Category: Greensand Way

Juneathon Day 11 – Further Up The Greensand Way

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Something I could have mentioned in yesterday’s 5 Ways To Make The Most Of Juneathon post, that fits nicely in point no. 5, is Juneathon is a good excuse to go exploring and check out new areas.

Which is what I did today.

The Greensand Way is a 108 mile path, stretching from Haslemere in Surrey to Hamstreet in Kent (four miles down the road from here). Because it passes the house, I’ve walked up the nearest bit that heads towards Surrey (if I go towards Hamstreet it involves going through a farm and I’m too shy to walk through someone’s farm; I feel like I’m trespassing) but haven’t got any further than about two and a half miles before turning round and walking back again. Today though, I cycled up to the Environment Centre and joined the Greensand Way there and walked as far as Hothfield. I would have gone further had I not taken a wrong turning somewhere and ended up going round in a circle. Duh.

Still, I saw part of the Greensand Way I hadn’t seen before so it’s all good. Next time I’ll take an Ordnance Survey map with me although I can barely read a London A-Z, let alone a map that seems to consist solely of lines and squiggles, so I’m not sure it’ll stop me getting lost.

I’ll post the photos of my walk tomorrow but in the meantime, here’s a photo of some calves I saw.

Calves on the Greensand Way

Stats

Cycling: 3.57 miles
Walking: 6.11 miles
Juneathons completed: 9/30

Smiley faces and white dog poo

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I went for a five mile walk yesterday. I usually hate walking for more than, say, a mile, but I wanted to investigate the next bit of the Greensand Way and I can only run about a mile at the mo.

When I got to what I thought was the next bit of the Greensand Way though, the sign said ‘bridleway’ and not ‘footpath’ and so it confused me and I didn’t want to walk up there just to turn round and walk back if it didn’t go anywhere especially as there was a man in a hi-vis vest on the corner of the gypsy house and I didn’t want him to think I was a weirdo going into fields for two minutes then coming back out of them so I carried on up the road until I saw a sign that said ‘footpath’ and investigated up there but the path only went about two feet parallel to the road and then back on to the road and so I went back the way I came and wanted to go up where it said bridleway but the hi-vis vest man was still there and he probably already thought I was a weirdo for walking up the road and back and so I went into the woods opposite instead and saw this

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and then walked back along the roads instead of the fields and I saw a smiley face on a door

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and even more exciting than the smiley face on the door was the 70s style white dog poo. Yay.

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Slightly less exciting than the smiley face on the door and the 70s style white dog poo was this snail.

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Next time, I won’t worry about people thinking I’m a weirdo and I will investigate the bridleway.

Stats (walking)

Distance: 5.11 miles
Time: 1:33:34
Pace: 18:18
Calories: 373
Bridleways: 1
Bridleways I walked up: 0
Men in hi-vis vests: 1
Smiley faces on doors: 1
White dog poos: 1
Snails: 1

The Grim Greensand Beast

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Because I’m off to London tonight to meet my friends with the impeccable taste in music (i.e. the Cardiacs chatlist people), I decided to save my energy and not do Grim: Beast in the East with Shaun, Grant and Tom, but to do my own cross-country 10k here instead, taking in some of the Greensand Way.

Although Shaun kept waking me up while he was getting ready to go by coming back upstairs to inform me that a) the cat had done a poo; b) it was really smelly; c) it was also quite runny; and d) he’d covered it over with litter (you will note he hadn’t cleaned it up. When it comes to litter-tray incidents, that’s when the cat becomes *my* cat), then back upstairs again to tell me that a) he hadn’t gone yet; and b) he’d made me a cup of tea, I had a decent night’s sleep and got up reasonably early and I’d said to Shaun that I would set off for my run at 10:30, the same time Grim started but that meant I had two hours to wait and so I decided that because they’d probably finish about an hour before me, that I should get a headstart anyway and so at 9am, I decided I’d get changed and head off for my run.

At 10am, I’m still sitting in front of my computer and hadn’t even changed into my running gear and so I decided I might as well head off the same time as Grim and so I got changed and went downstairs and put on my clown shoes and went outside and waited for it to be 10:30. (Why is it when you’re sitting in front of your computer dicking around on Facebook and Twitter, time whizzes past, but when you’re looking at your watch (or in my case the clock on my ipod), waiting for three minutes to go by, it seems like it takes for ever?)

The clock eventually ticked over to 10:30 and I set off on my cross-country 10k. All was well until I got to about the fifth field and at the end of the field were some horses and I didn’t want to run towards the horses in case they got scared and gallopped towards me and trampled me to death and I was scared enough being in a field with the horses in the first place as I used to think horses were friendly until someone on Twitter said her son’s girlfriend got attacked by one and had to go to hospital and so I walked slowly past the horses with what I hoped was my I’m-friendly-and-while-I-don’t-have-any-sugar-lumps-for-you-I-mean-you-no-harm face and the horses stared at me but didn’t look particularly interested in attacking me and then I got to the next field and at the end of the field was a toilet with a wooden seat and a basin and I wondered who dumped their bathroom in this field and then I wondered if I was near the gypsies house and then I was on the road and further along there was indeed the gypsies house with their lovely classy stone lions and stuff and all their gates were open and I was scared of their dog coming out and barking at me and chasing me down the road like it did to Shaun but no dog came out and a bit further up are some woods and I got to the woods and I went round the woods which didn’t take very long and then I had to decide which way to go as I’d only done about 2.75 miles and going back the way I had came wouldn’t have got me up to 6.2 miles but I decided to go back the way I had come and try and loop some more miles in and so I went back through the bathroom field but instead of walking past the horses again I went through a different field and up through another foresty bit and then I got to the road and I wondered if going on the road when I was supposed to be doing cross-country was cheating and I decided it was and so I turned right and went over what must have been the twentieth stile so far today and back through the fields I first went through and then I went down the cycle path as, even though it’s not really cross-country, it does feel like you’re in the countryside if you look to the fields to the right and not at the housing estate on the left and then I was back on the road and I decided to go through the park to finish up as there’s water there and Grim involves water and so although I wasn’t going to jump in it, I could at least incorporate some water in my run and so I went through the park and past the pond and I got out of the park and I did 6.2 miles in a very slow time but in my defence there were about sixty stiles to go over and a field of horses to walk through.

Stats
Distance: 6.2 miles
Time: a long time
Pace: slow
Calories: 531
Grims wimped out of: 1
Cats doing smelly, runny poos: 1
Boyfriends cleaning out litter trays: 0
Hours wasted until leaving the house: 2
Stiles climbed over: about sixty
Fields of horses walked through: 1
Fields with bathrooms in: 1
Forests: 2
Ponds: 1
Music
Toyah

On the eighth day of Juneathon, I went exploring

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Last night I dreamt I had a squirrel stuck up my nose. Not just his head up there with his little feet sticking out my nostril, but properly up there. In my dream I didn’t want to try pulling him out as I thought he’d be too big, so I left him up there and carried on with my day.

That dream is going to stick with me forever.

That dream wasn’t actually anything to do with Juneathon but I just wanted to share it (even though you’ve probably already read about it on Twitter or Facebook. Yes I’m one of those sad people who catalogues their every waking (or dreaming, in this case) moment via social media).

Still, as traumatised as I was, Juneathon had to continue. I decided to just do a couple of miles today, as I’m doing – for the fifth year running – the Crisis Square Mile Run on Thursday, along with Eating Trees and Fit Artist. This year’s bag-looker-afterer will be the Artist Formerly Known As Little Crutchey Man, aided by my friend Gary.

So off I went down the road and then I decided to go exploring down the footpath which isn’t a path at all

greensands way 023

and I think countryside people need to go and look up ‘path’ in the dictionary and all I can see is a field and I’m thinking do I just run round the field, or what? and then I come to a stile (is that the right spelling? It can’t be ‘style’, as countryside people have none)

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and I think aah, I’m allowed to cross over stiles without getting shot by ruddy-faced farmers and then I see a sign on it pointing the direction for the Greensand Way

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and I think hurrah, as I’ve been trying to find out where it is for ages and ages and so I decided to follow the Greensand Way, although not all the way, as it’s 108 miles long and then I’m in another field

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and then I cross over another stile and there’s a little bridge type thing

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and then another little bridge type thing

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and when I get over the little bridge type thing, lo! there’s a path!

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and I’m glad someone round here knows what a path is and I decide the field must belong to a Londoner and I decide this even more strongly when I get to the next stile and see it’s held together with barbed wire

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and there’s quite a nice view

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until I look to the right and see the housing development that reminds me I’m in Ashford

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because, like in London where you’re never more than six feet away from a rat, in Ashford, you’re never more than one hundred yards from a housing development, and then I get to the end of the field and there’s a road

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and although I don’t want to follow the Greensand Way any further, I’m wondering if I go right, will the road take me back? but I don’t want to climb over the stile, as it’s covered in stinging nettles

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and so I decide to go back the way I came

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and when I get to the next road I see a roundabout

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and although Ashford is the home of the roundabout, I think I recognise it and wonder if I should go back by road but I decide to continue back the way I came and I go back through the fields and back onto the road and my T-shirt is rising up in the wind and there’s someone coming towards me so I try to pull my T-shirt down but it doesn’t want to go down and so I suck in my stomach instead but I don’t want to flash my belly button as it’s a naked belly button as I had to have my belly button ring taken out as it went manky and the person coming down the road is a little old man and he smiles and I think aaah, nice little old man and he smiles back and then I get home and read up on the other Juneathon blogs and The Red Bucket has done a nice little pie chart and I think I WANT ONE and therefore he is my Juneathon Hero of the Day.

Stats:
Distance: 3.01miles
Time: 44:33
Pace: 14:48 m/m
Calories: 238
Dreams of squirrels being stuck up my nose: 1
Greensand Ways: 1
Stiles with barbed wire: 1
Stiles with stinging nettles: 1
Housing developments: 1
Roundabouts: 1
Little old men: 1
Nice little pie charts: 1