all that comes with it

Over the last couple of weeks we’ve implemented an new set of rules surrounding television in our house. Basically it boils down to the kids only being able to watch it between the hours of 7am and 9am and 5:30pm and 7:30pm.

That’s still three and a half hours of TV viewing, and so well above the recommended two hours suggested by the experts. But you can’t help wondering if those experts actually have kids of their own to try and deal with. Or if they do, are they some sort of freaky Stepford children who spend hours sitting nicely in the corner playing with tasteful wooden toys and being nothing but kind and courteous to their siblings.

No, three and a half hours feels about right to us. And it’s not as if they use all their allocated time anyhow. Amy in particular is generally choosing to spend her time skipping outside or making various cards for her friends rather than goggle at the box. Evan is more addicted, but he’s of an age where he’s just learning how to follow narrative so it’s all very new and exciting for him, plus he still finds the repetitive formula of shows such as Wonderpets and Little Einsteins is reassuring rather than boring.

While the implementation of the new rules has been a struggle at times, especially around 4pm when fatigue sets in on both sides, the new regime has been overwhelmingly positive.

Mainly, it must be said, because it’s forced me to be a better parent.

The internet is a wonderful thing, but I do have an unfortunate tendency to become over involved with it. Mailing emails, twittering on twitter, flicking through flickr, reading google reader, and blogging on… wordpress (damn, I knew I should have never left blogger) – it all saps time and attention. And if that is time and attention that you should be devoting to your kids then that can’t be a good thing.

You know how it is. You switch Playhouse Disney on to keep them quiet while you catch up on a few things on the net, and the next thing you know it’s an hour and a half later and your children have metamorphosed into slack jawed TV zombies.

And that just isn’t right. You shouldn’t sacrifice time with your family in order to mindlessly fritter away the hours looking at inconsequential banalities on the web. That’s what the internet connection at work is for.

I must point out that I’m not saying that I’ve been a neglectful parent, encouraging my children to atrophy in front of the television while I spent 14 hours a day glued to my computer keyboard. I’m a pretty active parent, and like to get out and about as often as I can. But things had been slipping, especially with the excitement of all this Hadrian’s Walk business occupying a large proportion of my consciousness (incidentally don’t forget you need to let me know if you’re coming or not by Sunday).

But as tempting as it is to repeatedly press refresh on my email to see if anything new has come in, the reality is that it’s going to make little difference if I read an email or a blog comment now or in seven or eight hours when the kids have gone to bed.

So by turning off the TV between 9am and 5:30pm I’m removing the temptation to avoid my children and escape into cyberspace. Obviously I can still steal five minutes here or there by getting out some toys, giving them a bag of grapes, or supergluing their feet to the hall floor. But those methods are temporary, they don’t allow me to get so absorbed that I loose my sense of time. I just do what needs to be done, and then get back to being Dad. Which is good, because although sometimes I forget it, being Dad is the thing I like doing best anyway.

This entire post has ultimately been a rather long winded way of introducing the fact that instead of sticking the TV on when Amy came home from school this evening we went all up into the back garden and I taught Amy how to use the camera on my phone. She took to it very well, I think she might have inherited her mother’s ability with the lens. Evan on the other hand appears to inherited both my taste for gurning at the camera and my attraction to chickens.

I am so proud.

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I’ve really made some headway in the garden this year. Over the past 12 months it’s gone from looking like this:

to this:

Ok, so they are taken from different angles, but you get the idea

However fortunes have not all run smooth on Old McHughes’ farm over the past couple of weeks.

On the plus side my vegetable crops are doing really well this year. My peas, potatoes, and pumpkins in particular are growing like the proverbial clappers, and we ate this years first home grown strawberries at the weekend too. Even the apple trees appear to have had a reprieve and are fruiting away happily.

My radishes haven’t done quite so well however as something appears to be eating them. I have a horrible suspicion that it’s something more unpleasant than slugs or snails too as I can see little teeth marks on them. I’m holding out hope that we have a colony of Fraggles nearby, but unfortunately I suspect it’s probably something a little more rodent shaped.

Which isn’t to say that slugs and snails haven’t been wreaking damage of their own. The leaves of my lettuce and pak-choi in particular are covered in gaping holes. I read somewhere recently that it’s wrong to say a garden has a surplus of slugs, it just has a deficit of ducks; but I think I’d probably be pushing my luck if I tried to persuade Kerry of this.

But the most distressing thing is that Rosa, my favorite chicken, started crowing last week, which was a bit of a shock as I’d been convinced it had been a female. I gave him a couple of days grace to see if his cock-a-doodle-doing would be a problem, but unfortunately it was just too loud and started far too early in the morning for me to be willing to ask my neighbor’s to put up with it. So this morning before the kids got up I “took him to live on another farm”.

I really didn’t want to do it though. I’d grown quite attached to the little bugger. Here’s a picture of him Kerry took when back he was an awkward and goofy adolescent.

Oh, and speaking of gawky gangly birds, congratulations to my sister Megan who got engaged yesterday. Rather you than me John, but at least you get to have a supercool-brother-in-law.

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Again I’ve already emailed this to everyone I think needs to read it, but just in case I’ve missed anyone in my general incompetence I’m republishing it here.

If you’ve already responded to me via email then don’t feel the need to do it again in the comments unless you feel you want to.

I’ve had an incredible response to my appeal for people to come on the walk of Hadrian’s Wall next July. So far a whopping 49 people from all over the world have said they are interested in coming along. They range from as far away as Australia to as nearby as, err, my house I suppose. And that’s just people to join Team Ocelot; my brother is pretty sure that team bandicoot will contain around 25 members too.

That’s 74 people. Just think how much sponsorship that number of people will raise; not to mention the great social event it’ll be. As I’ve said before, this is going to be bloody great.

However, much as I welcome as many people as we can get to come along, it does throw up a few logistical problems. Initially when I conceived of the walk I envisaged around 25 people taking part in each team, and planned accordingly. It’s by no means impossible to cope with a larger number than this, but it’s going to require more planning.

Over the past couple of days I’ve been eyeing the growing number of names on my spreadsheet nervously and have rung around a few of the hostels that I envisaged staying in; amazingly some of them have been already booked up for the dates we want to use them (the swines!). Again this isn’t too much of a problem as I’ve got alternatives lined up. But I’m getting a little nervous about leaving it until August to book them in case someone sneaks in before me. And obviously I can’t book any places until I know exactly how many are going to be walking.

So what I’m proposing is this: I bring the deadline for confirming if you are coming or not forward a little bit. One week away to Sunday the 5th of July to be precise. I really hope this doesn’t cause any problems to you or affect your ability to commit. If there is a reason why you can’t let me know by this date then please let me know and I’m sure we can work something out. But as it is the stress of having a possible 49 people eager to do the walk and the potential that there will be no where for them to sleep and me having to somehow “drop” people from the team is bringing me close to nervous breakdown.

So what I need to know is:

• Are you coming?
• Are you bringing anyone else with you? And if so who and what is their email address?
• Will you be in a position to pay a deposit, possibly around £50, in the next couple of weeks? (if not don’t worry, we can probably sort something out)
• If you don’t want to come for the whole walk, do you want to come for a section of it (either for a single day at any point on the route, or spanning days 3 and 4 where the scenery is most dramatic and we camp at night would seem the most do-able)

Even if you’ve told me all that information before, tell me again just to make sure your name’s been counted. My email address is dghughes28@yaho.co.uk .

I can’t give exact details about how much it will cost without knowing final numbers, but I will endeavor to keep costs as low as possible. There is a possibility that some people might have to stay in B&B’s on occasion due to the capacity of the bunk barns which might bump the cost up slightly, but my aim would be to share this out so it doesn’t affect one person/couple drastically. There is also a possibility that we might have to hire a minibus for the sherpas due to the need to ferry people about to accommodation from the trail and also shift the camping gear. I’m guessing the total price of the walk will be between £100 and £150 each (including most breakfasts). Obviously if the final total comes to more than you’re comfortable with then I’d not have a problem with you backing out.

The sooner you can let me know the better. You don’t have to wait until the 5th of July, you can tell me now. But if you do say you are coming then you need to consider that a real commitment and only back out if you lose both your legs in an industrial accident (both legs that is, if you only lose one then I expect you to hop).

If you can’t come then don’t worry about it, I certainly don’t think any less of you. Just get ready with your credit card when sponsorship time comes around :)

If you need to remind yourself about any of the details then you can find most of them on the walk’s blog hadrianswalk.org, or you can email me with any specific inquiries

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Have you ever wondered how all those sick jokes that emerge after the death of a celebrity

Well now I can tell you, they are all made up by UK comedian Richard Herring.

When I went to bed last night the news had just broken that Michael Jackson had died. When I open my eyes this morning and did my customary post-wakening checks (Alive? Safe? Location? Bladder Status? New Email?) I happened to scroll through twitter and noticed that Mr Herring had pumped out a staggering number of tweets about the end of the King of Pop’s reign. Here’s a quick selection. If you are a big Jacko fan or have particularly tender sensibilities I advise you to look away now

• Herring1967: A candle in the wind. And one for a change who has been actually been on fire. And looked like he was made from wax.
• Herring1967: If Uri Geller was any kind of friend he would make him alive again.
• Herring1967: I wonder if when Gary Glitter dies that everyone will forget what he did and get cross if you make jokes.
• Herring1967: Being reminded that MJ was found not guilty. It’s nice that people still believe in the process of law.
• Herring1967: It’s the cherubs that I’m worried about.
• Herring1967: According to Sky, Die Hard fans are out on the streets. They should go back in and leave this to the MJ fans.
• Herring1967: Heaven is definitely better than earth – Uri Geller has confirmed. MJ definitely there also.
• Herring1967: MJ proved innocent under hypnosis by Uri Geller – who is definitely magic and knows about the afterlife.
• Herring1967: Is Jarvis Cocker going to the funeral?

What is more interesting however is the buckets of bile and vitriol that he obviously received from the twitterverse. Now I appreciate that many people may find such comments offensive, you may well be one of them, and that’s completely fine. The death of anyone is a tragedy for those around them. But there is a real danger that something akin to the ridiculous behavior that occurred surrounding the death of Princess Diana (Queen of our Hearts) might start developing here. That the twitter may cultivate a mass hysteria about the death of someone that before he died you wouldn’t have left your children with.

As the story broke the news media quoted twitter extensively, citing a mass outpouring of grief throughout the entire internet. The 24 hour news channels need to fill their space with something, And lets face it there’s only so much standing outside hospitals saying “We’re still not sure of the details yet. Back to you John” one station can show (about 23 hours of it if past experience is anything to go by). But by reporting on a supposed mass outpouring of grief this only fans the flames of the hysteria. People start to think that everyone else can see the emperors new clothes so they should be able to too.

Hopefully I’m wrong about this. Hopefully it’s a flash in the pan. Michael Jackson and Princess Diana (Queen of our Hearts) are completely different entities after all. Certainly you can’t see newspapers like the Express and Mail getting behind a mawkish eulogizing campaign behind the man they dubbed “Wacko Jacko”. Most likely things will move on within a couple of hours and by tomorrow morning we’ll be back to the normal drudge of news.

But in this internet age where the world is bound ever closer together we need to be wary that everyday events don’t get blown out of all proportion. That the death of an emotionally scarred stranger or the discovery that a middle aged Scottish woman can sing doesn’t take on more significance than it deserves. The popular consciousness has a way of running away with us if we let it, and while the death of Michael Jackson is undoubtedly sad we must remember that it’s not a personal loss.

Or that’s my take on it anyway.

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Just why the commissioning producers thought that that a film entitled Beverly Hills Chihuahua would draw in an audience is a mystery to me. The very prospect of watching it instilled me with dread as I put the disk into the Blu-ray machine and I’m sure I wouldn’t be alone in that.

Other films in the talking animals genre feature cute animals like pigs (Babe) or parrots (Paulie), and of course Dalmatians (Full Metal Jacket). Chihuahuas however are not cute, they are pretty much repellant as is the vacuous celebrity culture that appears to have adopted them.

So, perhaps unfairly, this film had quite a bit of ground to make up with me even before it started.

So did it pluckily beat the odds and win over the sullen heart of this cold blooded cynic?

Well no, not really.

It was OK I suppose. The acting was reasonable and some of the characters were entertaining, if not a little by-the-numbers( I’m always a sucker for the gruff veteran with a heart of gold and took a particular shine to Delgado, an ex German Shepard police-dog voiced by Andy Garcia).

The plot is your basic fish out of water story, with spoiled Chihuahua Cloe (voiced by Drew Barrymore) getting lost in Mexico and finding her way home whilst being pursued by an evil dog-fighter and his demonic doberman El Diablo (voiced by Admiral Adama from Battlestar Galactica interestingly enough). There are no surprises and no upsets in the story line, which to be honest is fine. Well worn plots are like well worn footpaths; they are worn because they are pleasant to follow. The thing I object to is the lack of humor in the piece.

On the odd occasion Kerry cracked a smile, but I was pretty stoney faced through the whole affair. The obligatory comedy duo was present (in the guise of a rat and an iguana voiced by Cheech Marin and Paul Rodriguez ), but were underused and ineffectual.

But my main issue with the film was that I just couldn’t get over my distaste for the core conceit of having a Chihuahua as the central character. So to be fair the film never really stood a chance with me. If you’re into yappy little dogs that look like rats but without the charm, then you never know, this film may hit all your buttons.

Scanning through other reviews on the internet I noticed that many people were critical of the movies stereotypical treatment of Mexico. This surprised me as I really didn’t pick up on that at all, in fact I thought the movie was relatively enlightened. A fair proportion of the dialogue was in Spanish, and the main human character’s prejudices against Mexicans were held up and challenged quite early on in the film. The mexican police in particular were treated as being competent and modern rather than unsophisticated idiots from a third world country as I’ve seen in other movies. Of course I’m no expert in these things, Mexican stereotyping is probably a lot more basic here in the UK than I imagine it is in the States. I find the further you get away from a country the more unsubtle and broad your archetypes surrounding that place become. Our racial stereotypes of the Scottish are a lot more intricate and refined than those we hold about Eskimos for example.

As always with movies I’ve seen on blu-ray, the picture quality was excellent. The only criticism I have is the length of time it takes to actually start playing, but that’s the same with all of the discs I’ve used and I imagine is something to do with the sheer amount of information that’s stored on it. I’m sure that will improve as time and the technology moves forward

You can buy the Beverly Hills Chihuahua Blu-ray for about £15 on amazon.co.uk. Amazon also do a pretty good range of Blu-ray players as well should you fancy one.

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The radio show I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue is a much loved British institution. It’s now in it’s 51st season and has been going since 1972. It bills itself as an “antidote to panel games”, which as a definition is pretty redundant as the types of panel games against which it was railing back in the early seventies are long gone as a genre.

It’s probably best described by it’s other tagline: A game where panelists Graeme Garden, Tim Brooke-Taylor, Willie Rushton and Barry Cryer are given silly things to do by chairman Humphrey Lyttelton. These names not mean much to the chronically foreign, but trust me when I say they are the cream of the UK’s comedy performers, of a certain generation anyhow. Graeme Garden and Tim Brooke-Taylor are two of the founders of the magnificent goodies ad contemporaries of the Monty Python crew. Barry Cryer is an extremely prolific comedy writer who has written for George Burns, Richard Prior, David Frost, Bob Hope, and Morecambe and Wise. And Willie Rushdon who was one of the founder members of the satirical magazine Private Eye and a much loved roving wit.

Rushdon died in 1996. His seat on the show has been occupied by a rotating cast of british comedians who’s names again probably don’t mean much to an international crowd, but who represent some of the best comedy talent this country has to offer.

Over it’s 37 years of existence I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue (or ISIHAC for short) has developed a good number of in jokes and traditions that delight regular listeners, but never-the-less it remains accessible to the new listener. Here’s an episode from 2006 that I’ve taken my collection of recordings, my main reason for choosing it over any other is that it was recorded in the town in which I work.

 

 I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (17)

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In 2008 the chairman Humphrey Lyttelton sadly died. He was 89, so he had a good innings, but never the less it was devastating news. Not only had the country lost a fantastic personality, but there was a risk that without Humph ISIHAC would pass away too.

However the show must go on and the BBC announced that ISIHAC would return with a rotating guest chairmen Stephen Fry, Jack Dee, and Rob Brydon. The first of the new series went out last week, and the second yesterday. And I’m not keen.

The problem is that the chairman’s scriptwriter, the admittedly comic genius Iain Pattinson, has just transposed Humph’s world weary and bemused character directly onto the new chairman (Stephen Fry in the episodes broadcast so far) rather than take into account the individuals own personality. It just doesn’t sit right for me. It’ll probably work well for Jack Dee, but Fry is more witty and erudite than grumpy.

Saying that, the second episode grated much less than the first, so maybe it’s just a matter of getting used to it. Change is never easy to deal with, and change after 37 years of consistency particularly so.

You can listen to the most recent episode of ISIHAC on BBC’s iPlayer under Radio 4 comedy if you live in the UK.

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On Saturday Kerry and I headed down to London in order to go to the wedding of one of my old friends from university. I only ever see Rob once a year, usually around Eurovision time, but it’s amazing how quickly you fall back into old friendships. And as we’re male, and as male friendship basically consists of insulting each other at every given opportunity, I quickly made up for lost time and flung jibes at him about his buttonhole flower, his hight, his musical taste, and his antiquated mobile phone.

I started getting a bit carried away with it all to the point that when the registrar asked if anyone knew of any impediment to the marriage I had to physically restrain myself from standing up and shouting to the bride “WAIT! You do know that he irons his underpants!?”.

Rob on the other hand didn’t get a single crack in at me, and even made some complementary remarks about my weight loss and how nice it was to see me again. The looser.

I tried to take some photos but there is a reason that Kerry is the wedding photographer and not me. This is the only shot I got where everyones eyes weren’t closed.

Once the wedding had finished and I’d eaten twice my body weight in pork pies it was time for us to hit the road again and head back up to Huddersfield before we got corrupted by any strange London ways (they keep their coal in the bath you know).

On the face of it driving four hours down to London and then four hours back on the same day might seem a bit of a trial, but it was actually very enjoyable. Kerry and I got to chat, listen to podcasts, and argue about the merits of BBC Radio 1 (it has none I tell you!). We even got home in time to pick up the kids from the out-laws and put them to bed. It was a good day.

But Sunday was even better. For a start I not only got a two pairs of Batman socks and a William Shatner autobiography as father’s day presents, but I also got two very cool lego sets. Apparently when Kerry asked Amy what she should get me she told her “something with Batman on it and some lego”. It doesn’t get much better than that.

So far I’ve made a lego jet plane, and a lego helicopter and tonight I’m going to try tackling the biplane. I’d completely forgotten how much fun lego can be, and have now spent an inappropriate length of time lingering around the Toys’R'Us website. I keep on having to repeat to myself “I do not need another hobby, I do not need another hobby”.

The rest of Sunday was lovely too. Amy and I walked into the village an back for bread and milk then we all went out to the pub for lunch. this was quickly followed by a trip to a farm shop for some ice-cream (and crazy golf), and then finally to the hiking shop for a look around the rucksack section (You didn’t think I’d be able to get though a bog post without alluding to the Hadrian’s Walk did you?).

I then spent the evening pottering around the garden while Kerry read books and Amy played with some kids on the communal drive. Evan had fallen asleep on the way back from the hiking shop so we just let him snooze right until bedtime. A decision we deeply regretted when he woke up at 3am the following morning and refused to go back to sleep, but it’s all part of life’s rich pageant.

Yes, life is good.

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Evan was inspecting my scalp as I got him dressed.

“There’s no hair on your head daddy.” he observed with distressing accuracy.

“But there’s hair up your nose!” he added brightly

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Two years ago today NYCWD lost his son, Puppy Monster.

You’re in my thoughts man.

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I’ve sent this post out as an email to everyone who’s expressed interest in coming on our epic walk next year. However just in case I missed anyone I wanted to publish it here as well. If you’re reading this, are interested in coming on the walk, but haven’t already got this in an email then please let me know so I can add you to my address book for further updates.

If you did get this, took one look at it and fainted due to it’s sheer length and wordiness then I apologize. I get a little carried away at times. I promise to be more brief in future.

We’ve had a fantastic response from people, and this has the potential to turn into something absolutely amazing. Both in terms of raising money for the charity, and as a real adventure for those who are taking part. The timing of this is very good The Joseph Salmon Trust really needs a boost at the moment as they have just expanded the area they cover and so are receiving double the requests for help than they were before.

If we get a number of international participants coming along then the possibilities of publicity and fundraising for the walk are really significantly increased. Last year my online campaigning raised over £1000; next year our efforts could blow that out of the water. That sort of money to a small charity like the Trust can be future changing.

So I really want you to come. I mean I really really want you to come. But even if we weren’t doing this for charity I’d still really want you to come. Because it’s going to be bloody fantastic. There isn’t a single person who’s said they would like to come who I wasn’t already eager to meet. I’m incredibly excited about all of this.

There are however a few things I feel the need to point out, just so you feel you know exactly what you’re signing yourself up for. As I’ve said, no one needs to make a decision on this until mid August. In fact, shall we put a date on this? Let’s say Sunday 16th August 2009 (however if you want to let me know one way or the other before this it would make the task of organizing a lot easier).

So here’s some more details:

Difficulty of the walk

I’ve had a good look at the map and all the contour lines look nice and well spaced out, which basically means there won’t be any steep hills to climb up. That’s not to say that it’s completely flat of course. The middle couple of days in particular has a fair few short ups and downs. However both those days are the shortest (10 miles long) so there will be no pressure for pace or time.

There is also a 20 mile day in the itinerary. this is less than ideal, but necessary due to the lack of accommodation on that particular stretch.

A few people have expressed concern about the level of fitness they will need. While it certainly will be a physical challenge, and a the end of some of the days you will be decidedly knackered and rosy cheeked, you don’t need marathon runner levels of endurance for this sort of thing.

I walked the Dales Way weighing 308lb. And while I was a relatively fit 308lb, and I did suffer slightly (especially on the hills) I managed to do it without too many problems. It s true however that the fitter you are the more you’ll enjoy the walk. I certainly found that after loosing 70lb for the Cumbria Way. And I really wouldn’t advise coming on the walk without doing any training for it at all.

If you are thinking you need to get fitter than you are now I really can’t recommend doing this more highly. The Dales Way was 100% responsible my subsequent weight loss. It was just the kick off i needed and my life is much richer for it.

Accommodation
It is very important to point out that we’ll not be staying in 5 star accommodation during the walk. This is for two reasons;

a) I want to keep the costs down as much as possible
b) The potential numbers of walkers on this hike is quite high.

We will be sleeping for the most part in shared rooms of roughly 4 people, sometimes more, and sleeping mainly in bunk beds. In addition it is likely that at least some of these rooms may have to be mixed sex, although this won’t be clear until I get final numbers in August. There will be showers and such however, and i don’t anticipate having to cook our own food (other than make packed lunches)

In addition I’ve just discovered that the youth hostel that I planned for us to stay in on night three (the night that both teams meet in the middle of the country) is not available on the day we wanted to book it. This means that we are going to have to camp instead.

We won’t have to carry our tents and sleeping bags however; I’m currently in negotiations with a crack team of sherpas who will bring all that stuff to the campsite for us and take them away again afterwards. If you are coming from overseas, or even outside Yorkshire, you won’t have to bring any of that stuff over with you either. We’ll be able to find someone to lend it to you.

The night of camping we had when we did the Dales Way was one of the most enjoyable we had. We lit a fire, got takeaway fish and chips, and had a really good time. I personally think that the one night of camping will only add to the adventure of the trip; however if it is something that you just can’t stand the thought of then I can probably find a B&B for you to stay in somewhere. This will increase the cost of the trip for you however and i obviously can’t do it for everyone as there just aren’t that number of places available in the area.

Numbers

If everyone that has expressed an interest in coming on the walk actually comes with us (a man can hope) then team Ocelot will consist of roughly 33 people (this is taking to account husband and wife couples and the like). My brother is organizing the participants of his side of the walk separately and has around 15 people so far (the looser).

Hopefully we might even get a few more people saying they’d like to come over the next week or so as well.

We’ll obviously know more come August, and I may have another quick flurry of “do you know anyone who wants to come” in order to fill the numbers to the top before we close the admissions gate for good.

Equipment

We’re not going on a trek up everest here, but there are a few things that you’ll definitely need to carry with you:

Walking boots & proper walking socks – The trail is relatively straightforward, but it’s a path not a road and you’ll want some protection just in case you go over on your ankle or have to navigate muddy areas. As for socks, on the dales way i wore two pairs of normal socks and got horrible blisters; on the Cumbria way I wore walking socks and my feet were absolutely fine.

A water supply – There aren’t really any shops or places to get water for very long stretches of the walk, so you need to carry a water supply. I use a camelbak style water pouch which I found invaluable on the previous two walks.

Waterproof coat and trousers – My coat is rather bulky and takes up a lot of room in my bag so I might get a more lightweight one this time round. You put the waterproof trousers on over your normal trousers if it rains, although quite few people just wore them all the time on the last two walks.

A towel – As Douglas Adams says: A frood always know where their towel is .

Misc safety stuff – Like a torch, whistle, space blanket, compass, couple of high energy bars, that sort of thing.

Clothes to last you the week – obviously

A map and/or guidebook – Not every single person will need to have one of these and the trail is very well signposted. However it’s always good to have a few floating around and I find it’s always comforting to know what’s coming round the next bend. I’ve personally bought the guidebook ‘Hadiran’s Wall Path” by Anthony Burton and the waterproof map “Hadrian’s Wall Path XT40″ published by Harvey. If you are only going to buy one get the book as it has maps in too and has quite a lot of interesting facts in it. I’ve had a look and both the map and book are available from both amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com. if you buy from the UK site however could you get to it via hadrianswalk.org as the charity will get 5% of the sale as commission.

A backpack big enough to fit all that stuff in.

Travel

This is particularly aimed at those people who will be coming from overseas or places in the UK other than Yorkshire.

I don’t know if your intention is to come just for the walk, or if you plan on taking an additional vacation as well. Both ends of the walk are very well serviced by rail(although the end of the walk doesn’t finish near a station, our sherpas will drive you into Carlisle which does have one). Newcastle also has a airport. Train tickets can only be booked about three months in advance, but they are significantly cheaper if you book them then rather than on the day of the travel (we’re talking £10 as opposed to £40 for example). Kerry, my wife, is a genius at finding the best train deals so be sure to get us to help you get the best deals.

Depending on how many people from overseas come along on the walk we’ll be able to put people up in various spare rooms both before and after the walk if they want this like. We live in Huddersfield, which is relatively near Manchester airport and you would be more than welcome to travel up to the start of the walk with us. This can’t be planned until we know who exactly is coming oviously.

Liability

This may sound a little unpleasant, but I need to say it unfortunately.

While I’m organizing this walk, I’m not a tour guide. You’re choosing to come along on this walk as my friend and teammate rather than my employer. I can’t take responsibility for your enjoyment, the weather, or your safety – although obviously I’ll do my best as a fellow human being.

If you give me a definite answer that you are coming and I book a place for you, then you are going to have to pay me for that place even if you later find out you can’t come. There probably will be a possibility that I can get a t least a partial refund for you. But if I can’t then it comes out of your pockets rather than mine or, even worse, the charities.

And that’s about it. If you have any questions or see something I’ve got wrong or omitted then let me know.

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