Into the storm.

Foxhill – Barbury Castle

You’d think the weather was a bit pissed off that I’d caught it snoozing along the preceding stretch, because the minute I passed through the Foxhill junction, the sun promptly disappeared behind a cloak of clouds and the wind bid me a glorious afternoon.

A friend had warned me that serious weather would be coming in near 5 pm, and despite it being a few hours away, it was patently clear Ma Nature had hurled that gauntlet like a javelin and the time for a comfortable onward journey had now concluded. Please return your tray tables and seats to an upright position and prepare for a bumpy landing.

As I crossed the M4, I searched for a spot to pause and layer up again, deciding a slab of grassy verge would fit the bill. After a reasonably quick turnaround I tried to get up, which, considering the level of activity I’d managed so far, would seem to be simple. Ah, but no. I can only wonder what the man headed towards me was thinking as I delivered my best overturned turtle impression, rocking forward once, twice, now three times, before I finally got off the ground with a grunt and embarrassed snicker.

Friendly Walking Guy told me he was relatively local and was out on a jaunt to explore Liddington Castle. I explained where I’d come from and where I’d yet to go, and he wished me well before heading off with a motherlode of energy that immediately made me reminisce about Ivinghoe Beacon.

Halfway up the first ascent, I remembered that I needed to negotiate a longer stay for my car at the Premier Inn, so stopped to ring the hotel, more worried than not that they’d give me grief. When I told the man who answered that I’d underestimated the time required for my journey along the Ridgeway, he clearly knew what I was on about and promptly allowed me another full week. I was endlessly grateful, but also wondered exactly how slow he thought I was moving.

The rutted single track caused my heels to rub a bit more energetically than I’d hoped, but once I reached the top I immediately felt a new sense of invincibility – I felt as if I were suddenly unshackled from what had always seemed some impossible-to-shake burden of failure and dashed hopes.

I was eminently conscious that every step I took was further than I’d ever gone before, and every inch I moved forward was that much closer to my ultimate goal. Still, I began to ensure that I took extra breaks whenever I needed, no matter what, to tamp down the residual pain and keep my head in check. I genuinely no longer cared about the clock. It was almost as if time had been reduced to a mere spectator, now only allowed to tag along on this day of destiny.

A reasonably flat boulder beckoned me for a sit down. Within minutes, a grinning passerby delighted in telling me all about his dog’s fascination with my back sign flapping in the rising wind. I smiled back at him, figuring as long as Precious Pup didn’t try to take a chunk out of it, I was more than happy with that level of participation.

I took a few photos and moved on but it wasn’t long before I realised I needed another sit down, as my feet still wanted a reset with the ‘let them freak out’ pose I’d invented back in Grim’s Ditch. The heavy queasiness and fatigue I’d felt that morning had long since vanished. Those memories of exiting that undulating, snaking nemesis were becoming wistfully sepia-toned, despite still being so fresh. Trails genuinely are real-life time machines.

I shook off the whisperings of a chill and continued along the path, in search of the stand of trees where I’d originally considered camping, before The Great Easter Monsoon put paid to my plans. Those trees and the bench alongside them were additional points along the trail that I’d long envisioned, but had since taken on an alternate reality. I discovered the rains had completely flooded the ground, turning the bench into a peninsula, so it was a side saddle or bust job if I truly wanted that sit down. My feet and my need for clear memories were in charge along this section, so I did the needful.

So many rests, and no one cared. I smirked at the absolute ridiculousness of checkpoints and cutoff times and arriving at places begging for bananas, when you can always just bloody well carry your own. I thought again about the idea that I am here. It is now. And a few minutes later it will also be now. And who cares how long I stay in either of these nows because they are mine and I am the bloody timekeeper today.

It was all such a massive scoop of wonderful with celebration sauce up there.

At last, down the hill I went, reaching a bit of open trail I’d photographed at length during my 50^th birthday run but had never since been able to place. Once again, I realised how different the surroundings looked this time of year as I entered an entirely unrecognisable flat section, just as my phone started singing from my pocket. I pulled it out to see it was my solicitor.

I could have been upside down on a rollercoaster at that moment and would still have taken the call, to be fair. I explained where I was, in the event that I was sounding a bit Jason Voorhees again, and kept walking as she told me about a new hiccup with my purchase. I dropped my head in frustration, and was instantly delighted to discover a discarded dog ball buried in the weeds in the middle of the path. I massaged the hell out of my arches during that call.

Timing really is everything.

Phone down, I forgot all about it in minutes as I made my way down the path, searching for the cosy, tree-lined descent just before Ogbourne St George. It didn’t take long to dawn on me just how long I’d been trying to make it to this point, and I wanted to savour it. I scanned the side for a reasonable spot to stop and inhale the scene. I sat down to take it all in.

I had no idea just how much it would mean. One minute I was trying to avoid sitting on a bunch of stones and the next, I was in absolute floods of tears.

I am HERE. It is NOW.

I’d had a particular idea all along about where I’d be when I truly believed I was going to make it, and what it would feel like when I got there, but something seemed to have moved the goal posts when I wasn’t looking. As I sat there sobbing uncontrollably, swabbing at my face, blowing my nose to the four winds so I’d not suffocate on all that emotion, I knew it.

I knew I was going to finish. Beyond any shadow of doubt, whatsoever.

After all those years of trying, and dreaming, and wondering what it would feel like, it all came to this.

This is what it feels like. This.

Perhaps the most incredible thing is that I cannot for the life of me recall another moment of fatigue for the rest of the journey. That realisation was like rocket fuel for the soul. Chimp Obliteration Potion. It just lit me up. It lit me up so much that I actually jogged down a lot of the descent into town, turning the corner, spotting the welcome under the bridge.

It is now alright, and it’s going down.

On autopilot, I took the right fork, up, up, now a dip, some traffic – more people who had no idea of how long I had taken to get here and why I probably looked like I was about to spontaneously combust. I reached a side road with a fingerpost telling me to go up to the right but the journey I know goes left. So I followed my nose, round and up still further, onward until I reached the gate to Smeathe’s Ridge. I looked skyward and pumped my fist.

We’re here, Pop. We made it.

And through the gate. The first one.

There were almost as many sheep along the trail as there had been diving worms back in the Princes Risborough farmland. Once again I found myself worried I’d worry them, so I took the low side of the trail, remembering that I should have gone high. How many recces and how many times had I made that error! The history of the journey so present, so large in my mind. I remember eating an orange that had tasted like the nectar of the gods, while powering my way through the last out and back I’d done here. I remember that first ever Race to the Stones 50k, walking along this ridge in 30 degree heat, my feet blistering as if we were traversing the surface of the sun. I remember my 50^th birthday, over there, along that fence line, the wind gusting and blowing the faith back into my heart after that gut-wrenching failure to finish two months prior.

But that was then.

I am here. It is now.

Now, rain. A drizzle. Check my watch. It's early. The wind blows that drizzle sideways. Without warning, now five times the rain. Now gusting. Five steps, now six, now the realisation that it's early and it's ON.

I dig behind me into the vest pocket for my poncho, yanking it out with the kind of energy you get when pace suddenly means the difference between More Waterproof and Shaking Crazies Part Three. Now the wind is gnashing its teeth, and as I open the poncho it’s blowing inside out and the wrong direction. Move myself around a bit to work with the wind, letting it blow the poncho open, now it’s like a sail, but I have to get under it, so I’m holding it up and doing a mad frantic limbo to dive inside. Now it’s stuck on my cap, hood at the side so half my face is covered and the arm holes are on my chest and back.

Streams of cursing. I’m dancing around like I’ve accidentally jumped into a hornet’s nest, where the fuck are these armholes, turning me, turning foil—

Cursing cursing cursi—

I’m in. I’m in. Fuck sake I’m in, where the hell did this rain come from?! Gah, wind! Fuck!

I catch the bottom of the poncho as it’s flapping around, making the most almighty racket like a herd of elephants dancing the cha cha on a bunch of empty crisp packets, shove poncho ends under the vest and—

…shhhhh it's suddenly a little bit quieter…

Onward, panting.

Onward, grinning. How strong am I? This is how strong I am.

Now.

It’s hammering down and I’m laughing. Hysterical laughter, louder than the rattling foil poncho, horizontal rain pushing me sideways so I zig zag my way up that ridge, drunk on the idea of a quest complete, further, further still, that mileage clocking up and I’m now seeing the cut out Ridgeway signpost at the top. I take my phone out and take the photo just as Hobs pings to remind me to take the photo I’ve just taken.

More laughter, more swearing at the puddle blocking the latest road, more movement and then I spot it.

The gate. The Barbury Castle Country Park gate.

That gate.

Only there IS no gate. The gate is missing. The way ahead is open. There is nothing in my way.

Now.

I text to tell Hobs they left it open for me, how nice of them. I type a laughing emoji and try it on my face for size. I’m grinning ear to ear and there’s nothing to do but pass on through.

How do you dooooo?

I reach the shelter in need of a rest and some food to get ready for the final stretch. I’ll forever be grateful I remember immediately that I need the duvet coat back on again or my body temperature will plummet. Off goes the poncho, the rain coat, the wet gloves. On goes the coat. In goes the food. The smile glued on, you could not kick it off.

I look with envy at the motorhome in the car park, knowing its inhabitants are warm and dry and potentially looking on at the mad woman with volumes of kit sprawled out on the bench. As I turn my head the other way, I see the sign.

Avebury 6.2 miles.

My decision to stop in Avebury is ridiculously easy to make, considering the difficulties I had the preceding two nights with the conditions. Things are deteriorating rapidly once again and I know that even the last 10k would be slow going and arduous given the terrain yet to come and the teeth in this storm.

With great pride and nothing remotely like regret, I tell friends I’ll be finishing my journey in Avebury.

Delighted to still possess some kind of appetite, I down another packet of olives and a few other snacks before kitting up for the final leg. I retrieve my waterproof mitts and debate whether I should put my sodden gloves back on or just go with the mitts with hope they’ll warm up as I walk. Wet still equals cold, so into the pack go the gloves and I kit myself back up with the mitts, six layers on top, two on my legs, three on my head, and a million layers of courage and faith encircling my heart.

For one last time, I strap on my pack, take a deep breath, and walk into the storm.

This is what we came for
And we couldn't want it any more
We could never turn back now
Got to leave it all on the floor

Been dreaming of the payoff
Through the struggles and the trade-offs
Fighting tooth and nail on the way up
Tell them the truth but they think it's just made up

And I think they got it all wrong
We just gotta hold on

And on, and on, and on…

- Legendary, Welshly Arms

(11 / x)

Prologue: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/in-search-of-inner-greatness.html

Part 1: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/why.html

Part 2: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/when-adversity-comes-calling.html

Part 3: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/once-more-unto-breach-dear-friends-once.html

Part 4: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/dream-big.html

Part 5: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/the-big-chill.html

Part 6: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/let-it-begin.html

Part 7: https://madmaxruns.blogspot.com/2024/04/keeping-faith.html