I walked to Ely the other day

Not a big deal you might say if you live in one of its adjacent villages but I live in Histon which makes it a 27 km hike. Even 27 km might not seem that far to some but although I do walk a lot and join groups that do regular Friday morning walks they tend to run to 12 km or so max.

It came about as a result of an invitation from friend Howard who’s off on an Italian walking holiday next month and wanted to get his muscles attuned to longer distances. ‘Hilary and I are walking to Ely’ he said ‘why don’t you join us?’. So I did.

It was a fine morning with the possibility of showers forecast and we left Histon at about 0930. Our route took us to Waterbeach, via the recently tarmacked Mere Way, where we enjoyed an excellent coffee at the Pharmacie (photo above). 9 km and a third of the way there. Feeling good!

We joined the river and walked along the west bank which was easy enough until about 15 km in when we encountered a herd of cows with calves and a big bull in attendance blocking the path. We opted instead for an alternative path which was less well defined and became increasingly overgrown with nettles. That didn’t suit Howard who was walking in shorts so we decided to go back and see if the cows had moved on. That’s when it rained.

Fair does the rain was brief and our detour short but we were a bit deflated. We opted for lunch and then we’d be on our way again.

With half of our journey complete we resumed our journey with renewed vigour but slowly the muscle fatigue began to set in and each km seemed a little longer. Every twenty minutes or so we paused for a breather and at one point we actually found a bench to sit on!

The gentle slope up to Ely Station seemed like a mountain but the ticket machine worked and soon we were on the train back to Cambridge North where Panther was waiting to take us home.

I tracked our route on MapMyRun which showed our pace to have been 12 min/km for the first 5 km and then fairly steady at 17 min/km thereafter albeit I did not correct for our coffee and lunch stops. We ‘wasted’ about 0.5 km on our bovine diversion.

I ached, it took a couple of days before I could walk easily again, and I had blisters which I relieved with needle and thread. But by Saturday I was fine and could have done it again.

I reflected. Have I done similar before?

During the late 80s and early 90s when we lived in Switzerland I rode with the velo club at Dow Chemical and towards the and of that period it was my main source of exercise, my other was swimming, when my osteoarthritis made running impossible. We didn’t do long bike rides, one evening a week and a Sunday morning run, and these were often round a lake which meant they were on the flat. But Switzerland is nothing if not mountainous and sometimes we went uphill.

In the summer of 1991 we headed off to cycle the Clausen Pass. I imagine that we must have parked up at Linthal which put us close to the start of the first of two climbs. This one was about 700m after which there’s a long relatively flat section before the second, another 700m, to take us to the top.

I’d never done anything like such a climb before but somehow I managed it and then survived the scary descent where there was a trade off between going too fast and wearing out your brakes. I remember feeling pretty tired and worn out at the end.

Further back in time I was a student at Cambridge in the late 60s. I led a fairly normal undergraduate life being a mix of lectures, drinking and sport. I was OK fit but not especially so but in the Spring of 1967 Ed Libbey and I decided to take part in the Boundary Run. That’s a run around Cambridge and measures about 26.2 miles ie the same as a marathon.

I’d never run much over 3 miles before and did no special training but I remember we did the first 15 miles without stopping. It then became an exercise in survival but I seem to recall finishing in about 5 hours with the final mile or so heading back into Cambridge being drawn by the sight of the University Library.

I’ve run on and off throughout my life just to keep fit but rarely more than about 5 km or (3 miles) although 10 years or so ago I did train myself up to do 10 km. I can’t imagine myself doing another marathon or, in fact, committing the time to do the training to do so.

But people do these things. My son-in-law had done an Ironman triathlon and think nothing of a quick 20 km run. The guy who runs my cardio classes tells us about doing ultra marathons and long distance night time walks. And a good friend who’s a keen cyclist told me of the time during a ride down to Brighton (from Cambridge) he helped a fellow cyclist who was struggling to keep up by pushing him up one of the climbs! I am in awe of these people.