in the parks (or beaches)

Cliff Richard eat your heart out!

So I've missed the end of February and all of March. Hardly surprising as I had other things on my mind. However the heart procedure was seemingly successful and things are now going well. And we've been keeping up with the parkruns. A rather slow one (for me!) at a delightful little park in Glossop, where our Mary beat me out of sight, was followed by our first beach parkrun. Here's Vicky approaching the finish line at Pwllheli, a new parkrun entirely on the beach. We should really look at the tide tables before doing this one again - a high tide had left the sand wet and soft, just look at the deep footprints! This was our second trip to Pwllheli in less than a year - highly recommended  (by us) for a short break. There's a lovely little SPAR grocery in the middle of town, more like an old fashioned delicatessen.

By hook or by crook!

NN

Next up, and final run pre-op, was Watermeadows parkrun in Towcester, Northants. The night before we'd had a fine couple of beers at the Towcester Mill Brewery Tap - it's a very well organised, well run brewery but as I stood at the bar I kept hearing the old regulars saying "I'll have a crooked hooker please." Which could be misunderstood somewhat, Crooked Hooker is the name of the regular brown bitter brewed here and is clearly a very popular tipple. The parkrun  itself was several laps round the meadows, only the third running of this one and I wonder if they have an alternative wet weather course as some sections get very greasy - as you can see from the photographic evidence!

Oops!

Glossop parkrun
(Beaten by our Mary who finished in 24:46 - age grade of 75% which for park runner statisticians is extremely good for age!)
Me 41st 25:56
Vicky 97th 34:48

Hafan Pwllheli parkrun
Me 14th 28:11
Vicky 45th 44:49

Watermeadows parkrun
(First parkrun for sister in law Teresa - plenty more to come we think!)
Me 49th 24:51
Vicky 174th 33:33