another walk with no rain

Sunday 22nd ..6 weeks till we fly out. Trying to walk in the rain...everytime we put our boots on it stops!!! Started at 7.00 this time..was supposed to be a bit earlier, but I slept in :) Started at Chris's place again. Walked further this time, went for 3 hours. Feet fine. This time I tightened the strap around my hips. This got some of the weight off my shoulders, which was great. They felt a lot better than the last time.

We were wearing sock liners today as well. They were not as thin as we thought. felt fine while we were walking..seemed to have a red mark on the ankle when we took them off..

While walking up the road we heard a few " grunting noises".. sounded like a pig..but could not see one!!! was not until we came back that we found him! He looked like he wanted to follow us down the road..glad he stayed put!!

Walking up at Carool is just beautiful. Views of the coast through the bananna plantations are really something..even with the odd pig popping up!!!!

The rain just did not come...lots of black 

clouds ..but no rain. So we have not found out if our boots are waterproof yet or our backpacks!!!. We are hoping that they are...but we are also hoping that the weather is getting better over in Spain :)

After our walk we started to weigh some of our clothes.. my sandals are quite a bit heavier than Chris's, so might have to go and change them. Have decided that our beautiful icebreaker scarves that belong

to our daughters' are just too heavy to take. Will have to look at getting smaller ones. we know that it will be cold in London when we get there, but don't know what to wear on our feet in the plane??? We are only taking our boots and sandals????? Any suggestions??? Koo????

Report on Walk of 15/02/09
We wanted to walk in the rain this weekend to try out our wet weather gear. So the day was of course very hot, humid and practically rainless! We parked the car at Kingscliff beach and decided to walk 2 hours then turn around.Started out very chipper, congratulated ourselves on the lightness of our packs the comfort of our boots and our general all round cleverness.
Ambled along at a casual pace, worked up a thirst so reached for the drink bottle. Problem, that handy little side pocket on our pack that holds a water bottle is impossible to reach when the pack is on. Kinda like a dog chasing its tail! Some team work required to access each others bottles.Not to worry - they were soon empty and we were looking for a shop!
Very sticky day - decided that walking in Spain in the summer would be a real slog. Our cleverness has us walking in the early Spring which should be glorious (or not!)
Ok, 2 hours past time to turn around and head back to the car. You know how return journeys always seem shorter? Well not today, kept imagining a mirage of the car up ahead. Kingscliff is such a long beach - who knew?
The closer we got to the end of our walk the heavier our packs felt. Did a mental inventory and really couldn't think of a non essential item that I could ditch. Michele could do without the 4 tins of dogfood in her pack. (thanks Noel!)
A learning experience to be sure. Was quietly horrified to find my expensive socks with silver and enough high tech features to fly the space shuttle have given me a nasty rash. Great - I get to do the rounds of Katmandu, Anaconda etc. again!!!!!!!!!

Back a few weeks!!

Just going to be a bit out of order here at the start..want to go back to where we started getting ready but first, just last week.

Went on our first walk with pack and boots. We packed what items we had, still had to put in toiletries and odd bits of clothing. But at this stage packs only weigh about 6kg so we are very happy with that.

Still very hot here in Northern NSW so we started about 4.00pm from Chris's place up at Carool.

Only walked on the road to start did 2hours very managable no problems at all. Good sign..very happy!! :)

2nd weekend training walk 4hrs

7 weeks today(we thought it was 6!!) and we will be on our way. Did a 4 hour walk this afternoon with pack and boots.

Hot aussie summer afternoon!!!! we are sure Spain will be cooler!

Michele has sore shoulders..bad sign..pack must not be sitting right. 

Adjusted Chris's pack half to sit lower...

Chris a bit sore in hips??

All ok though  probably walking a bit faster than we would in Spain.

mmm having a red wine now..shoulders feeling better:)

Chris practicing Spanish greetings to Aussies passing by!!!

certainly wont take any extra "anything" to make the packs heavier. 

Note: tins of  food noel put in  pack certainly made it heavier than it needed to be.!!!!!

:)

53 days to go

53 Days till we start our journey. Time to start our blog to put all our planning in.