I Have Run, I Have Walked

Well, we've had a good weekend.... although in one way it has been a sad weekend. Good because Sarah and I have had enjoyed a lovely weekend of walking, with great weather, fabulous terrain and a really relaxing time, but sad because I've had to say farewell to a pair of faithful friends...

Yes, after 12 years and an unknown number of miles, on Saturday, 6 miles through our 11 mile walk, just as we approached the hostelry chosen for our lunch, the sole of my left boot decided to come away from the rest... and started flapping around and catching on the floor with every step taken.  What should we do, we wondered? After all, we were about as far from the start and end point as we were going to be, and whilst we had completed the relaxing stroll along the river we had planned to get ourselves going, we still had the more challenging trip back, over the hills to go -- and we were looking forward to the change of scenery. 

A bandaged boot...

A Steak and Onion baguette was beckoning, so we decided to worry about the boot after lunch. The barman informed us (wrongly as it turns out) that there were no buses on Saturday from there, so we had to choose either to fix the boot somehow, or spend a large amount of money on a taxi back to Ross on Wye, abandoning the second half of the walk and somewhat reducing the success of our walking weekend.

After some discussion, we decided to see what we could manage with the bandage from the first aid kit.... so after a little bit of trial and error from Sarah, the boot was "fixed", and we set off again, albeit with the taxi company phone number stored in the phone and a contingency route decided on to get us back to the road if things got worse. 

On we went, and actually, apart from a slightly hairy moment when the reduced grip made walking down hill on a concrete path a little slippery, I was doing okay. I actually started to think we would make it.... and then, the sole of my right boot started to flap, this time coming away from the rear... 

As we were on a footpath, midway between somewhere tiny and somewhere even smaller, we had no choice but to keep going, all the while looking out for a way back to the road, but wanting to keep on going, not to have to give up. There was no more bandages, and no way to fix the second boot, so I had to keep going with the flapping sole making walking a little uncomfortable. 

The further we went, the worse the flapping got, but the more I wanted to keep going... I decided I really didn't want to be beaten. Finally we came the point of no return. Two and a half miles from the end, we could either follow the road the rest of the way back, or complete the walk with the "big" hill that was at the end. The sensible option would be to stick to the road, but would I really be satisfied with that. Sarah was very good and left the choice to me, but eventually I decided that I wasn't going to beaten, so up and over we went...

It was hard, hard on my legs, hard on the bandage still holding the left boot (which started all these problems) together and hard on my increasingly dilapidated right boot. So hard in fact that somewhere halfway up the hill, the entire sole came off, and I found myself walking with little more than a piece of cardboard between my foot and the path!

and a sole-less one....

But little more could be done, and we walked on, down the other side of the hill and back into the town, where a walking shop (in fact the same one where the now destroyed and useless boots were purchased) enabled me to buy a new pair, so that we could actually continue our walking weekend properly. And so, not wanting to carry a useless pair of boots any further than we had to, my trusty old boots ended their life in a public bin, just outside the shop from which they were first bought, 12 years later...

The new boots were great, and although I probably walked a little too far in new boots today (and have the blisters to prove it), I was pleased with them. But even more so, I was pleased we had kept going, not given in and turned back, or taken the easy option, because the reward, and in particular the satisfaction of having completed the planned walk, despite the obstacles, made the pain and difficulty worthwhile. 

Paul commonly describes the Christian life as a race, but I like to think a cross country walk is as good an analogy, particularly one like this one with its many obstacles and difficulties. Like in Paul's race, we have to keep pressing forward, our eyes on the goal. The prize is not just the satisfaction of getting to the end, but instead those words of praise from our heavenly master "Well done, good and faithful servant!" a reward worth far more to me than any pain or difficulty along the way - and a much more worthwhile end than being unceremoniously dumped in the public bin!