A few more Pyrenean photos

As promised here's a few photos from when we spent Easter 2001 touring the Pyrenees.

The first one is St. Jean-Pied-de-Port, an excellent little town which is the junction of the GR10 and the main route of the Camino de Santiago Compastela.
I think the second is also St Jean but may need to recheck the original photo.

The third one is of the hills nearby to St. Jean.


More from a bit further on.

Tinkering with the layout

Just been doing a few changes to the heading of the blog. A few days ago I added an image I found on the web of the Cirque De Gavarnie so uploaded that with some changes to the wording. Today while hunting for something else I came a across photos of our trip through the Pyrenees back in 2001, so scanned them in, one of which was this one of Gavarnie. I'll post up some more later.
So rather than pinching someone else's work, I've added my own with a bit of photoshop work to plug the charities I'm trying to raise a few bob for. There's a few out there who keep saying they will make a donation but may have had difficulty in finding the site. They are:
(for Guide Dogs) http://www.justgiving.com/GordonsGR10guidedogs
(for British Heart Foundation) http://www.justgiving.com/GordonsGR10BHF/

Continuing Week 20 - it's a big week

Having rested on Thursday, I decided to do my Winter Hill/Belmont run on Friday followed on Saturday with a run out with the wfdbwgua group. This was initially a depleted group with just three of us setting off from Rivington Lower Barn at 8.30. As John was considering whether to do the Pike Race on Easter Saturday, we ran the Pike Race route from Rivi school then back down to repeat it. For a bit of fun, I gave John and Pauline a couple of minutes start to see if I could catch them on the climb. On this second ascent Ed joined them near Georges Lane then a Brentford supporter, who must of lost his way, found us - nice to see you Chris and well done considering you've not run for 2 years. So the effort petered out we ran as a group to the Pike then around to Noon Hill from where Ed and Chris departed whilst we carried on in the direction of Great Hill.
By our return we had completed ten and a bit miles and about 1850ft of climb.
Sunday was an early start as I was sweeping for The Two Crosses Challenge Walk. This meant setting off about 30 minutes after the mass start and gradually catching up the backmarkers just before the walkers and runners divided into 18 mile and 25 mile routes. My fellow sweeper and I then followed the 25 mile route, checking that everyone had gone through at each checkpoint. It was a long day out, made even longer by suffering from a big blister on my left heel which was diagnosed as down to old socks. Offending socks are now in the bin and I shall recover.

The accumulated mileage and climbs of the past two weeks (66m,9950ft preceded by 64m, 9750ft) means that I have just about reached my target for March with 10 days to spare, so I can now compensate for the shortage in December.

Week 20 - Yorkshire Water Way Walk - back to Top Withins

After the 32 miles of the Haworth Hobble on Saturday, I just had a short walk to loosen up the muscles on Sunday then on Wednesday returned to Yorkshire and again to Widdop Reservoir (where I'd been at 9.30 on Saturday) for this Irregulars midweek LDWA walk. The route to Top Withins nicely varied from that used by the Hobble.



Thus started the purpose of the walk to - a section of The Yorkshire Water Way Walk to Hebden Bridge, initially back-tracking then across the seemingly endless tussocks of Middle Moor and eventually to our lunch time stop at the Hare and Hounds in Old Town. This is a really excellent pub - great value lunches for £3 and a wide range of Timothy Taylor brews.
Drop down to the Calder-Hebble Canal for a bit of flat walking before coming through Hebden Bridge and up the lovely cobbles on the way to Heptonstall (and so back to the Hobble route!) However rather than continue up the road, leader Mick had found a good path to the west of the road which to stay off road most of the time.

Through Heptonstall then across the top edge of Hebden Wood before dropping down to the river.


Walking through Hebden Vale must be one of the most pleasurable ways to pass time and brought back memories of my childhood when a group of friends would catch the bus from Brighouse to Hebden Bridge and walk up through the valley.
Finally a good strong climb up to the road for the final stretch back to Clough Foot Car Park. A good day out, 19 miles and 3000ft of ascent.
Most bizarre was that while driving home what do I hear played on the car radio - Kate Bush's Wuthering Heights!

Week 19 - Haworth Hobble

I was five miles and 1100 ft short of target on the first week but this didn't bother me as I knew this would be a big week with the Haworth Hobble providing 80% of target on its own.
I ran my now regular training run over Winter Hill to Belmont and back on Monday and finally achieved my sub two hour clocking - by quite a margin - just over 1:52. I repeated the run on Wednesday and further reduced the time to 1:48. I could now rest until the Hobble on Saturday but did decide to make a walk to the library into 7 miles and 950ft by returning via Rivington Pike on Friday.
I'd arranged to travel with one of my training partners over the years so after a 5am alarm picked John up at 6.15 to drive over to Haworth to register by 7.20 for the 8am start. The journey was into blinding sunshine as I drove eastward into Yorkshire.
8am and we are off. I was running solo but John this year paired up with Pauline, making her debut on the Hobble. The weather forecast meant that I chose to run lightly clad with just one thermal below my club vest and in shorts (carrying full wind/waterproof body cover of course in my rucsac - and a over a litre of lucozade sport). As we headed up onto Haworth Moor, the sun had gone and we were in a cool mist and I wondered whether I'd made the correct decision re shorts. I planned to stay with John and Pauline, probably to checkpoint 3 at 13 miles : I wanted to ensure I didn't repeat the my too fast start of two years ago which turned into a hard slog over the second half of the race. They were looking at 12 minute miles which I did think was possibly optimistic but would give a good completion time of around 6 hrs 25 - an hour and a half faster than I did last time - I'd be very happy with that.
As we headed for CP3, I could see we were somewhat behind a 12 minute per mile schedule but I was happy to stay with them and start to work harder from that checkpoint. CP3 (13 miles arrived at about 2hrs50 and I bade my farewell and start to work up the hill.
Got to CP4 and opted for doughnut rather than my usual hotdog then really enjoyed the cruise along the Calderdale Way and caught up a pair of clubmates of my daughter who with others were glad of my direction at one of the two main points for navigation errors. More good climbs to Mankinholes which I reached in just over 4 hours (possibly slowest time since the wild weather of 1992) and then Stoodley Pike and over to Hebden Bridge where for a change my knee wasn't in agony on the steep descent.
By now it was warming up and I was enjoying hauling in runner after runner - it's so much more enjoyable to set off steady and be able to do that rather than the other way round (as was the case two years ago). As we got to the final four miles I was not quite as fresh but still managed to finish in 6:47 (officially - results have just been published), an hour slower than my fastest time, but that was when I was 15 years younger but half an hour faster than my debut 24 years ago and over an hour quicker than two years ago. I suspect my split from Mankinholes to the finish (about 2hrs42) may be my quickest ever. Looking at the results, those who I passed around the half way mark finished nearly an hour behind me : but I couldn't have run an hour faster though as the conservative early pace is what paid dividends in the second half. Hopefully there will be some piccies to link to soon.


Now for a couple of days rest before upping the level again.

Week 18

Getting a bit behind with the blog but at least I keep my log up to date so can use that to refer back. This was a good week as the the snow was starting to clear in most places. Tuesday saw a good day's walking with West Lancs LDWA Rivington Ramble led by ex-Harrier John Crook - mostly familiar places but new (to me) territory on the route bak from Healey Nab to Rivington village (and a very muddy route. Did my usual run over Winter Hill to Belmont and back on Thursday and almost got the time down to sub two hours, being just a minute or so over. The snow lying on the north face of the Winter Hill and the top end of the mast road still slowed the speed a little.
It was a long drive up to Barrow on Saturday for the final cross-country of the season and for once the club turned out in (reasonable) numbers. My training over recent months paid dividends as I swapped my usual place of last or next-to-last Horwich runner to beat two club-mates that have generally (or always) been in front of me for the last ten years as well as being far higher up the finishing order than usual. The firm conditions certainly helped me.
A good week although slightly down on mileage and ascent targets.

Bears and snakes

Now I don't want to get anyone worried, least of all myself(!) but watching the recent couple of programmes on BBC covering a year in Yellowstone Park (why do I always want to call it Jellystone? - I don't know ask Boo Boo), reminds me that over the past decade there has been an ongoing debate about the re-introduction of bears into the Pyrenees. Has there been any incidents? I shall have to ask on the forums.
Here's a couple of links:
www.ariege.com
Mountainbug - also has a GR10 diary
There seem to be a healthy supply of Seoane's Viper, Lataste's Viper and Asp Vipers in some parts of the Pyrenees. Although poisonous (the Asp in particular), they appear to be generally timid - as long as I don't go poking my fingers into crevices which might be their home.

Week 17 - February Complete

I realised that the first half of February was well ahead of schedule but the continuing Winter weather meant it was an extra challenge to complete my targets. I also wanted to increase my studying.
A quick run mainly on the flat on Monday followed by table tennis league match in the evening had left my left leg complaining. Luckily I didn't mention this to my opponents in the match until after otherwise they may have been able to adjust their game!
Just a five miler on Winter Hill on Tuesday followed by a short walk on Wednesday before I felt fit enough to get a long run in over Winter Hill on Thursday.
This left me needing to complete 22 miles and 1700ft of climb on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I built a 6 mile walk around a trip to the dentist on Friday, heading up towards Two Lads on the side of Winter Hill after Horwich.
Saturday was the National Cross Country Championships at Leeds. Having lived in Leeds for over 8 years, I was quite familiar with Roundhay Park and knew that "Hill 60" would give me some climbing. An excellent run in which I was nine minutes quicker than the last time I ran the Nationals there, six years ago. It was also good to meet up with friends from previous running club, Abbey Runners and my old boss who started me running 25 years ago.
The weather forecast for Sunday was not good- gale force winds. If the weather was decent I would do the Lostock 6 Road Race : if not I would find an alternative means of completing my target. Sunday morning came and no gales, so a jog down to the registration (less than a mile from home) and started off near but not very near the back of the field (the race seems to attract many slower runners - unlike the previous day's XC where I set off quite near the back of 1450 runners, but gradually overtook 200 of them). Quite happy to finish with a slight improvement on the last time I ran it, despite being quite weary for the final two miles. A bit extra on the warm down meant that I had exceeded my target for the month.




More mileage to do in March, more climbing but of course I'd not taken into account that there are three extra days to do it in - so in fact my daily average target is slightly less. I shall just have to ensure I shall exceed it.
With the 32 mile Haworth Hobble (somehow they've lost a mile this year!) and the 25 mile Two Crosses Challenge coming up, that should be a good basis. I also now must put together some back to back walking days with a decent size pack on my back.

Week 16 - a lighter week

Again somewhat thwarted by the weather - but 3 times up and down the road outside my home on Monday (which I've measured as exactly a mile each way) gave a good start followed by 7 miles up onto Winter Hill on Wednesday.
With no Cross Country on the Saturday, I joined a few friends for their Saturday morning run (see the the Feb 20 post on wfdbwgua blog for more). As you can see from the photos which I've blagged from the blog, plenty of snow so three and half hours out gave us only ten miles - but it was quite marvellous to be above the fog and clouds.