Adventures in North Devon

As many of you know, I spent the past week in North Devon, combining some training with a final chance to do not a lot before I head off to Peru.

Day 1: A 7-mile walk around Croyde, during which we stopped briefly for lunch overlooking this:

And later walked above Woolacombe beach:

If you can't get to altitude, bring altitude to you. Guess how my tan turned out that day

...

Day 2: From Mortehoe to Bull Point via Lee Bay. We ate lunch looking at this:

And I bought a stylish sun hat. 

Our third day's walk took us from Velator Quay almost into Braunton. It was a bit boring after the first hour, so I don't have any photos, but we took my brand new walking poles, which turned out to be a solid purchase.

Overall a decent week training - no blisters, and I know where my aches are going to come from!

The second tasting

Having returned yesterday afternoon, I grabbed a couple of hours' respite in my parents' back garden before heading out to deliver a wine tasting for some friends. We took advantage of the beautiful evening, and after some chaos involving a lively pug and a terrified moggy, we went through six wines and a lot of cheese, finishing the evening with a game of Cards Against Humanity. A tidy total of £60 was raised thanks to their generosity.

Which leads me to my grand total. Since signing up for the trek in January, I have raised a staggering £1,705. This is far, far beyond my expectations, and I'm hugely grateful to everyone who has donated for their generosity.

The Great Wine Tasting

Last Saturday was the evening of the Great Wine Tasting, during which I schooled my parents and a handful of their excellent friends in tasting wine like a boss, and somewhat surprised myself at the amount of information I was able to fish out of the dark recesses of my memory.

The evening was a great success - we explored the differences between old world & new world Sauvignons, Chardonnays from different climates and Pinot Noir vs Malbec. We sniffed, we tasted, we food matched (and if anyone can give me the Latin for that I will buy them a drink). We ate grapes and chewed stalks (one or two over enthusiastic tasters also swallowed said stalks) and finished with a blind tasting, by which time everyone present was a pro at tasting and managed to identify at least a couple of flavours in the wine.

Although spittoons were offered, they were roundly rejected and I'm told there was more than one aching head the following morning. Parents, eh?

At this point, I would like to say a very large, very warm and very fuzzy THANK YOU to Carrie & Keith Devonshire, who couldn't make the wine tasting in the end, but kindly donated £150 to the cause. This donation alone is enough to fund a local support group, enabling people with mental health difficulties to get their confidence and self esteem back. And believe you me, that's money very well spent.

In prep for high altitude

The very same day of the tasting, I obtained a training mask that simulates high altitude. This, when twinned with the aforementioned waterproof trousers, makes me so irresistible to the opposite sex that I've been banned by the authorities from wearing the two together. Behold:

My experience so far, aside from confirmation that it's really hard to breathe at high altitude, is that Darth Vader must've had it pretty rough, always having the noise of his own respiration in his ears. Seriously. I'm at the sitting-still-and-practising-breathing stage and I keep wondering why there's a Sith lord in everything I'm watching on TV.

Step two of my training has begun, with a program that requires me to make a concerted effort to be physically active on a more regular basis. The effort is largely home based, but I am also being good and parking a 10 minute walk away from my new office to build in a little daily walking. I'm hoping that at some point this year the weather might decide to, I don't know, warm up a little, and perhaps treat us to some sunshine and an absence of 70mph winds so that I can do a 1-2 hour ramble along the coast.

Donation total

Thanks to some ace baking by my mother and her buddy Mrs Ashley, I got a further £50 hit into the Just Giving account this week. Poppa C also managed to get some extra weight added to my Mind collection tin through selling cake and persuading people to give up their hard earned cash for a good cause. To my relief, I have not received any complaints about his methods of persuasion, which I'm assuming were above board.

So once again a big ol' happy thank you to those who have helped me reach an amazing £664 (+ what's in the tin). I'm genuinely bowled over by the support I'm receiving.