As is tradition with us, the person celebrating their milestone gets to choose where they go- as there is no Ellenbrook Fields we have tended to spread out celebrations a bit.
Dad chose Bury Fields as we loved it last time, and a bonus is that it is close to where Brian (his cousin) lives, so we could meet up with him too. My brother even came along!
Bury Fields is a gem of a parkrun- it’s one lap over flat fields, (well fairly flat), parking is right by the park and also right by the town centre (and it’s free), it has such a friendly feel with a small number of participants so you can chat to people. If it was closer it would probably always be my chosen one as it ticks so many boxes. It’s around a 45 min drive from my parents though so we are not doing that journey regularly when we have so many closer ones.
The four of us at the finish/ finish token/ new and old parkrun barcode band
We had arranged to meet in the car park at 8:30 and it was still raining at that point so we sat in the car and caught up for a bit . Brian had recently run the Great South Run in his goal time of under 2 hours- amazing! We then braved the rain and walked over to the field. It turned out it was their first birthday too- such a coincidence! Thankfully the rain stopped as there is no shelter on the fields.
We listened to the new runners welcome, and Brian mentioned to the RD that we had come to celebrate a 250th, so Dad got a clap in the main briefing too.
Then we were off. Dad, my brother and I ran together, with Brian wanting to set his own pace. (This was around a week or so before his 80th birthday so he is just so impressive). The one lap course keeps heading back to a central point before heading out, so it makes a pretty map (maybe like butterfly wings?), so there are a few points where you pass other runners. The three of us crossed the finish line in order of most to least parkruns, and then we scanned in and waited for Brian.
I’d given Dad a 250 barcode band to celebrate, so I was very relieved when the results came through and it scanned properly (I had the same worry the week before at Blickling when I tried my own band for the first time- even though I double and triple checked the barcode number I was still paranoid that somehow I’d typed them in incorrectly).
After scanning in, we headed to the high street and went for breakfast in a little cafe (we went there last time we went to Bury Fields too)- a toasted teacake and hot tea for me was perfect. The whole morning was just a great way to celebrate- it’s so nice to have a reason to all get together.
How do you like to celebrate milestones?
