HUGGINS TOURS

Round London Highland Walk - Section IX

How Long Is A Piece of String   by Dave Smith

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Simon's Highland (and Lowland and Highland etc) walk. Start Date 3rd April 2005

Simon, Paul,Tony, Lyn and Molly meet up with the myself and the Railway Children - Stu, Sarah and Derek.

A little later this Sunday morning: The Blairs are getting up late at their weekend retreat - Chequers. They had stayed up late on Saturday working out whether it was 'black dress' for Friday's 'do' or a posh frock.

As they come downstairs and mooch around, they flick on TV and hop through the channels... BBC1, BBC2, ITV, CCTV... "oops what's that" says Cherie... "pass me the remote Tony"... We have some yokels crossing the minefield. I think the leader is a liberal (swinging the CCTV round to face Simon) I've heard of him -apparently he's always sitting on the fence and never gives a straight answer.

Tony B then urges Cherie to get dressed, saying... "Prescott will be here soon with his demonstration on how to avoid crowded buses".

Back to the walk...

As we successfully cross the minefield we are confronted with a Motorcycle being chased by about 40 cycles. To save Road space they all ride closely. They must have fantastic brakes as their stopping distance must have been inches.

To prove their skill, they wear clothes tighter than a labour budget.

As we make our way upstream, the cyclists continue down in sporadic groups.

We find the only pub in the first 11 miles, but Simon makes his only decision of the day and passes it. His followers have a choice: Die from malnutrition. Receive sustinance and get lost.

The former is chosen - as we still have our emergency rations to chew on. We last another mile before collapsing at Happy Valley. Here we sit on the hill top surveying the flatlands below. Local families are seen tobogannning downhill in their off-road '3 by 3' push-chair buggies. It is unclear whether the baby had been ejected from the conveyance at times of high 'G' force or whether the mother had repacked the valued offspring in her backpack.

As we munch through our load, Stuey (All Ozzies have names ending in 'y') reminisces about his time in Oz. Perhaps the hill reminds him of Uluru. Personally I can't say any connection with Star Trek's Communication officer.

I am informed by a local that the previous hillock we crossed was a burial ground and is surrounded by dikes. Today, the women in the area did not bear signs of such traits.

We continue and look back on the White chalk cross. It was so arduous Molly stuck a thorn in her paw to avoid the supposed 'last mile' of the walk. But crying wolf was to no avail as Tony removed the physical thorn. The metaphorical thorn was left holding Molly's lead.

Next Stu and Derek heard we were by Princes Risborough. Thinking this is the name of the local boozer, they convince Sarah her feet need a rest and avoid the 'last mile'.

At this point I should explain - the last mile lasted for 50% of the trip. I can only conclude Stokenchurch is on a seperate tectonic plate moving at greater than 4 mph or Simon's hands, jiggling away in his pocket, interfered with his pedalo-meter. Perhaps he used some old knicker elastic to measure the distance on his map.

This is why surveyors always get 3 quotes - you can't trust any one reading.

As we arrive in 'The City' we find our way to the 3 horseshoes. Tony decides he's knack.... - I mean very fatigued so convinces Lyn she needs a rest, so he doesn't look like a whimp. Simon, Paul and I know we are whimps. But we are also lazy and we know we have to make the last mile (which was about 1.5 miles by now) to get to the car. Red kites wheel above us awaiting our collapse.

As I write this, 1 week later, I find my scalp peeling from the intense sun we encountered. I believe our fatigue was down to our lack of fitness and stops for refreshment, rather than the distance/terrain.

I look forward to the next leg.