Local parkruns to keep the tourist streak going!

A few weeks ago I was looking at the 5K app (the purple one, that incidentally is going to be the official parkrun app from December), and noticed that I was on my highest ever tourist streak (the number of different parkrun locations attended in a row). It’s not a challenge I have actively chased before, but previously my highest streak was 12 runs, so I was surprised to be on 18 without really focusing on it. With some tourism to Peckham Rye already in the diary (a few weeks ago) and more tourism coming up at the start of October, I decided to try to keep the streak going. This meant that for the final two weekends of September I could not repeat an event that was already in that tourist streak.

The streak started back in April when I went to North Walsham while we had a weekend in Norfolk, and then includes some local events (I will put these in bold) and some tourist trips:

North Walsham, Victoria Dock, Hackney Marshes, Pymmes, Ben’s Yard, Tokoinranta, Haga, Jersey Farm, Panshanger, Beckton, Letchworth, Preston Park, Jubilee, Egham Orbit, Clermont Waterfront, Harrow Lodge, Cassiobury, Irchester Country, Peckham Rye.

Often I’d easily repeat either Panshanger or Jersey Farm in between tourist trips, but for various reasons I’d not. A few of the trips were spur of the moment- sometimes I joined in with some OH ladies (Pymmes/ Cassiobury/ Irchester), some of them were planned trips for Cowell celebrations (Preston Park and Egham Orbit), some were while on holiday (Finland/ Sweden/ USA), but somehow I just had managed not to repeat any in all these months.

I also try to run with Dad when he is around, but happily he was keen to repeat venues rather than go to new ones as he is close to his Cowell (100 different parkrun locations) but doesn’t want to end up doing that while he is away. So last weekend we went to Oaklands College parkrun- it’s around a 1.2 mile run from where my parents live, so I drove there and then we ran up and back for a parkrun sandwich. I’d only been there to take part 3 times before (and once to marshal), despite it being so close, so it was very enjoyable to revisit. The ground is still quite rutted so for some of it we had to run single file rather than next to each other, so the chatting was harder, but it was enjoyable as always.

This Saturday I opted for St Albans parkrun. This was where parkrun started for me, and my brother decided to come along with us too which was fab. The weather was amazing- beautiful blue skies, calm air, perfect running weather. The last time I was there was April 2024, but the course was the same- out through the park along flat paths, into an old golf course where you do 2 undulating laps, and then back onto the flat path to go back to the start/finish area. The car park there charges from 9:30am onwards (and you could not just buy an hour, you had to get a minimum of 3 hours), so Dad was very tempted to not get a ticket, but I am glad I still got one as the run didn’t start bang on 9, and there was a bit of a queue in the funnel as we finished in the busiest section, so when I looked at my watch it was already 9:36 before we scanned. It meant we could take photos by the pop up and hang around the finish area for a bit- we ended up chatting to a few other runners and of course taking a few photos for other people too.

So, two more parkrun mornings complete, and two more venues added to the tourist streak! I don’t think I will be able to continue it all the way through October, as it is Panshanger’s birthday at some point and I do like to go to that. I have a few local events that are not in the streak yet, including Stevenage and Westmill, but there are 4 weekends to fill between that and my next parkrun tourist trip so I don’t think I can stretch it out.

Next up- some tourism involving some train travel- I am very excited about this! All will be revealed soon!

Do you use the 5K app? Are you excited that it will be an official parkrun app soon? What changes would you like to see?