A fun and varied weekend of running!
Saturday 06.08:22 - I cycled to Euston with Andrew to catch the 08:20 train up to Macclesfield. On the train, we were planning on meeting Alan, but the train was busy with football and cricket fans, so we all crammed into whatever seats we could, and reconvened at Macclesfield station, to head off on an adventure! The first 2.5 miles were uphill to Tegg's Nose Country Park to meet up with Lindsay. The whole way around the run, I was wondering who Tegg was, and why his Nose was on a hill just outside Macclesfield. It turns out, that Tegg refers to either an Norse settler named Tegge, or a sheep (teg). And nose refers to the southern promontory of the hill. Which wasn't quite the exciting explanation I was hoping for.
Anyway, from Tegg's Nose, we (and when I say "we" I really mean Alan) were navigating along the 2019 route of the Magnificent Walk, which is an annual event organised by the Friends of the Peak District. My sole contribution to the navigating was to follow the pink line of my GPS, on the very very rare occasion that Alan was unsure of a turn.
Having initially been unimpressed by the abrupt 2.5 miles of uphill out of Macclesfield, once up there, it was well worth it for the beautiful views!
Tegge's Nose used to be quarried for millstone grit.
Down off the hill, and around the ends of the Tegg's Nose and Bottoms Reservoirs.
Followed by some nice field running. Everything is so green up here, compared to poor parched London. The fields are full of lush green grass, which was wet. Such bliss! There were even a few mini bogs!
Then it was up and along the Winkle Minn, down, and over to The Roaches.
For beautiful views! Shutlingsloe, the pointy bit in the distance, was the final hill of the route, and we could see it pretty much all day, so we renamed the run the Shutlingsloe Appreciation Round.
The next part was downhill (hurrah!) and to Lud's Church, a deep chasm 100m long and 18 m deep, created by a massive landslip. It's spectacular! Cool and damp and dark, even on a hot day like today.
Soon after, we had a luxury checkpoint at Gradbach (white mint choc chip ice cream, and ginger beer).
Then it was up a valley following the River Dane, to the Three Shires Head, which is where the counties of Derbyshire, Cheshire and Staffordshire meet at a waterfall.
Then it was up and up, to finally climb Shutlingsloe!
From there, a nice downhill for fabulous views back to Shutlingsloe.
Then we dropped down back into Macclesfield Forest, which was lovely in the light.Before the last 2 miles of the route back up to Tegg's Nose, and then the final 2.5 miles downhill into Macclesfiled, to make a marathon with about 2000m of ascent. Amazing run, thank you Alan, Andrew, and Lindsay!
Things started to go wrong from then, when our train was cancelled and the next one wasn't for an hour an 20 minutes. We solved this problem of suddenly acquiring an hour and a half extra time in Macclesfield, by having pizza in Victoria Park opposite a palm tree.
Feeling better, we approached the train station with gusto, and were rewarded by the train arriving on time. Our luck shortly ran out, as the train got slower and slower, and we passed through Rugby (by the very platform I had been on last weekend!) at the same time that we were meant to have arrived in Milton Keynes. Having then left Milton Keynes 20 minutes late, the train tootled on, only to grind to a halt a little while later, and here it stayed, still as a statue, for 45 minutes, as the train in front had broken down. Arriving into Euston after 11pm, when we should have been there at 8:30pm was quite a record for delays, I thought. On the "delay repay" thing, it only has 120 minutes as the maximum suggested delay time, and we smashed that by some way. A delay PB, you could say.
Sunday 07:08:22 - the train shenanigans of the night before meant I only got a few hours sleep before getting up at 05:30. I was quite unhappy about this, and was in bad sorts this morning! However, my journey to Walton-on-Thames went without a hitch, and I met Sarah on the train, and we walked to the start together. We had a number of topics to cover since a week last Friday, so we made a start on chatting on the walk there.
Today's run was called The Princess and the Runner Run, and was to celebrate the lovely Princess Caroline's 100th Half Marathon! And also the lovely Kerry's 300th Half Marathon! They are both so wonderful and kind to me, and to everyone, and it's always a treat to see them at events, and it's brilliant to see them hit their magnificent milestones - well done ladies!
Because it was the Princess Run, tiaras and tutus were the dress code, and so it was 8 laps, going the blue bridge way, in our outfits. It's only the second time I've run in proper fancy dress, and it's really the best fun! My favourite moment, no actually there were two, were 1) a man on a bike saying "nice skirts!" and Sarah saying "thank you! But they're tutus!" and 2) A tiny little girl dressed as Elsa, who we'd waved at earlier on when we ran past in tutus, watching Caroline (dressed as Princess Fiona) have her 100th presentation, and wee Elsa looked like all her princess dreams had come true!
We had the best pootle along the Thames, meeting lots of cute dogs (best was Bronte), having ice lollies, and enjoying the sunshine, skipping, chatting and seeing friends. I was very tired, and probably, I suppose, acting like a bit of a princess at times. Thank you Sarah for putting up with that, and tutu-ing along and making me feel better!
Amazing to see everyone today, and see lots of people I haven't seen in ages! Thanks Rik and Phoenix Team and Marshals for an terrific day!
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