Aaagh… Major gut rot

*snivel*

Does 5 hours of cramping gut rot with puking count as food poisoning, d’you think? Or maybe I’m just dying. All I ate was chicken salad and 3 greenish bananas 😦

*makes hurried exit*

Challenge MP3 music — a wee fragment of it

Now that I have my darling Piglet home (she sends lix, btw) I’m spending a happy afternoon trawling YouTube for some of the things that helped me run up the steep, steep hillies and get through the long, cold nights.

Here are a few of them: some of the ones that accompany me on every walk. Happy memories!

There are lots more but I’m sure that’s enough for now.

Well, almost. Here’s my favourite ever walking song. This has been the accompaniment to many a secret boogie on a high hill, far away 🙂

Chally pics

Caburn crossing the Derry Burn

I’ve put a bunch of Chally pics up on Smugmug: here. If you take a look then I hope you enjoy them 🙂

Home again!

Breakfast at the wonderful Hungry Highlander

I’m home at last. What a long train journey it was!

I’ve walked about 212 miles, but haven’t yet attempted to work out the ascents and all that stuff. It was great fun. The washing’s in the machine, the tent is drying in the garden, the cat has been fed and tomorrow I’ll go and collect wee Piglet. How fast it all went.

Almost finished

2146: Wednesday night

Not a lot left to do, now.

1. Cascadas arrived.

2. Have arranged to have Recolites sent to Oban. Major kudos to the mind-bogglingly helpful young woman at Run For It in Glasgow!

3. Rucksack almost packed.

4. Tent dry enough.

5. Charging phone batteries now.

6. Boxes sent.

7. Jacket and smock drying downstairs, post reproofing.

8. Most of the train tickets packed. Still haven’t decided whether to shell out £12+ extra for train from here to Preston, or whether to take the coach. Tim and Kate will be on the train.

Still have to:

1. Finish packing train tickets.

2. Tidy the house, which looks like a bomb site.

3. Have dinner.

4. Make sandwiches for tomorrow.

5. Sleep!

6. Make the mic cover. Ugh.

I may make the sandwiches now, and cook dinner, and then go to bed. Get up early for a tidy round. This is comparatively organised for me…

The good news is that Daddy’s even *better* in his new place now than he was a couple of days ago. When my sister and I visited today he’d been down to eat with the others (!) and was sitting in a lounge chatting with them!!! He said to us, “I think we’ll keep this place.” 🙂 Less than a week ago I simply wouldn’t have believed it possible. Whoohoooooo!

Two adverts I really like

Taking a break by marking up my maps, here, I’m sort of watching Market Kitchen, or something like that. The adverts are better, though.

Bugger…

Have woken to an email from http://www.wiggle.co.uk telling me that they’ve only just packed the order I put in on Sunday, so my Recolites won’t be arriving in time for the Challenge. That’s a blow. When I’ve bought stuff from them in the past it’s always come the next day.

This highlights a problem with couriers. I’d happily have paid extra for ‘next day’ delivery but I couldn’t because for that Wiggle use a courier. I have to wait in for a courier because if I miss them I have to make a 60+ mile round trip to collect the things, whereas if I miss the Royal Mail (or whatever they’re now called) the depot is only 10 minutes away by car. I therefore don’t buy things from people who use couriers. Since Wiggle have always been excellent on delivery in the past, and their standard delivery method is Royal Mail First Class, I took a chance, but it didn’t cross my mind that they wouldn’t even *pack* it until Wednesday! Sigh…

May look for some in Glasgow and send the Wiggle ones back when I get home.

So much to do today, but I’d rather stay in bed. I’m tired.

Stuff done: 2

8pm Tuesday evening.

1. Piglet delivered. She ran screaming with joy towards her Mummy 2, and disappeared into the house without a backwards glance at me. Unnatural little wretch…

2. Maps have come.

3. Waypoints loaded onto the GPS.

4. Books loaded onto the MP3 player.

5. Clothes in the washing machine.

6. Second dehydrated meal still drying. First now bagged.

I reckon I’m getting there 🙂 I’m going to have Happy Beef Burgers for dinner, and catch up with Great British Menus. Bliss!

Stuff done: 1

1. Camera case has arrived.

2. Paramo have promised to send my Cascadas by Special Delivery this evening for delivery tomorrow.

3. Have bought 4 books from http://www.audible.co.uk: (i) Lion’s Head, Four Happiness; (ii) A Short Walk From Harrods; (iii) Stirred But Not Shaken, and (iv) Father Joe.

4. Have realised my train isn’t going from Southport, but I’m expected to get a coach to Preston! Bugger…. wondering whether to buy ticket from S/p to Preston, now, or just put up with it. Will ring Tim and Kate and see what their tickets say.

5. Must leave for B/ham in about 30 mins. Would therefore be a good idea to get into the shower.

6. The dehydrator still doesn’t seem to be putting out the usual volume of hot air, but at least the mixture has begun to dry out. Phew!

7. Got GPS going with the PC, finally, and updated the firmware to get round the year problem that Gibson alerted me to. Phew! Will do the waypoints later.

Later…

Final Challenge Stuff Still To Be Done…

Although I’ll be getting up and jumping in the shower to get ready for the off this time the day after tomorrow there’s still quite a lot to be done here, as I’ve been doing the usual combination of juggling act and disorganisation.

Lemme see, now…

1. I rang Paramo y/day to check that they’d posted back my Cascadas to me, as promised, but they haven’t 😦 They say they’ve gone to the laundry, and they’re going to try to get them back first thing this morning and post them out to me Special Delivery.

2. My second dehydrated meal–Andy’s amazing Thai Green Curry Porridge–is dehydrating downstairs. Last night in bed I was woken by a couple of loud clanking noises, and couldn’t work out what it was. This morning I’m not entirely sure that the dehydrator isn’t a bit broken. Although it’s making all the right noises, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of hot air coming out and the curry hasn’t changed much in consistency overnight. I hope it’ll work, not because I’ll starve without it (I can always fall back on Beanfeast & Smash) but because I put such a lot of effort into making it, and it sounds really yummy!

3. I should be receiving (i) Innov8 Recolites, (ii) 2 maps and (iii) a camera case in the post today from Amazon. Fingers crossed!

4. However, today I’m driving little Piglet down to Birmingham, where she’ll be spending her holidays in great style with her two Cairn pals Bink and Bluster. I will miss her. I’m pretty sure she won’t miss me. I hope I won’t miss the delivery of my Recolites and maps.

5. I’m taking Quo printouts as well as the full OS maps as they’re easier to manipulate. I printed about half of the route off several weeks ago, and need to finish it.

6. I want to put some waypoints on my GPS (Garmin Geko 201) just in case, but realised a week ago that the lead I’ve got won’t work with this PC, because this PC doesn’t have a serial port. I sent off for a USB lead, which has arrived, but I’ve not had a chance to see whether it works yet. Fingers crossed.

7. I need to choose and download some books from http://www.audible.co.uk, and put them on my MP3 player. I also need to add some music.

8. I need to pack and send off my two boxes.

9. I need to dry the tent! Oops…

10. I really need to sort out the guy lines on the tent because the little tightener thingies are all in the wrong places. Have been meaning to do this since I got the tent about 8 months ago.

11. I need to find, buy and manipulate a piece of foam into a microphone cover for my cunning podcasty device, and then make some sort of cotton cover for it. Have been meaning to do this for almost 12 months, since I bought it. But don’t tell Bob…

12. I need to sort out and wash my clothes.

13. I need to pack my rucksack.

14. Oh, and I need to choose a book for the tent.

15. Finally, I hope, I still need a few batteries.

16. And I need a warm hat. Eep! Those forecasts are scary!!

17. Aaagh! I still need to wash and re-proof my Cioch Glamaig jacket, and my Cascadas if they arrive in time.

18. Need to dig out my train tickets and proof of bookings at Rucksacks and The Park.

19. Still need to find a place to stay in Taynuilt.

So! Still quite a lot to do, bearing in mind that I’ll be in Birmingham most of the day. It’s doable, though, I think.