The Conclusions of 2018

Wrapping the 2018 Season 

at Morley Hole.

Another Walking Season has resolved, my seventh, and still doing this with such regularity is something that my 2012 self surely wouldn't have believed possible, and as 2018 passes into memory, we're all still here too, which would surprise my 2017 self just as much as it does me now, and with that thought still our heads we have to ponder the question that always comes to mind at this time of the year, What Have We Learned in 2018? As ever, the season has to be regarded as a whole, and the thought pondered, Was it a Success or Not? and as ever, the answer is a resounding yes, with the important qualification for next year being Don't Plan So Much as the itinerary that I walked though the year has ended up looking little like the list that I compiled back in February. That's just as much Don't Add So Much to Your Schedule as it is Spend A Lot Less Time Plotting, as both of them are issues that have come up during the 2018 season, as my plans for last year totalled more than ten bullet points, which was far more than needed as new plans arrived on my schedule as the season progressed while others got dropped and forgotten about. So despite best intentions, a six week tour in and around Malhamdale never got onto the schedule, and I never got close to doing anything around Bradford and the territories around, while the failure to do the Witton Weavers Way should come as no surprise at all, but on the other hand, I never had any intention to head into the Washburn valley until I became familiar with the Dalesbus timetable and so many other schemes ended up taking many more weekends than had been expected. Seven years in an I still seem to be surprised how few walking days I have in a season, really not many more than 40, and thus having a lot less time to utilise than I always anticipate, especially with a quarter of them being away from home, thus the planning is necessary to get the season off the ground, projecting the long walks for the high season, and plotting the logistics for holidays away, but otherwise, the plan needs to be to relax and just let the season take you where you fancy, not to spend your time trying to fit as many routes into far too few days annually.

Your Foot Shouldn't Do This.

As the season has progressed, I have also discovered that Getting Healthy is Hard Work, which really shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone, as anyone who has started a new dietary regime or a weight loss programme would tell you, but after starting the year with the idea of shedding some bulk and getting my weight down from a seasonally padded 77kg and trumpeting great progress by Easter had me thinking that it might prove to be a bit of a breeze. I honestly should have known better as shedding the first 4 kilos was pretty straightforward thanks to the total elimination of snacking from my lifestyle, coupled to the shift out of Winter that makes my body realise it doesn't need the extra fat retention for my hibernation period. The regular long walking days, coupled with plenty of busy - busy at work ensured that a steady weight loss continued going into the High Season, managing to bottom out at 71 kilos in Mid August, but unfortunately such progress couldn't be maintained, and difficult slump in moods through the final third of the year caused me to slip back into bad habits, and the snacking resumed, causing the weight to come back on, and the post-Christmas binge has me sitting at around 74+kg, which is a lot heavier than I'd like to be, indicating that a lot more focus will be necessary in the coming year to get myself down to somewhere to a healthy mass for my height - weight, which should be around 68 kilos. This is one story that will probably run on into 2019, but hopefully my foot issues won't as that was something that came out of nowhere last year and I honestly hope to never experience again, as it took me 3,000+ miles of walking to experience blistering and it's not something I'd care to experience again, as I'd thought I was impervious and it made me rather anxious that some other health issue might have been a contributing factor. Fortunately, my leathery soles, well tempered by being on my feet all the time, protected me well against the risk of rubbing myself raw, and the pains of stretchy skin were the worst that I had to experience, and after losing two layers through the Spring, things finally calmed down thanks to the application of gel pads to my insoles and acquiring myself some better walking socks than the ones that I'd been going with, and retiring Pair of Boots #5 as my Down Country pair also proved to be in order, replacing them with Boots #6, so that future trails around Leicestershire might not afflict the damage which they did to me along the way.

Let's Recall the Good Times, Down 

Country, with My Parents in 2018.

Ultimately, though the main takeaway from Season #7 is that 2018 Will Probably Not Linger in the Memory, in part because despite all the miles put down it didn't especially expand my horizons around West Yorkshire that much as I mostly walked in between points previously seen rather than moving the borders of my walking field outwards, indeed it has probably been the most contained of all my seasons so far, as I largely stuck close to places I knew, far less adventurously than before. The tour around in Leicestershire can be counted as the real success of the year, as it showed my much of the county that I'd never really encountered before as even with two decades of growing up there and travelling around extensively, I'd not seen much of the far east of the county, beyond our regular stomping grounds, and parts of the southwest had never been seen at all where the M69 or the old Fosse Way had been our sole points of contact. Those revelations were hugely satisfying as was the fact that My Mum managed to taxi me out to all parts of the Leicestershire Round path, and that My Dad was able to travel out with us, and the sad fact of the year is that seeing his deteriorating condition is why I feel that this year will be one to largely forget. Since his initial brain haematoma and hospitalization in 2015, and his later diagnosis of Parkinson's disease in 2017, this has been the year that has really seen his condition worsen, with him no longer being able to walk more than a very short distance with his frame, thus relying on a wheelchair out of the house and becoming virtually seatbound indoors, his continence has also gotten markedly worse and while still able to feed himself, he needs his food to be carefully cut up for him with mealtimes sometimes taking well over an hour at a time. Aiding him to bed daily whilst staying with my folks has illustrated just how much of a handful he can be, and the amount of physical effort that is needed to man-handle him, which gives me such a clear of why My Mum can be physically and emotionally exhausted caring for him, but he's hanging in there and still leading something that resembles a normal life, as well as seeming a lot more like himself during my visits in November and December than he did during those bizarrely hot and tiring days of the Summer.

Add Pair of Boots #7 to the 

Walking Company of #6 & #6b!

That's not altogether a positive sort of takeaway for 2018, but it's really been a trial for us all, with the walking having become something of a compulsion rather than an entertainment feature this year, as I have toiled myself in ways not experienced for a long time, as work has been difficult with the usual issues of there being more to do in the department than we have people to do it, and even with service changes coming in the hospital to reorganise our work load, it hasn't prevented me ending virtually every day feeling utterly exhausted. That's not just physical tiredness though, as I've also been in a deep mental funk for most of the last third of the year, a grey mood having settled on me to give me the hardest period of emotional toil; that I have endured since 2004, when I almost drove myself into a nervous breakdown, and familiarity with my past troubles can surely be the only reason that I've managed to hold myself together this year. Couple this to difficulty sleeping, what feels like the onset of tinnitus and a lasting anxiety about the state of the contemporary world and you don't find me in a particularly good place as we put 2018 away forever, I'd hoped that the long break from walking through The Dark Season would provide me with a chance to unwind some, but that really hasn't been the case as my mental focus is so much worse than it has been, and my batteries are resolutely refusing to recharge. Still, I can't write this year off as a failure, as it's been a good walking year along the river valleys and over the high moors, as well as around the county of my birth, and my strength to do that has endured, despite getting more muscular tweaks than I'm happy with and almost shredding one of my soles along the way, the walking has been for my mental benefit as ever, and if I hadn't bothered with it, my condition would surely be exponentially worse. I've got to look forward to the new year, anyway, as it has to offer me more days on the trail, even if it offers literally nothing else, so you'll probably see me out and about once the daylight returns, and hopefully find me here to tell you about it if I can really get my will to write going again (the last three months of writing have been an absolute trial, a virtually joyless endurance test), and as I've now got a fresh pair of boots to wear (Pair #7!) thus we can look forward to wherever Season #8 might lead me around this county and country, due to start on February 9th.

5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 3650.4
2018 Total: 537.9 miles
Up Country Total: 3257.3 miles
Solo Total: 3364.1 miles
Miles in My 40s: 2244.2 miles