Tuesday  22^nd April

My plans for a long early in the day run down the coast or on the Quantocks were thwarted as I awoke to heavy rain drops on the roof.  This continued for most of the morning, so decision was to run later over Neroche.

The car park was deserted for a late afternoon, heavy clouds hung over the Blackdowns, but hopefully I should get round before anymore downpours.

I was unsure of what to wear as it was quite chilly when the sun was not shining. However, I set off in the sun, trees were now getting more and more greenery, after the heavy rain my woodland stage of the run was quite muddy. As I crossed the farmland near Britty, Exmoor ponies are now grazing as an experiment, they completely ignored my presence! There were bluebells just emerging in the open ground but the woodland, most were still just very green shoots.

I managed to jog up the ‘stairway to heaven’ up to Neroche castle at a slow pace, small steps, a bit of walking near the top. The run back down from the castle was enjoyable and I noticed a 7:52 pace on my Garmin!

Crossing the road and the climb started back up to Staple Hill car park, resurfaced by the Forestry people [not sure why!]  Back over the open ground and the final climb back up to the car park – 7.10 miles, no rain, an enjoyable run.

In the mean time I have been using my newly acquired Kindle [birthday pressie] reading two books ‘Run Wild’ by Boff Whalley, a great book, very philosophical as he spends time looking and trying to understand  runners who run marathons on the road, with all the technology and pressures of times and placings, with that of running off road, trail and mountain running and the simple pleasures this gives, without the pressures – I found the book really interesting, with lots of references to running on trails and mountains, and really questions why anyone wants to run a marathon on the road! However, he is very sympathetic and acknowledges  that they do raise a lot of money and draw attention to charities, and many people would not run if it wasn’t for their commitment to raising money for a good cause, quite an inspirational read, by the end you want to get the trainers on and go off road running. By coincidence my current read is ‘Running Free –A runners journey back to nature’ by Richard Askwith, this book follows a similar vein but less reference to road marathons. He does make references to the ‘clutter’ of technology in running and celebrates the simple pleasures of running off road, whether its muddy fields around his Northampton home or running on the fells [I read Richards first book ‘Feet in the Clouds’ – a really good book about fell running and the Bob Graham round] he compares this again with running around the sterile streets of towns and cities – and questions why people run? What do they get from it? Etc. I am only 29% through [according to my Kindle white – a great piece of kit] so will complete my review when I have finished it, again, just like Bofs book,  inspirational that makes you want to go out and run up the nearest hill, off road of course!

Yesterdays warm sunny day gave me an opportunity to give the Camper a good clean inside and out, so its now ready for some fabulous trips this summer – hopefully Cornwall in a couple of weeks and of course the French trip in June, we still need to sort our final destination in France.