Training Log Archive: Bash

Hello from Scotland. 'Bent and I have been walking all over hilly Edinburgh for 2 days but I'm only logging the part on trails. Holyrood Park in the city has a fantastic trail network leading up to and around the rugged summit of Arthur's Seat.



Today the park hosted the Urbanathlon, a 10K trail running race that finished with some special challenges. Wish we'd known about it; when the runners went by on the trail, it gave me itchy feet!



As advertised, this is a scenic city with interesting topography and a mind-blowing amount of history. I'll need to do lots of reading to keep up.





The fashions are a little different here. Note that kilts don't just come in plaid - there's even a camo option. Some of them have handy cargo pockets instead of a sporran. One of the T-shirts in the kilt display says, "If I wore underwear, this would just be a skirt".







The food options are interesting. Haggis is everywhere.





Actually, the food and coffee have been spectacularly good so far. Lots of vegetarian things for 'Bent.

This street performer might have regretted asking 'Bent to help him with his escape artist trick. "Tighten that straitjacket as hard as you can. Ouch!"



Signing off for now.

Met Jean Wessel of GHO in the airport departure lounge, heading out for 5 weeks in Peru and the Galapagos. Nice!

Well, things are ready for the house sitter and dog sitter. Bags have been packed, CO2 emissions have been offset, gear has been lent out, urgent e-mails have been answered, parents have been phoned, batteries have been charged and iPod has been loaded. Training has *not* been done - oh well. I'm going to carry my SPOT during some of our Scottish explorations on foot and by bike, in case anyone wants to follow along occasionally. There won't be anything to see for a few days yet.

If you're interested in following the Wilderness Traverse adventure race in Haliburton on June 5-6, sign up for the Facebook page (visit it and click "Like") to start receiving news and photo alerts. Racers, your friends and families might be interested in receiving these updates too.

Leanimal, Hutspot and Wanda will be posting news updates from the event site, and Luis Moreira and William Young will be uploading photos.

Live coverage of the race will be hosted on the main Wilderness Traverse website including maps and SPOT GPS tracking which will broadcast team locations every 10 minutes. I'd rather race but it will be fun to be a spectator too!

Just finished reviewing the final maps and race instructions for Wilderness Traverse; it made me want to drop everything and head up north! Really sorry to miss it but I'll look forward to hearing the stories.

Too bad running errands doesn't involve any actual running because I "ran" to a zillion places around the GTA without logging any training today. Changed currency, visited MEC (how can I still need anything from there?) and the Salomon Store (ditto), etc., etc.

Heard a fun piece on CBC Radio about the Tweeting Too Hard site. "Where self-important tweets get the recognition they deserve."

Here's an example of a tweet that was submitted. (People submit tweets they've received that they feel meet the criteria.): 'feeling very loved this week. Check out this blog interview of me by @kempedmonds http://bit.ly/c1opig '

Just learned that ticks and Lyme disease have increased sharply in the Scottish Highlands over the past decade. That possibility had never even occurred to me. Annual incidence of Lyme is 28 per 100,000 population, about the same as New York state. Worse than most of the U.S. but better than most of the northeast states including New Hampshire, which has the highest incidence at 92 per 100,000, just ahead of Delaware and Connecticut. Time to sharpen my tweezers and look for my lightest-coloured clothing!

Pooches and packing were our top priorities today. I ran cross-country to the village of Palgrave, following 'Bent's commute route through Palgrave West and Palgrave East. 'Bent, ThunderDog and BulletDog drove over and met me at the fish ladder for a hike around the Palgrave village trails. The Humber River runs right beside the trail so the dogs got to swim as much as they wanted. ThunderDog can't walk to the nearest pond anymore so we have to take her on a road trip every once in awhile.