A few final numbers

By Juli

Hurrah!  We did it!  Never in any doubt.  

So what did we do?

Overall we walked 131.9 miles of The Thames Footpath, from Oxford Osney Bridge to The Thames Barrier, so a little bit further than we originally calculated.

Then there were all the incidental miles - to the B&B from the river, to find somewhere to have supper, to find a loo in the O2 arena, to get to the station or from the station to our starting point for the day -  that brough the total up to 145 miles, although sometimes it felt further.

We set ourselves the target of raising £1500 for Macmillan and thanks to all of you we have done that handsomely.  Currently we have raised 115% of our target, which is the total of £1733.  Brilliant.  But with all of the gift aid the grand total is £2083.  Fantastic!

We stayed in 5 B&Bs or hotels and would recommend them all even though they were all very different. We were based at my Mum's for 5 nights and appreciated having supper cooked for us every night and  being able to make our sandwiches every day.

It was sunny for 9 days out of 10, and heaved down with rain for 1 day, the last one as you will see from the photos.  I was wearing 5 layers and was still soaked to the skin.

In terms of hours walked, we did 70.1 in total which if we had just walked would have been very nearly 3 days.

Funnily enough, the some of the  longest days walking were some of the shortest in miles but were also the days when we had company and were chatting as well as walking and looking.  Thank you for your company. We really enjoyed all the conversations we had.

We expended 10756 Kcals over the 131 miles.  Sounds great, but we didn't add up how much we took on through the great English breakfast, hot chips and turkey & pate sandwiches, not to mention cream teas and pints of bitter!

We went under or over 69 road and rail bridges, including three motorways. (M4, M25 and M3).  We nearly took a ferry in Shepperton, but because it was the bank holiday, they didn't start until 10am, when we wanted to cross at 9am so we had to do the alternative route via Walton Bridge.

We went past 37 locks and saw boats in nearly all of them.

We had to take 2 diversions because of the flooding and saw countless sandbags, as well as several boats on the footpath or otherwise casualties of the flood water.  It could have been much worse.  We really felt for all of those who had suffered as a result of this year's flooding.

On average the number of wee stops in a day was about 6.  (For both of us - unusual for those of you who know the legendary strength of Nick's bladder!) Coffee and tea stops, about 3 a day.

Blister plasters used: 6. Mashed toenails: 2 on the main walk and 2 on practice walks.  Visits to Boots: 3.

But we survived and will be planning our next adventure soon.

Day Ten

By Nick

This was going to brief because a) it's late, b) I'm tired and c) I've been drinking. However, on rereading, I see I've written quite a bit, and there aren't even any photographs to break it up. Sorry about that; I'll add some tomorrow.

It rained today. Quite a lot, in point of fact. We got rather wet, which may have effected our view of today's walk and the things we saw. That said, when it wasn't raining, we again saw some great sights, including things I'd not seen before. Walking along the South Bank was lovely, as was suddenly coming upon the golden hind amidst all the little lanes around London Bridge.

 

 

 

 

 

However a large part of the day was spent away from the Thames. Sometimes following a permanent deviation, but more often than not, a series of poorly marked, temporary detours around new building work.

Halfway round the big loop in the river that forms three sides of the Isle of Dogs is Greenwich Reach, where you can find The Cutty Sark, Gipsy Moth, the Old Naval College, the National Maritime Museum and the Old Brewery, where we ate our lunch.

 

So far, so good, but after Greenwich, the character of the riverside changes dramatically, as you leave 'Tourist Town' and enter an altogether different environment: one of an industrial, somewhat rundown, dirty and decidedly scruffy stretch of working riverbank. There are vacant plots here with no development in progress. There's an aggregates business that was working even on Easter Sunday. There are industrial estates, wharves and jetties that have nothing to do with leisure or housing. This is the rough and ready, scarred, littered and ugly, unbeautified counterbalance to all that has gone before. In truth, we didn't belong here. This is a part of London visitors aren't meant and don't want to see, and walking through it was a little uncomfortable. Even the stretch around The O2, while it's being redeveloped, is not for tourists' eyes, but isn't screened off as all the central London developments upstream are.

 

 

 

Whether it was our ill ease or the now torrential rain, or the knowledge that we had just two more miles to go, our pace quickened when we rounded the Greenwich Peninsula and the Thames Barrier came into sight. The rain began to ease and then stopped. Not long now, we told each other. Not much further, we told our aching limbs. Then, as we rounded the final bend, standing at the end of the path, was a small group of people holding a banner and waving flags. There, bearing gifts of beer and chocolate, was a welcoming party comprised of our best friends Richard & Gill, Marion & John. What a brilliant surprise, what a fantastic finish to our walk and what a sight for sore eyes.

 

 

From the barrier, we drove back to Greenwich for reviving coffee and cake, and from there, after saying thank you and goodbye to Richard & Gill, Marion & John drove us back to Juli's Mum's, where Champagne and an excellent feast awaited.

I'll most probably do a roundup post tomorrow, but, for now, sufficient to say: job done.

TTFN - N