Post-race walk with Claire

My fairly new Welsh medium colleague Claire had suggested an evening walk. She lives in a neighbouring village. That sounded like a good idea! Even when she suggested Monday, the day after my race. I always have post-race legs, but I thought a gentle stroll might even help with that. And the legs ended up in a lot worse state than I had anticipated! 

We would just do a stroll around Moel Faban, my standard running ground. And we agreed to meet at her place, which is more or less on the way. And it turned out she lives in the converted chapel there! I have run and biked past that so many times. I had no idea she lived there. 

I got there and she first showed me the place. In Welsh, of course. That was going to be the language of the walk. And the building was gorgeous! But she will be leaving it soon. Then we set off. If you walk around Moel Faban you spend the first half of the route going uphill. At my request we didn't take the steep route, but I still felt very creaky. I could really feel my legs. But at least this was gentle exercise, so it might even help keeping them flexible.

She also mentioned the famous stone that had is said to been used for sharpening stone arrowheads in the olden days. I said I was aware that it must be somewhere around, but I didn't know which one it was. I had never found the markings! But it turned out we were walking past it, and she showed me. Now I finally know! And in return I explained rock cannons to her, and told her about two locations in the area where you can find them.

Finally: the sharpening stone! 

We walked on. It wasn't raining too hard. And then at a dreaded moment we reached the highest point of our walk. And now the downhill would be a bit steep for a while. That was quite a challenge! My knees were not keen. But Claire had a lot of patience with me.

When we reached the very gentle path again it was like a switch had been flicked. Suddenly I was totally able-bodied again. Nice! The worst was over.

On the way I did get an opportunity to nerd out a bit about slate, and what reduction spots are. Claire is a biologist and she had been wandering about things like that.

We walked down through the Rachub High Street. And got caught up in another adventure! Some ill-advised young man had decided to try to turn off from that rather grandly named but very narrow road into an even smaller side ally. In a van. That doesn't work. But now he had ended up so close to the wall he was scared of scraping along it. Not something most car owners enjoy.

With Claire observing from the front of me from behind we managed to talk him out of his predicament. It was so close! It took a while before he had managed to put more than a centimetre between the van and the wall. But in the end he got away with only his pride damaged. He was so relieved! And we continued our way.

Back at the chapel we had a cup of tea, and then I went back home. I had done some 5 km on my very old legs! And had a lovely time with Claire. We both expressed the intention to do this more often, so watch this space!