# #walk1000mileschallenge



## eggyg (Feb 27, 2020)

Is anyone else doing this? It is run in conjunction with Country Walking magazine to which I subscribe but of course you can just join the Facebook group and join in or just do it yourself. It officially started on 1st January but it doesn’t matter as long as you walk for 12 months. It actually only equates to 2.74 miles a day, which for me is less than an hour.
I had a slow start to the year as I was recovering from a back injury but I’ve now caught up and on track. I have chosen to just count “ boots on” miles, ie deliberate walks, not just walking around at work/ home/ Tesco. Others count every step/mile. The choice is up to you.
Like the Diabetes UK Million Steps fundraiser, which I did in 2016, it’s a great motivator to get out and about. It doesn’t matter if you are just pounding the pavements around your streets or climbing fells in the Lake District, they all count. In this month’s Country Walking magazine there is a progress tracker on the back page. I already have one as a subscriber, if anyone wants my spare, PM me your address and I’ll pop it in the post for you.
It would be great if any of you wanted to join me in this challenge and we could post photos of our walks and cheer each other on. I’ll start the ball rolling with a 9 mile walk I did yesterday around my home town. ( I don’t do that everyday, I’ve done a reluctant 3.1 miles today.)


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## everydayupsanddowns (Feb 28, 2020)

Sounds great @eggyg

it can be great to have a big target like that to keep you motivated.

I did a much more modest 400,000 step challenge last year (400,000 being roughly the number of people with T1D in the UK), the aim was 10,000 steps a day for 40 days.


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## Eddy Edson (Feb 28, 2020)

Sounds great. What a lovely part of the world you live in!

I'm averaging 9.3 km per day in Jan/Feb, so about 6 months to hit the 1,000 miles if I keep that up.

A lot of it is just through the wonderful parklands ringing the centre of the city. But apparently serpents have invaded my little slice of paradise:



Just next to a playground, hence the cartoon snake, I suppose.


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## eggyg (Feb 29, 2020)

Eddy Edson said:


> Sounds great. What a lovely part of the world you live in!
> 
> I'm averaging 9.3 km per day in Jan/Feb, so about 6 months to hit the 1,000 miles if I keep that up.
> 
> ...


I hope you tuck your trouser legs into your boots! 
Yes I do live in a beautiful part of the world, those pictures are of a park and river in the centre of our city. I live a 20 minute drive from the Lake District ( Beatrix Potter, William Wordsworth country) and 10 minutes from Scotland so lots of lovely walking. Weather has been pretty ropey the last few weeks, storms and torrential rain,  so hampering the daily walks. But fingers crossed for next week, the forecast is dry and moderate winds so off to a part of Yorkshire Dales on Monday which is actually in Cumbria, my home county. Weird I know! I’ll post some pictures. Good luck on your 1000 miles or are you doing kilometres?


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## Eddy Edson (Feb 29, 2020)

eggyg said:


> I hope you tuck your trouser legs into your boots!
> Yes I do live in a beautiful part of the world, those pictures are of a park and river in the centre of our city. I live a 20 minute drive from the Lake District ( Beatrix Potter, William Wordsworth country) and 10 minutes from Scotland so lots of lovely walking. Weather has been pretty ropey the last few weeks, storms and torrential rain,  so hampering the daily walks. But fingers crossed for next week, the forecast is dry and moderate winds so off to a part of Yorkshire Dales on Monday which is actually in Cumbria, my home county. Weird I know! I’ll post some pictures. Good luck on your 1000 miles or are you doing kilometres?



Look forward to your pics! 

It's all km here - took me decades, but nowdays I have to do arithmetic to work out miles.


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## Eddy Edson (Mar 1, 2020)

So for Jan+Feb:

- Total miles walked: 351
- Avg miles/day: 5.9
- Avg MPH: 3.1

On track for 1,000 miles by end-June. 

Fingers crossed I can keep it up. Barring snake bites, think I should be able to.


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## eggyg (Mar 1, 2020)

Eddy Edson said:


> So for Jan+Feb:
> 
> - Total miles walked: 351
> - Avg miles/day: 5.9
> ...


Wow! That’s amazing! I’m on 115 miles. On track for hitting the 1000 by New Year! But once the better weather comes, I’ll be out on them thar hills and the lakes where I can hit the big miles.


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## Northerner (Mar 1, 2020)

Would love to join in @eggyg, but this **!!&!* plantar faciitis is showing little sign of improvement as yet  In fact, I just checked my Garmin and I have managed a total of 50,608 steps in February, which I suppose is around 25 miles for an entire month


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## Eddy Edson (Mar 1, 2020)

eggyg said:


> Wow! That’s amazing! I’m on 115 miles. On track for hitting the 1000 by New Year! But once the better weather comes, I’ll be out on them thar hills and the lakes where I can hit the big miles.



Mine's mainly flat, unlike your mountain-goat efforts, and it's been a fairly mild summer here after the country stopped burning down. But I managed to charge through last winter at the same kind of rate, even though there were *whole days* when it rained, a couple of times.


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## eggyg (Mar 1, 2020)

Northerner said:


> Would love to join in @eggyg, but this **!!&!* plantar faciitis is showing little sign of improvement as yet  In fact, I just checked my Garmin and I have managed a total of 50,608 steps in February, which I suppose is around 25 miles for an entire month


How frustrating for you Alan. What’s the next step, pardon the pun, for the plantar fasciitis? Hope it’s temporary.


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## eggyg (Mar 1, 2020)

Eddy Edson said:


> Mine's mainly flat, unlike your mountain-goat efforts, and it's been a fairly mild summer here after the country stopped burning down. But I managed to charge through last winter at the same kind of rate, even though there were *whole days* when it rained, a couple of times.


This February has been the wettest in 30 years apparently. Everywhere is so clarty ( extremely muddy)  so lots of pavement pounding at the moment which can be a bit boring at times but even though I’ve lived in my town for almost all of my nearly 60 years ( next month ) we still find places we haven’t been to and it makes me appreciate how lovely it really is.


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## Northerner (Mar 1, 2020)

eggyg said:


> How frustrating for you Alan. What’s the next step, pardon the pun, for the plantar fasciitis? Hope it’s temporary.


It went through a period of actually getting worse, which made me feel a bit despondent, but currently it does seem to be improving a bit (I was able to walk the 4 miles to the hospital and back a couple of weeks ago and only started to really suffer by the end). I think the key is to just keep going with the stretching exercises, the amusing and uncomfortable night boot, the foot roller and the ice pack, and daily supplications and sacrifices to the walking/running gods


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## eggyg (Mar 1, 2020)

Today’s walk was intended to be “ mud free”, which is pretty difficult at the moment. So we opted for a country road walk. Our village, through to the next, then the next and back home. A circular walk of about 2 hours.
In village number 2, we spotted a public footpath sign to the final village which, for some reason, we have never noticed in the 34 years we’ve lived in the area! We decided to explore it, Mr Eggy has OS online on his phone, so checked it and it brought us out virtually exactly where we wanted to be.
This turned out to be a rather clarty ( Cumbrian for extremely muddy) footpath, I really don’t know what we were thinking. It also wasn’t a well trodden path and the many stiles were downright decrepit and dangerous, the vegetation was overgrown, we were nearly blinded by bramble bushes and our feet were getting tangled in roots and I nearly come a cropper.
Five miles later we were home. It was fab! We love finding a new path!
Apologies for sideways photos. They aren’t like that on my phone but can’t fathom how to sort it.


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## eggyg (Mar 1, 2020)

Northerner said:


> It went through a period of actually getting worse, which made me feel a bit despondent, but currently it does seem to be improving a bit (I was able to walk the 4 miles to the hospital and back a couple of weeks ago and only started to really suffer by the end). I think the key is to just keep going with the stretching exercises, the amusing and uncomfortable night boot, the foot roller and the ice pack, and daily supplications and sacrifices to the walking/running gods


Fingers crossed the walking/running gods appreciate your sacrifices! I don’t want to know what they are!


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## Eddy Edson (Mar 2, 2020)

eggyg said:


> Today’s walk was intended to be “ mud free”, which is pretty difficult at the moment. So we opted for a country road walk. Our village, through to the next, then the next and back home. A circular walk of about 2 hours.
> In village number 2, we spotted a public footpath sign to the final village which, for some reason, we have never noticed in the 34 years we’ve lived in the area! We decided to explore it, Mr Eggy has OS online on his phone, so checked it and it brought us out virtually exactly where we wanted to be.
> This turned out to be a rather clarty ( Cumbrian for extremely muddy) footpath, I really don’t know what we were thinking. It also wasn’t a well trodden path and the many stiles were downright decrepit and dangerous, the vegetation was overgrown, we were nearly blinded by bramble bushes and our feet were getting tangled in roots and I nearly come a cropper.
> Five miles later we were home. It was fab! We love finding a new path!
> Apologies for sideways photos. They aren’t like that on my phone but can’t fathom how to sort it.



Very nice, even with mud.

That's the great thing about being on foot - discovering things which were always there but you never noticed. 

NYC was the best place in the world for that - a city made for walking, and every block has more to discover the more you look.


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## eggyg (Mar 2, 2020)

Hi I’m going to bore you all again with my photos, probably sideways on, unless the “ bug” has been sorted.
We drove to the Yorkshire Dales today, in Cumbria! A mere 45 minutes drive from home. Never been before. Smardale Gill. The path starts in a nature reserve and follows an old railway line. This in turn brings you to the Smardale Viaduct, it’s closed for health and safety reasons at the moment but you can get round it. We opted for a circular 6 mile route, on the way we came across some absolutely gorgeous Dales/ fell ponies. Very tame and in fact they followed us for a while. We’ve had sun, rain, sleet, snow, hail and of course more mud than you can shake a stick at. There’s water running down the hills constantly. We’ve seen three rainbows, snow topped hills and did I mention mud? It took us 4 hours with 29 floors walked. It was very different to our usual haunt, the  Lake District, very peaceful and beautiful in its wilderness. We really enjoyed it.


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## grovesy (Mar 2, 2020)

Pictures look fine.


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## eggyg (Mar 2, 2020)

grovesy said:


> Pictures look fine.


Yeah. Have you tried putting any on? I didn’t do anything to them so can only assume the bug has been fixed thank goodness.


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## grovesy (Mar 2, 2020)

I managed to post the photo last night I wanted to post but it was drawn out and difficult, and when it eventually posted it was on its side . I will not be trying again. Unless things change . Thanks for asking.


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## everydayupsanddowns (Mar 2, 2020)

grovesy said:


> I managed to post the photo last night I wanted to post but it was drawn out and difficult, and when it eventually posted it was on its side . I will not be trying again. Unless things change . Thanks for asking.



I know the forum architect was looking into this, but I’ve not heard any updates yet.


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## grovesy (Mar 2, 2020)

everydayupsanddowns said:


> I know the forum architect was looking into this, but I’ve not heard any updates yet.


Thank you for the update.


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## Northerner (Mar 3, 2020)

Fab pictures @eggyg!  Well jell!


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## Robin (Mar 3, 2020)

Gorgeous, @eggyg. I always think a good viaduct improves the view. I don’t know why, if there was a block of flats there, I'd be appalled!
(On a technical note, the ponies look like Shetlands).


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## eggyg (Mar 3, 2020)

Robin said:


> Gorgeous, @eggyg. I always think a good viaduct improves the view. I don’t know why, if there was a block of flats there, I'd be appalled!
> (On a technical note, the ponies look like Shetlands).


Yes, my daughter has already told me that. Apparently fell ponies are bigger and only grey or white. She said someone has just put them there to graze. I’m gutted, I really wanted them to be wild ponies! Considering my daughter has an unknown quantity of equine creatures and breeds them, I’ve never sat on a one and am totally ignorant about them, as you can see!


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## Northerner (Mar 3, 2020)

eggyg said:


> Yes, my daughter has already told me that. Apparently fell ponies are bigger and only grey or white. She said someone has just put them there to graze. I’m gutted, I really wanted them to be wild ponies! Considering my daughter has an unknown quantity of equine creatures and breeds them, I’ve never sat on a one and am totally ignorant about them, as you can see!


I think I sat on a horse once when I was about 4 at the Brighouse Gala, it was the police commissioner's horse (he lived across the road from us so we knew him  )

Obviously, I've been on a few donkeys, although not in the past 55 years!


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## Bloden (Mar 3, 2020)

You look so glam @eggyg! Lovely pics.


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## eggyg (Mar 3, 2020)

Bloden said:


> You look so glam @eggyg! Lovely pics.


Thanks @Bloden. You should have seen me at the end! Flat hair, watery eyes, smudged specs, no lipstick left and clarted up to my knees. It was fab!


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## grovesy (Mar 3, 2020)

Never had the inclination to horse ride.


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## silentsquirrel (Mar 4, 2020)

eggyg said:


> Yes, my daughter has already told me that. Apparently fell ponies are bigger and only grey or white. She said someone has just put them there to graze. I’m gutted, I really wanted them to be wild ponies! Considering my daughter has an unknown quantity of equine creatures and breeds them, I’ve never sat on a one and am totally ignorant about them, as you can see!


Lovely pictures!
Fell ponies can be grey, brown or bay, but more usually black.  Probably never piebald or skewbald like the Shetlands in the front of the photo.  Dales ponies also single coloured, very sturdy and again quite a bit taller than a Shetland.  Prince Philip used to drive a team of black Fell ponies.


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## eggyg (Mar 8, 2020)

Hi all. Have done a lot of tramping about and have finished on 33 miles for the week. Best this year. Most of that has just been pavement pounding as everywhere is still so muddy. Today’s pavement/ country road pounding totalled just over 5 miles and we found another track we have never been down. About twenty minutes into the walk, we spotted a bright orange vehicle of sorts coming towards us. Luckily I managed to get my phone out and captured it. I now know it’s a Quattro Velo, a velomobile. A cross between a car and a bike. They are made in the Netherlands and cost a whopping €9! It did make me smile spotting this on the A6. A first for me.


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## nonethewiser (Mar 8, 2020)

Looks like Clive Sinclairs C5 eggyg.


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## eggyg (Mar 15, 2020)

Hi all. Not been walking as much this week and finished on just over 15 miles. Life got in the way as it does. It’s hard work being retired! 
Today we walked to a nearby wood which we haven’t visited for a few months, I couldn’t believe the havoc  Ciara and Dennis has wrecked on it. Trees down, river still very full and the banks have fallen into it. Very, very muddy underfoot but as usual nature just gets on with it.  Here’s some shots with my new camera. Quite pleased with them. Oh and I walked 5.3 miles.


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## eggyg (Mar 19, 2020)

Haven’t done much walking this week as it’s been a strange one hasn’t it?  I’ve been very anxious about it all, Mr Eggy and I are socially distancing ourselves from everyone, including children and grandchildren. We’re lucky enough to live semi rurally and we can be in the country in five minutes, walking, that is. Today has been a lovely day and after a mini meltdown this morning we decided to get out for a walk. I took my new camera just incase of any photo opportunities. 5.4 miles and here’s a cute picture to cheer everyone up. Stay safe everyone.


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## Robin (Mar 19, 2020)

eggyg said:


> Haven’t done much walking this week as it’s been a strange one hasn’t it?  I’ve been very anxious about it all, Mr Eggy and I are socially distancing ourselves from everyone, including children and grandchildren. We’re lucky enough to live semi rurally and we can be in the country in five minutes, walking, that is. Today has been a lovely day and after a mini meltdown this morning we decided to get out for a walk. I took my new camera just incase of any photo opportunities. 5.4 miles and here’s a cute picture to cheer everyone up. Stay safe everyone.


Aw, cute. We went for a walk today too. No lambs, just a load of pregnant ewes, but we saw a tiny calf in one of the barns as we passed. Would it be too much to ask if it could stop drizzling, and dry up the mud a bit to make walking a bit more pleasant, now it’s about the only thing we can do?


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## eggyg (Mar 19, 2020)

Robin said:


> Aw, cute. We went for a walk today too. No lambs, just a load of pregnant ewes, but we saw a tiny calf in one of the barns as we passed. Would it be too much to ask if it could stop drizzling, and dry up the mud a bit to make walking a bit more pleasant, now it’s about the only thing we can do?


We had a gorgeous frosty bright morning but we had hail this afternoon! Everywhere is still very muddy though. I am totally sick of it now, I nearly ended up on my backside today after slipping on a muddy bank trying to avoid a huge puddle.


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