26 Oct 14 - Our Last Training Walk

We chose a reasonably challenging stretch of the South West Coast Path as our final training walk to do today, between The Lizard and Cadgwith. The weather was good as it was mild and dry, but, to be perfect, it could've been a bit sunnier.

We were joined by Barney and Betty again and they had a great time. They encountered wild ponies, sheep and a field of cows all of which they took in their stride, except Betty did want to take on a whole herd of cows all by herself!

There were loads of people around and The Lizard car park was chocca. We had a lovely lunch at the Cadgwith Cove Inn which, again, was really busy with all tables inside taken or reserved. It was great to see so many people enjoying their half term holidays in Cornwall.

We stopped off on the final stretch to visit a Holy Well which Barney drank from so he is probably now blessed, maybe with immortality, we'll see!

Can't believe our next walk will be in Peru!!

Now there's just 6 days to go!

6,000 miles and a world apart ...

We've had our travel information confirmed (all local times):

Sat 1st November 
09:30  Coach leaves Cornwall Air Ambulance HQ at Newquay
18:50  Take off from Heathrow (2 hour flight)
22:25  Arrive in Madrid, Spain

Sun 2nd November
00:35  Take off from Madrid (12 hour flight)
07:00  Arrive in Lima, Peru
09:15  Take off from Lima (1 hour flight)
10:35  Arrive in Cusco, Peru

As you can see, if we were to fly direct from Porthleven to Machu Picchu it would be 5,949 miles. If we add in the diversion to Madrid it adds up to 6,777 miles. [All according to Google, so it must be true!]

We're just glad the plane will be taking the strain and that we only have to walk the final bit from Cusco to Machu Picchu which [also according to Google] is 46.5 miles.

19 days to go!!

11 Oct 14 - A longer training walk this time!

Lamorna Cove to St Loy's Cove and back

"Fancy joining us for a walk?" we said to some friends. We might have forgotten to mention the distance and difficulty of the walk so there were a few surprised/shocked faces when we arrived at Lamorna Cove and said we thought the walk would be about 8.5 miles. It turned out to be nearly 11 miles, oops. Ah well, what better way to enjoy a glorious Autumn day?!

Our fellow walkers today were, from left, Gary and Jayne (friends who join us to do all sorts of antics!), Miguel (Naomi's husband), Debs (a friend we worked with at the maritime museum who recently went trekking in Bhutan), and then the four-leggeds were our usual furry companions Barney and Betty, plus Ruby (who is staying with Annette for the weekend) and Gylly (Debs' dog, who Ruby was rather taken with!)

We set off from Lamorna Cove in the lovely Autumn sunshine armed with packed lunches, trekking poles and lots of determination. Annette and Debs, having popped into the cafe, had slices of carrot cake stashed in rather large takeaway boxes that were a bit too big to fit in their bags. This explains why Debs had a fish & chips box sticking out the top of her rucksack!

It was pretty tough going in parts as we had to clamber over some pretty huge rocks but that's the reason we chose this bit of coast path; so that we could practice walking with our trekking poles. We ate our lunch surrounded by the Merry Maidens, a late neolithic stone circle. Legend has it that nineteen maidens were turned into stone as punishment for dancing on a Sunday.

After re-fueling, we set off across the fields. The first part of the walk, along the coast path, meant negotiating rocks and some pretty steep cliffs, but now we had to cross a slurry covered farmyard at milking time and, a bit later, a rocky stream, which was useful to clean our boots off.

After 5.5 hours of walking we all made it back to Lamorna Cove, slightly stiff and aching, but we all enjoyed it, especially the dogs!

Just 21 days to go!!

5 Oct 14 - Training

We decided to do another training walk today, again along the Cornish coast path and with Barney and Betty as company. The weather was good for walking: dry and not too hot.

We set off from Marazion where we enjoyed glorious views of St Michael's Mount and walked as far as Perranuthnoe where we enjoyed a rather lovely mug of hot chocolate and a slice of cake at The Pepper Pot Cafe.

We'll be doing a bit more challenging bit of the coast path next Sunday.

27 days to go!!

28 Sept 14 - Training

On Sunday we did a training walk with some of the trek group from Mylor to the Pandora Inn and back. The weather was perfect and we had a lovely lunch.

We are planning our own training walk for next Saturday, 11th October,  along a really rocky bit of the coast path to practice walking with trekking poles.

We're now all busy getting our final bits of kit, buying our US dollars and getting excited! We've just received our flight times and we have over-night flights both on the outward stretch and coming home so we'll be tired when we arrive. It'll take us 1.5 days just to get from Porthleven to Cusco!

34 days to go!!!