After a fantastic breakfast I was off, day 5 was supposed to be around 17 to 18 miles, but it ended up being a very long 20.5 miles. All the twists and turns of the trail plus the walk to and from the hotels added to the distance. By the end I was pretty shot but made it to Carlisle. I am going to rest the rest of the day as my ankle and knee are pretty stiff at times. Time for an ice bath!

The first part of the walk was pretty wet, so I made some impromptu waterproof socks with some plastic bags (if you are wondering about that picture).

Tomorrow I have the last day of the walk, hopefully only ~15 miles to the sea :)

Day 4 was gorgeous and finally getting into the swing of things! I ended up walking about 14.5 miles. I took it pretty easy today as I had a lot of trouble finding a place to stay, and I didn’t want to walk 25 miles :).

Day 3 wasn’t quite as long as day 2, but I still ended up walking over 18 miles. The countryside was amazing, and I had good weather all morning! Late in the walk a strong cold wind came up, and a bit of rain off and on. I walked from Newcastle to Corbridge to a little B&B off the road from Fort Vercovicium.

Day two was long, I ended up walking a little under 21 miles. I walked from Newcastle to Corbridge, and I was glad to have beautiful weather and no rain. This is a beautiful part of the country. My feet are pretty sore and I ended up falling asleep in the afternoon once I found a place to stay and got some lunch.

I didn’t do much planning on my route, I was hoping it was well marked. At times it is well marked, and at times it is confusing as hell. Unfortunately today I kept going when I probably should have turned right, so now I am stuck trying to figure out how to get north a bit. I am doing some reading as it seems like there might be multiple trails and the guide book I have is no help. Google maps doesn’t work for following the trail too well either. I recommend avoiding the book “Hadrian’s Wall Path” by Mark Richards, it is really hard to follow.

So after a day of rest in Salamanca I’m going to have to call it quits, its going to take a week or so to get the swelling down on my ankle and after that type of delay I’d have to average some really long miles every day to finish in time… Which kinda sucks but it was a good break, going no internet with nothing to do each day but get up and walk is incredibly refreshing. I need to do it more often.

And maybe I can come back at a later date to pick up from where I left off, maybe this time with a bike or running it. But for now I’m off for a bit of a rest for the ankle and exlore a different part of Spain. I do wish I hadn’t put it off as long as I did, and did it 5 to 6 years ago, I think it would have meant more to Ben version 1.2. Good walk though of almost 150 miles.

Eek, so my right ankle did not enjoy walking for 11+ hours and decided to swell up and evoke some pain on the top tendons. I’m out of vitamin I so had to walk on it for the next few days, not feeling so great right now. Got some vitamin I (ib profin) and frozen veggie packs so hopefully swelling goes down and I can bend this sucker in a few days.

Day 5: Valverde to Fuenterroble – With my ankle swelling up I retired after a mere 7 miles :(. Had to rest a bit as right ankle is pretty messed up. Kinda cool to see socks soaked in blood though.

Day 6: Fuenterroble to San Pedro – 17 Miles in 5 hours 18 minutes. It’s crazy how much altitude affects pace.

Day 7: San Pedro to Salamanca – 14 miles in 3 hours 40 min. Going to rest here for a few days as work starts up this week and might need to cut this thing short and pick it up again in the future :).

I slept in an Aburgue/dorm for the first time last night, man i hate people who snore :). So I didn’t sleep great but got ~5 hours sleep. Surprisingly I didn’t feel too tired, as I usually sleep through other people’s noise.

Galisteo to Aldenueva – Day 3
I started at 7am when it was still dark for an hour since this was going to be a long day… It was the most beautiful hiking yet and just awesome! Amazing Roman arch and excavations in one area too where you could see the entire stratis of the roman road. But also a very very long walk before there was a town to stop in, I ended up making a few short but painful navigation mistakes and when I finally stumbled into town, I had walked ~36 miles in 11 hours of walking. Some blood, a few small blisters, sore feet, but otherwise intact. Crazy enough I wasn’t very tired, and didn’t sleep well.

Aldenueva to Valverde – Day 4
I woke up with sore feet and shins, duck taped the holes up and started walking. A shorter day today and I did 20 miles in a little under 6 hours. Really beautiful walk and it is crazy how the scenery turned to forest and mountains from the deserty vibe earlier this week. A harder day as I was so sore and very happy to stop. Tomorrow is a 36km one as there just is no place to stop that makes sense, after that an easy day + a day off to let my body heal a bit.

I’ve been wanting to do one of the Camino Pilgrimage routes for a long time and finally made some time :). I’m doing the Via de la Plata route from Seville to Santiago (mostly along an old roman road = awesome).

I really really wanted to run it every day, but after spending 3 hours until 2am trying to pack everything into a 1,000 cubic inch backpack (suunto 14l skin pro) I just couldn’t make it work. Plus since I need to bring a laptop and combined with other gear it was going to be heavy combined with water. So after a mere 4 hours of sleep I switched gears into a small day bag and planning to walk the trip. The big problem was trying to plan for winter gear, as its 70f to 80f at the start, but up north it should be really cold and rainy…. Although we will see if that is really true… as after day 1 of the trip I think I could have done it. I also am not in great running shape and can run 10 to 15 miles pretty easily but doing that day after day would cripple me + I have to carry enough to stay warm when I switch to walking. Anyway….

I arrived in Seville on October 10th, bought my sim cards for being on emergency call + 3g, and found a cheap swiss army knife for food/wine, and the next day took a bus North to Caceres so I could start from there. Why? I just didn’t have enough days off to do the complete journey, I’m taking 10 days off work, but then the normal calls and work start :).

So what did I bring?
– 3 pair wool socks
– 3 pair underwear
– 1 pair thermal running tights
– 1 pair thermal long sleve shirt
– 3 t shirts (2 synth / one cotten)
– 2 pair of shorts
– 1 pair jeans
– 1 macbook air 11in
– 3g modem
– iphone
– kindle
– Suunto gps watch
– bathroom goods + micro fiber towel.
– rain cover for bag + a few micro dry bags
– smart wool running hoodie
– wind proof warmth hoodie
– gore tex rain jacket
– gore tex rain pants
– room for food / side pockets for carrying 1.5L on either side.
– sunglasses / cords / water proof stuff for laptops.

I’ve got one walking / running outfit which I wash every night, we will see how that goes :).

I stupidly brought my fav laptop backpack, and its not a good hiking bag maybe… Hopefully the bruises / blood heal quick on my back/shoulders. I say stupid as I have about 15 different bags for the different adventures I imagine myself having back at home.