Busy banding

Got national finals coming up, so had a weekend at home rehearsing, doing chores and squeezing a bike ride in whilst wifey was visiting family up in Norfolk. I've found a better finish which avoids nettle alley, but does involve a BIG push uphill and then has an annoying finish. So i'm just hopeful that someone will deal with the nettles instead!


it looked a bit like this*


Much rehearsals and mini-concert this week before off to the finals in Cheltenham with the Amersham Brass Band on Saturday. Would hope for a nice Sunday for a bit of chiltern based fun, or cake, or even both!

*it looked very similar to this, but both camera and phone are currently suffering from drinking too much water.. yikes!

Stag!

Or should I say beaver... It was one of my best mates stag do's at the weekend and spot of canoeing was had on the river wye. About 13 miles on the Saturday and 12 miles on the Sunday.

I helped friday to collect canoes from one the attendees (who works at an outdoor centre) then arrived to much beer driknking and merriment. Had a wonderful bivy out on the friday night. It's been agees since i've had a bivy, but it was really good - if not quite the dewy/foggy morning that we woke to.

Much faffage with cars, canoes and people transport ensued. We were eventually on the water by 1pm starting at Whitney toll bridge. After a slow start the guys realised some paddling was required, but with some faffage for stories and water based fun we got back to our campsite eventually (bycross farm again). BBQ and fire breathing, plus more beer before passing out under a clear sky. It was my first try at fire breathing and i'm sure it didn't look impressive, but it was good fun to give it a try nonetheless.

Sunday dawned to blue, blue skies, and midly foggy heads. We were a bit more organised today so were on the water by 10:30 and had a lovely day getting wet again going down to Hereford rowing club. They were having some sort of event on, so it was a bit of a hectic arrival. However, it did mean some of lads grabbed tea and cake. I was involved with car shuffling and helped tidy up back at the campsite, before getting back on the road and delivering a canoe back to the outdoor centre before heading home for food, shower and sleep.

All in all a cracking weekend! Cannie wait for the blessing really.*


*he's getting married in Canada first - hence the beaver reference!

Aug Bank hol

Oops, didn’t get round to writing that one up! Had a good, if wet, weekend in the lakes with wifey, Chris and Claire. We had a nav-tastic day on Rosthwaite fell with very low cloud and minimal visibility making route choice somewhat hard. However, it was good fun and even better to walk into the café at the end and have a completely random meet with Don & Carol (on his last guiding weekend)! Queue much hugs and chatting before a very quick plan was made to join him and his group for dinner.. Which considering the weather we witnessed outside was pretty good and the drying room that we made full use of!

Sunday dawned a bit better, with an improving weather forecast. So a bigger day was had going up Green Gable and Great Gable then back down to Styhead Tarn. Unfortunately we missed the clear summits promised for the afternoon being a bit too early. But had a lounge round the tarn and then mooched back to the campsite via a quick tea stop at seathwaite. Dinner with dessert followed (treacle syrup cake and custard) then beers in Keswick. Monday was a complete wet washout so a bit of a gear faff in town, new boots for me and approach shoes for Wifey – both much needed! All in all an good weekend, but the 13hrs travel involved there/back seemed excessive…

Yoga and a quick run in the week (avg 7:10mile so 22:15 5k which is a current PB!) and suddenly a new weekend arrives. This had Wifey joining a Hen party in Oxford, I was keeping Mark and baby Henry company round town as proximity was required for the occasional feed! Otherwise coffee, tea, ice cream and cake for us… after a long luckily sunny day I headed back home for a very quick MTB ride. A slight oversight on timings meant I hit dark, dark woods without a light. Hmmm luckily I vaguely knew the route, but still almost impaled myself (and tyre/spokes) on a few fallen logs, nearly got sucked into a bog and would like to forget nettle alley. However, much wildlife was seen, badgers, rabbits, bats and a owl. Sunday was some chores and cooking lemon drizzle cake and Sunday roast for Wifey on her return (muchos tired) from hen-ing.

Phew, more of the same please?

Weekday fun,

I don’t often get chance to write up a week anymore. But needless to say I generally get up to some fun. Most weeks there’s a 1:30 yoga session. Which is good for stretching out the hamstrings and working on the core. It’s also a good way of chilling out as it’s very slow, flowing and breathing focused. I would blame the wife for taking me to this, but after 10 or so months I think I can say I’d go by myself now. Plus it helps for the band practice that I get to most weeks, they’re prepping for the annual trip to Bensheim (twinned with Amersham). Shortly after that there’s the National Brass Band Finals over in Cheltenham which we’re off too (finishing first in our section at the areas). Since we’re being promoted to 3^rd section I’d say we’re hoping for great things. Then there’s normally a Thursday run at lunctime and a gym or swim session if we both have the time.. Plus then a weekend of frivolities.

However, this week has seen a minor shift.. Since I had to drop wifey off at the tube I was at work early today. Because I’d had some forethought I’d packed my running kit… there was only one thing for it, a quick blast was required. Well it wasn’t quick-quick, but it was good nonetheless. Plus since I’ve got lunch free I’d say a second one should be required! Ahhh I love it when a plan comes together ;-)

Smokin’

Blimey that was a hot one. Went trog-on reunion camping near the white horse on the ridgeway nr uffington. It was a good catch up with all old uni mates from the outdoor club. If anything it was a bit too hot.. We had a mini trog-olympics with 4 teams in 10 events. With a pause for oranges and lunch! Cracking good fun, just hot work. Further fun was had by a bike ride on the ridgeway with Ant. It was going quite well (apart from the really steep push up onto the actual path) until a flint hacked into his rear tyre*. It put a nice gash on the inner tube and meant change was in order. Unfortunately his spare was too big, so much faff proceeded whilst we tried to repair the original. Patching on a load of ribs, with a large gash just wasn’t happening, so we gave up and put the bigger tube in. Luckily it worked really well and meant we could carry on with the intended route.

ridgeway loop 

Had a bit of a low energy surge about ¾ of the way round, but pressed on as BBQ was in (slow) motion. Both of us completely crashed after this, perhaps the combination of heat and exercise wasn’t a good idea? I just laid low in shade, drank lots and ate a bit too much, since BBQ followed shortly after this (created and cooked by wifey). However, about 2 hrs later picked up again, and became normal.

Sunday consisted of a lazy breakfast (with warmed up sausages – brilliant idea wifey!) and much chatting. However, it soon became too hot again so after de-pitching the tent we vamoosed to air conned car and home for washing, snoozing and an ice cream in the park.

Much fun, thanks to trogs, sprogs and Em for organising!

*please note, there were NO punctures on my bike!

A busy weekend

But a productive one. Had Stefan staying over for the weekend with his mate Erik as they had tickets to the olympic footy final. Unfortunately I also needed to get on with some of the chores I’d been putting off as it was the first vaguely ‘free’ weekend for a while. So Saturday dawned with a further trip to the DIY shop required and then a second breakfast before getting on with patio repair and fence reconstruction. Some assistance from the guys was had before they scarpered for the safety of tube and football match. I continued on and got patio down and fence supports in before having to leave that to set. It didn’t mean the end of the chores (tip run/lawn mow) But thankfully was halted by dinner out with the lads back from footie.

Sunday was an even earlier start for a quick local 10k run, not my best time in 53 mins – I’m really noticing a lack of running in the legs. Followed by breakfast and several showers later for all of us. After this a quick drive to do a slightly less-local walk of 10k again with a pretty good view from Whiteleaf hill, before lunch out and then bidding farewell to the guys who needed to catch a flight. I then cracked on with finishing the fencing and pointing the patio repair. Still more to finish on that – but hopefully a bit of dry weather will ensue.

panorama from whiteleaf hill

Not bad for a ‘quiet’ weekend. Oh and Jury service this week – which so far has resulted in no requirement today so I’m back in work. Somewhat tireder than I’d like tho!

One year on

Shucks, I meant to post something on the 3rd (being exactly 1 yr on blog birthday n'all), but i'm sure this'll do..

What a year… I can say with 100% certainty, that it’s one of the most active I’ve had. Having done 2 triathlons, 2 x 10k’s a 5mile, 2 mini-MM’s and one full MM and those are just the organized events. If you’d have said about doing these before I probably would have laughed!

One thing that is apparent looking at stats is that I do a fair amount of different things! However, cycling which was big last year (tri training) has dropped off. Swimming, which likewise was a feature last year (tri’s again) has dropped off, but is still done now and again. Weight training can sometimes be that or climbing (and a large chunk this year was in font). Kayaking has featured a bit this year – but quite a lot down to the week trip down the wye. Hiking has already matched what I did last year distance wise, with a lot more planned.

doubled distance in running this yr

 Running, well as you’d expect with MM training and the several races (and support of wifey) that I’ve done, has exploded this year. I’ve still not topped the 135k odd that I covered in March. That may stand as my all time high!

chunk from running and climbing/font

What’s expected in the future? Who knows…