As we left the story of my adventure on the West Highland Way, it was 10 pm and I had just set up at the wild camping zone at the Bridge of Orchy having covered 104.3 km of the 154 km trail in 3 days of walking. This meant we now had the wildest section of the route to go…

The West Highland Way is the UK’s most popular long-distance path. It’s not hard to work out why – it takes in some of the best of Scotland’s scenery, yet is fairly accessible hiking. Apparently, some 40,000 people complete the entire walk each year, and I was soon to be one of them…

I decided to walk the West Highland Way (running some 96 miles, or 154 km, from Milngavie, just north of Glasgow, to Fort William) after some original solo holiday plans fell through with a couple of months to go. I hence found myself trying to figure out what I’d need to do to walk a long-distance path at...

I did it! That is, I finally completed the London marathon 21st April 2024, with a time of 6:33:02. Oh my gosh, has this ever been a lot of hard work – I’ve effectively trained for it three times after first the delays of the pandemic pushed it into 2023, then injury meaning I had to defer to 2024. So my initial...

I’m finally there… that is past the longest run of training, past the last long run of tapering even, and it’s looking more likely than not that 2024 will be the year I really make it to the start line of the London marathon. It’s now ~1.5 weeks to go – I’m nervous, excited…

With a lot of hobbies, there’s always the bit that’s the chore. Maybe washing your brushes if you’re painting, figuring out code if you’re blogging, weighing the ingredients if you’re baking (endless washing if you’re running?). With making paper planners, it’s the dating, printing, cutting and punching…

It was ~2 years ago that we started this blog as a way to share long-form musings or the simple stuff going on on our lives with, well, with anyone who wanted to read it. Then, ~2 months ago, coffeenow also joined the fediverse and now has its own account on Mastodon…

Ok, so for those who don’t know, the London marathon didn’t happen for me this year. I think I’ve always been clear that there was a bit of an ‘if’ getting to the start line. When you are pushing yourself doing runs that are that far, there’s always a risk of picking up an injury…

I decided to enter the Sandy 10 this year after learning that it was the 40th anniversary of this race and realising that I had run the 30th anniversary race, which I think was my very first race as a member of NHRR…

It’s January. And, for a lot of people, at this time of year, there’s a renewed focus on fitness goals. This isn’t quite the case for me, as I’ve been training for the three-year marathon (yep, still plan to do it, injury excepting) since the start of October. Not quite training like I managed in 2019 and early 2020...

When there’s a big banner for a 10 km race staring at you if you glance out of your office window, it does seem rude not to enter. Mind, this was back pre-pandemic in 2019, not long after I learnt I’d got a 2020 London marathon ballot place and at a point I could actually run a full 10 km…

Amongst the hasty planning of our wedding, it occurred to us that I could provide a musical interlude on the tin whistle that I’ve been learning to play over the last 18 months or so. I was initially a bit hesitant about this (can we say reluctant…)