Day -2 – July 20, 2022
Hi guys…well as per tradition here we go with the first daily update from the POF22 adventure.
It’s been all about the preparation.
Setting aside the numerous long walks and HIIT sessions with Rich Jones my personal trainer and great mate, one of the last things to do was to arrange a little mitigation for the stress of the event.
I have been feeling a left hip issue for a couple of months that turns out to be a torn cartilage. The doc says it will need surgery but for now a steroid jab into the offending hip will help me for the next couple of months.
So accordingly, I was the guest of the wonderful team at the Circle Hospital in Reading who duly administered the dose of 40mg of prednisolone.
Here are Ran and Joy who helped me out today. And Joy….thanks so much for the donation!
Today was also a big kit day.
The whole challenge requires two quite different sets of gear.
The climbs on the 3 peaks are really about hydration, layers, good climbing boots, wet weather clothes, cold weather protection, head torches, medical kits etc.. So it is an overall heavier kit pack than the canal walks that are really about staying light and cool and well-hydrated.
Here’s the kit list and guidance for the climbs….with a few of my scribbles and notes.
The kit for the walk….well I just made it up based on my own experience over the years.
Here’s a few photos of the end results of the kit prep.
First for the climbs….
And then for the walk home…
The campervan has been arranged months ago and we are in the final details for Alan to pick up the truck on Sunday at midday for the long drive to Llanberis to meet me after the descent from Snowdon.
Many thanks to Peter and Yvonne at Crawford Cab Rentals. They helped us on the JOGLE in 2021 and are doing the same this year.
On late Sunday afternoon we then drive to Llangollen to begin preparation for the start of the walk on Monday July 25th.
Our plan is to be ‘on the road again’ at 7am each morning. This gives me a chance of being done by 5pm each day and Alan more time to navigate what is going to likely be an ever-evolving pattern of checkpoints and overnight stops.
The eagle-eyed among you might have noticed that we are prepared for the evening entertainment as well. Alan loves my joke catalogue and who am I to disappoint him?! 😊
Finally, just some points about the navigation.
We have a Whatsapp group called POF22 that we will use to track my walking progress through the day. Let us know if any of you would like to join it…in case there is slow news in the rest of the world!
And Alan and I will be using What3Words to ensure that we always end up in the correct place. Alan has done some great planning work to set out the route and you can see this below. You can imagine that as we are using canals, it’s not as easy as meeting, for example,at the corner of two road junctions.
This example is the third walk day on July 27th and as you can see it uses the What3Words method to guide us both to a 3sqm meeting place.
This is crucial as not all postcodes are anywhere near as accurate
So that’s it for now. The next blog will appear with hopefully lots of great photos on Sunday evening, after the climbs are completed. It’s not possible to write the blog over the weekend as it’s really all about the climbs and the travel in between them.
Keep in touch and thanks for any support that you can offer the charity. Nothing is too small, everything is appreciated.
www.pof22.co.uk
Dale & Alan.
You are a total ****ing madman but the best bloke in the world and it is an amazing privilege to call you friend. Good luck!
Dale, always an inspiration to me. Going through a few personal issues myself and ijust knowing you are going through a massive physical and mental challenge for “fun” after being through several involuntary ones just baffles me. What I can take from this is that through life you have to keep challenging yourself to help you and others. Well done mate and see you in race night.