Fridays late blog and today

Friday started of with the now usual routine of shaking ice off of the tent and walking a few miles before breakfast, this time was a bit unusual as breakfast was eaten at the highest point on bodmin moor at the summit of the unfortunately named Brown Willy,

 superb views all around with the moors to our selves we headed east blazing our own trail to the roads that linked us to launceston.

 this road section was again through tiny country lanes in beautiful sunshine and that gentle breeze keeping us cool, dinner was had at a pub (The Rising Sun Inn) enroute consisting of a nice bangers and mash followed by sticky toffee pudding.mmmmmm the last few miles saw us to our destination the thornbank guesthouse where we are now( Saturday) chilling out for our rest day.
 Pleasant town with a nice castle ruin in the middle, just had lunch here and am looking forward to doing nothing for the rest of the day ;)

Gallery member 3

And here's another! a nice lady named Shirley

Gallery of fellow nutters 1&2

The first two lejog walkers I've met.

Namely Peter and Chris.

Location : Launceston, Cornwall,

The dog is officially knackered!

Wednesday (d4)
We woke up nice and early and were enroute from our woodland wild camp by 7.30 a relatively warm night so both of our energies were high, a good thing too as 20 miles of mediocre road walking under grey skys was to follow, the highlights of the day consisted of a huge Bacon butty at a roadside cafe,followed by an ok meal at a pub in a town called Indian Queens, out of town we head over Castle an Dinas an old hill fort

you can just make out the earthworks in the pic (i hope)
as the walk ended at Ruthurn bridge we met an eccentric old chap with a garden full of ex millitary vehicals and two huge remote controlled boats each at least 5foot long which he had made himself one of which was a functioning submarine !.

Shortly we made it to the splendid ruthurn valley campsite, where we very quickly fell asleep!.
Day 5
Sadly our nights sleep was less than comfortable as temperatures dropped sharply below zero, this in combination with leg cramps from overworked legs has left us both tired today (thursday).
The scenery and landscape have been a balm for our tattererd energies as we plodded the 12 miles to St Brewards along the delightfully flat camel trail (top pic Alfie on the camel trail!)to the push up hill to the pub we now sit(me)/sleep(alfie) in,
Our planned days end is only 2 miles away wildcamping on bodmin moor at king Athurs Hall

so we taking advantage of every modcon a pub can give "hic!".
As the planned stop was a bit exposed we pushed on a further kilometer east to a sliver of woodland below Garrow tor.

God an early blog!

What a day! Blazing sunshine lovely people and my first pint of the walk, the picture if it uploads is the view from bench at the pub ,honestly its scenic ok! The blur behind the trees to the right is truro cathedral , and we have just been watching two lads fishing in the river that should be at the bottom of the pic,just gonna grab some fish and chips and some supplies then off for our first wild camp, see ya

Day3 (added after completion)
We leave Porkellis by road to Carnkie where we head out across farm footpaths to Stithians, the weather is great again and upon arrival at Stithians refreshments were bought at the Spar there, before more road walking to Truro via the delightfully named Frog pool!.
After our stop mentioned in the original blog above we headed north out of Truro to St Clements wood and our first wild camp.

Alfie braving the wild wood.

Early day three

Ok I'll admit it cornwall is tough walking , very glad to have finished the coastal path, it was of course very beautiful but the first day following the coast from landsend to marazion was harder than most of the mountain walking I've done! Tho having said that the cornish ice cream kept me going ;).

The weather for the first two days has been amazing and today looks to be another day of sunshine and clear blue skyscapes !

Yesterday went a bit wrong at both ends of the day,packing my tent away in the morning I managed to snap the main pole! Glad I bought a repair kit with me ! And at the end of the day the pub I was aiming to have dinner at closes on a Monday night! And just to finish off the day my chosen camp site doesnt open till may, kindly they let me stay ! Today should be better.

Day 2 (added after completion)
we headed out through Marazion with a quick walk along the beach to see St Michaels Mount,

then along the coastal path once more, a quick snack at Perran sands (very kind as they weren't actually open!) walking round Prussia cove we met lots of french girls (ooo la la!) the reason became clear when we passed The Enys where a musical (college?) was based, very pleasing to walk past and nice to see some of there handy craft on the beach below!

Passing Pra sands the surf dudes did there best too....

a walk of extremes!
A bit of field walking to Porthleven and its harbour

and we head inland not to see the sea properly again untill Queensferry!.
More of those tiny Cornish lanes bypassing Helston and we get to Porkellis for our rather unusual campsite!




Location : Wendron, Cornwall,

One of two achieved

Well after a nice easy drive to lands end (thanks mum and peter for the lift!) We are finally here, we arrived early enough to get the picture taken at the first sign post, time will tell if we get the second but it will prove harder to get I think !. The transit verification form for the end to end club has its first stamp and now everything is in place for our 8.30 am start. while at lands end we met up with the mayor of penzance who was seeing a group of cyclists of for the start of their trip to great yarmouth so we stole the oportunity for a  photo  (will add this to the blog upon the return home) nice chap.
We are now at our hotel the commercial in st just, an excellent fish pie dinner has stoked the engines for tomorrows start and an early night is in store for us.
The walk still feels unreal even after all the planning and training a few days walking and this will resolve itself. the weather is excellent and looks set to stay good for tomorrow so we can count our blessings and await the morrow.

Day 1(added after completion!)
stunning sunshine for the start what more could you need?
oh yes beautiful scenery.....

All the training walks at home can't prepare you for coastal walking, i knew there was a good reason I hadn't walked a coastal path before, bloomin hard work!
I quickly headed in land and followed the quaint local roads to Treen where after a refreshing ice cream we headed back onto the coastal path at Penberth

(looking inland to a wheel used to land boats I presume)

(looking in the other direction!)
following the coast past St Loy the path blurs somewhat requiring a scramble over a barbed wire fence to get downhill thru woodland to the real path!
Another stop for refreshments at Lamorna bay (its very hot and the goings hard!) and round to Mousehole and the long drag around penzance bay to Marazion

 and our campsite Dove meadows.

Another LeDog

How great is this, we will be sharing the trail with another lejog man and dog duo!

http://gyptackleslejog.blogspot.com/

Nice to know I'm not the only nutter!

Gyp and Pete will start they're lejog on the 14th of April so we will be sure to meet at some point,I hope!

Alderwood

Second attempt!

A quick test for emailing the blog to Alderwood

Hi Claire, this should now be set up to forward you the daily blogs!
Andy

More alterations to the gear for the walk

First off for my latest gear tweaks is something for Alfie.
having spent a night camping in the back garden in -8 degrees to test our gear.

(spot the ice on the tent!)
 my conclusion is my gear is great but Alfie's options for keeping warm were ineffective to say the least, the fleece coat I bought him (pictured near the beginning of the blog) was hopeless and after shivering for the majority of the night he ended up forcing his way into my sleeping bag!, so I have committed a great sacrilege by cutting up camping gear!.  :-o
The gear in question was my old snug pack softie sleeping bag, I've decapitated this to create a doggy sleeping bag:-

Trust me the dog is not dead! just very warm and sleepy :). And yes he can get out if he wants!
by removing the old fleece and packing this I only gain 0.1 of a kilo so considering the amount of energy it will help Alfie conserve it's well worth the slight added weight

The second tweak is a new rucksack, a 51litre golite pursuit ,admittedly this is the third pack I've bought for the walk! but at 1.3 kg's it saves me a whole kilo of weight in comparison with my blacks pack. tho not as functional as the blacks pack everything will still fit on or in as well, tho my first two attempts at packing left me with gear still scattered across the floor and me scratching my head!

Alfie seems happy with my choice too!

The countdown to the walk is at 19days 11 hours 37 mins and 1 second as I write this!
I seem to be in the process of saying goodbye to my home town already! every time I drive or walk passed a landmark (no matter how trivial!) I'm thinking "wont see that again till mid summer!" an odd mix of sadness and excitement is building as I sever ties with my usual surroundings, one thing I wont miss is my local footpaths I've walked them all so many times now maps are no longer needed , I'm so looking forward to chasing the horizon!
Bring it on!
ps will be going to the outdoors show this friday gear heaven!

Strangers can be Lovely!

This is a quick post to celebrate my first donation via my paypal button!
The kind person who donated is a lady named Stacie from Washington, I wont give out more of your details Stacie but you know who you are!
What makes this donation so special is I have no idea who Stacie is, other the payment details from paypal!
Hope to get lots more of course! and if and when the walk is complete I shall post a list of all people who donate to the fund.
Thank you so much from Alfie and me :-)
Oh! I can say at this point donations are up to £217.00! considering that other than the paypal button I have only been hassling people for donations for one and half weeks thats great going! thanks to all!