A different kind of training

One of the things I have agreed to take part in during 2018 is The Three Peaks Challenge. This involves climbing the tallest mountains in England (Scafell Pike), Scotland (Ben Nevis) and Wales (Snowdon). 

But here’s the kicker: you have to do it all in twenty four hours. 

Why would anyone want to do this? I don’t know. I’m too young for a mid-life crisis, too old for a quarter life crisis (yeah, seriously, that’s a thing now). Maybe just plain stupidity…

“…sign me up”, I said. 

And so it was that I found myself a few weeks back heading out in totally inappropriate footwear on the one and only day of 2017 when we got any real snow. Needless to say my non-waterproof trail shoes (not even boots) got soaked. 

I had been shopping for boots the week before but got stingey at the last minute and decided “one more pay cheque first”. (I tend to do that: put off buying things I need when I see the cost of them. After a year of living in my current (unfurnished) house, I still don’t own a bed frame (the mattress is the important bit after all, isn’t it? Who needs to be raised off the floor?) 

Nevertheless, the walk was only six miles, and I really had no choice but to suck it up. 

We went along a section of the Ridgeway in Berkshire. It looks a bit like this, not a mountain, but still undulating: 

The original plan was to climb a proper mountain in Wales but the conditions were too severe, both for driving that far, and for climbing. 

We did make snowmen though: 

(Mine is the one on the right, with a face that looks as if it had been modelled on a Slipknot mask.) 

A quick trip to a pub in the village of  Goring with an open fire completed the day: