Maria Runs - parkrunning and touring since 2013!

The house move

The house move feels like it has been in the works for so long. Before Christmas we said that in the new year we would talk about moving house, and at the start of January we put our house up for sale to see if it would sell, and go from there. It turned out that the housing market was very competitive (good for us as sellers, not so good for us as buyers). We sold very quickly, and then began the painful process of trying to find somewhere to buy. Around here all the estate agents host open house sessions (we did for our sale, as that was what they all said they would do)- a couple of hours, 15 minute slots, as many buyers in that time. Once we were looking, it turned out that often the slots would be full on the day of the house going on the market. After a few open houses, one rejected offer, a day seeing lots of houses and none of them being quite what we were after, we struck lucky. In half term a house came up which looked perfect. We rang up and the owners weren’t doing an open house, and even better we could see it on the Friday- if it had not been half term I would not have been able to go. It was perfect, we put in our offer at about 2pm and then had a very nervous few hours before the call at 6.30 confirmed that our offer had been accepted!

Our old house

Then of course came all the boring legal and logistical bits. Our chain was short (our buyers were first time buyers moving from home, and the people we were buying from were moving to an empty property) but of course things were not simple. Originally our moving date was the 12th of May (so we could then book our South Africa trip) but it got pushed back a few times. Anyway, it’s all done now!

As I mentioned before, I found Mary’s blog post very helpful. We had been given some boxes so we packed a lot of things away and left them in Andy’s parent’s spare room. I had a notebook to record what was in each box. We sorted out the internet so we knew we would be having only a few days without it, changed addresses on some things, and set up the mail re-direct (although I didn’t realise it took 5 working days, and only set it up the weekend before so a few things slipped through). We had hired a moving company, so they had given us many more boxes and we ended up stacking them in the garage (and me parking outside) because in our old house once a few boxes were packed there was no way to get around them.

The movers were meant to arrive “from 8am”- so of course we had a late night and an early start frantically doing the last few things (including finding late on Monday night that the plumber who had fixed a small issue with the heating the previous week had knocked all of the Christmas decorations our of reach in the little attic space- we only have a small ladder so in the end had to move a chest of drawers for Andy to stand on so he could get up there and reach them down), but then they actually turned up at 9am. They were really good- they had to carry all the furniture downstairs, plus any boxes we had left up there. They took apart the bed but somehow managed to keep our wardrobe together and got it down the stairs without any of them falling to their deaths- there were some tense moments!). I hovered about with the hoover- I was shocked at how much dust there was behind some of our furniture! Once it was all in the van we had to hang about a bit as they were ready but we could not collect the keys straight away. We headed off to get the keys and they met us at our new house- when we arrived they had already unloaded the plants which was very efficient.

Then the fun of deciding where things were to go started. We had decided all boxes for downstairs could go in the dining room, and all the upstairs boxes went into one of the spare rooms. The movers put the bed back together which was brilliant- when we moved into our first place we had a lot of Ikea furniture to build and one of my main memories of that day was us building the bed late at night so we had somewhere to sleep. At one point Andy was sorting the garden and I was just waiting, so I went around and checked that all the lights worked (another Mary tip)- I found that 1- they love their colour changing bulbs, and 2- there was no switch for the bathroom (and we hunted high and low, in the hall, in the airing cupboard…). It turned out that the bathroom has a sensor, only activated when it is dark, which is rather annoying as it switches off after a couple of minutes- not great when you are having a shower and not near the sensor! The bathroom lights are also multicoloured and colour changing- something we will change quite soon.

Our dining room- looking much better now as most of the boxes are behind and at least we can sit at the table.

The movers finally left at 4pm- we had not stopped all day so had a break for some belated lunch, before trying to unpack the essentials. I had sorted an “open first” box but then with the movers unloading everything it took us a while to find it! I had packed some teabags to last us the first few days, and I am very glad I did as we didn’t find the tea straight away. We went out for dinner later, as we did not fancy cooking!

Our back garden! It’s been lovely to come back from a run and cool down here- our old place had a garden but you had to go through the garage so we didn’t use it much.

The next couple of days were not very productive as I had meetings after work both days, and then we were off on holiday, but the Sunday when we came home was brilliant (only one hour time difference so no jet lag)- we unpacked so many boxes, put the Christmas decorations in the loft, emptied our suitcases, set up my desk in my office and arranged the kitchen. I’ve been ticking off the boxes as we unpack them (I get huge satisfaction from ticking off lists) but we sometimes do forget.

There are many boxes still to unpack here too, but at least I can get to my desk now.

I love the willow tree in our garden. But we also have two (including one massive) leylandii trees which will need to go as they block out so much light.

I now have a whole host of new running routes too, but that is for another post!

How many times have to had to move house? We moved once when I was 12, then when Andy and I moved in together we moved out of our parents homes so that was fairly easy. I lived at home during uni so I really did not have much experience of it.

Cape Town!

So we had a bit of a stressful week- moving house on a Tuesday is not the easiest of days, needing work things right up to the last minute, and the day after. It was made a bit more stressful because on Friday night after work we were flying to Cape Town! It was a bit of a last minute trip, as Andy needed to go there to meet some colleagues. As our move was meant to be the 12th of May, and he was able to combine the trip with some leave (if he wanted to, so I could join him), we booked it for half term (only at the end of April I think- very last minute for us!). Then our move was moved back one week (20th), and then again to the following Tuesday. We could not have moved much later! It meant we packed as much of our holiday suitcases before we moved, so we were not frantically trying to find things in boxes. Although my little tube of germoline went missing, and at Heathrow my bag was not accepted in the x-ray machine as there was something there. Turns out the tube was right in the bottom of my rucksack- no idea when I put it there!

Anyway, the flight was really good – it was 12 hours overnight but we had the exit rows which meant lots of leg room. It didn’t take off until 10pm, and after a busy week we were both shattered and went to sleep straight away. It is only one hour time difference which really helped- no jet lag!

After a quick change in our B&B, we were off to Table Mountain. You could hike, but it looked steep and we didn’t have that long, so we got the cable car. We had a long walk around at the top, admiring the views.

After heading back down we were being picked up by Andy’s boss, who was taking us (along with other people from his company) out to dinner at a vineyard. We arrived just as the sun was setting- it was stunning.

On Sunday morning we had booked a tour because I really wanted to see the penguins, having never seen them in the wild before. The tour went to a few places along the coast, including the Cape of Good Hope. The coastline was beautiful and dramatic- a bit like Big Sur in California.

Before finally getting to Boulder’s Beach and the penguins!

I could have watched them for hours- I love how they waddle along. Our tour then took us back to Cape Town, where after a little rest we headed out for some dinner. I did wonder about veggie options as they do seem to love their meat, but we found a nice burger bar that had a few homemade veggie patties, and lots of salad options too. We shared guacamole for starter which was freshly made and mashed at our table in front of us.

We shared this brownie for dessert- it was very good!

On Monday Andy was popping in to work so I went on the Big Red Bus tour. It is a hop on hop off bus, and one route was a loop around the bottom of Table Mountain, along the coast and to the waterfront.

I got off at one of the beautiful beaches, but I got a bit accosted by people trying to sell me their artwork (which was impressive, but I wasn’t going to buy any of it)- it reminded me a bit of Turkey as the people were a bit more pushy than I am used to. I rode the bus the rest of the way, looking for where we should get off later when Andy joined me.

I had a lovely wander around the V&A waterfront, and a very good lunch.

Veggie and hummus sandwich, and rooibos tea of course! I then headed back, as Andy was on his way back from meeting people at work (they had been out for lunch) and so we did the bus tour again, this time getting off at a later beach and walking along as the sun was setting.

The next morning we were up early to catch a flight to Jo’burg, but I will save that for another post…

Packing and parkrunning

Are a bit of a tiring combination!

This weekend was the inaugural Ellenbrook Fields parkrun (look it up if you are in Hertfordshire)- our running club had a lot to do with setting it up, particularly our super coach Carrie. A lot of our club were going to be there, whereas often there are only a few of us at parkrun each week. It was novel for me because the start is jut over a mile away, so I could run there instead of driving. I got up a bit later, pottered about and then jogged up to the start. I wore my hat because it had been raining, but I didn’t need it in the end. There were loads of people swarming towards the start- I knew it would be busy as word seems to spread quickly through our running community- there are lots of running clubs nearby, and plenty of towns with clubs but no parkruns (Welwyn, Ware, Harpenden to name a few), plus they had mentioned it a lot of times at Panshanger as the Panshanger team had mentored the Ellenbrook team and been involved in helping with the start up too.

Our club had a banner out near the start. We love a bit of extra support.

I was there at about 10 to in the end, so had a quick chat with a few of the marshals and runners from our club, before Carrie did a super welcome speech from a fence (as it’s so flat there- no nice hill for her to stand on).

Then we were off! I realised right away I had started a bit too far back, but I wasn’t going for any pb (of course the first official one would be my pb for that parkrun)- I quite liked the idea of beating my time from last week but as I had already run up (and used my Garmin) I could not really work that out. Anyway, the course starts with a little loop (around a km I think), and so during that I took my time overtaking a few people at a time. It was so lovely because I knew most of the marshals (by name too, not just by sight) and so they were cheering all of the OH runners on by name too. I saw a few OH runners up ahead so ran to catch up, and the after chatting for a bit heard someone else call my name- it was someone I used to run at Sweatshop with- I don’t think we had seen each other for over a year, so it was good to have a little chat. Once the first little loop is done, you do the first part of it again before carrying on in a much larger loop. By then it had thinned out and so I could focus on where was best to run (the ground is a bit uneven). I may be biased but the best marshal (the lovely Donna, my run leader) was yelling at the top of her lungs at around the half way point. Her opinion (which I agree with)- no point being a marshal unless you’re going to encourage people on. She certainly did!

Nearly both feet off the ground I think!

Then it was through the cow field, and along a very rutted bit of grass, where I caught up with someone I know a bit through the facebook DRYT (Did You Run Today?) group, and Strava, so we said a quick “hello”. Then (passing two more lovely OH marshals) it was onto the old taxiway (Ellenbrook fields used to be an old airfield) to the finish. I ended up running next to a guy who chatted to me for a bit, and then up ahead I could see a few more OH runners (one of them is a very fast runner so I did wonder about my time at that point) so I decided to try and speed up a bit to catch them. I could not quite manage it, and crossed the line 2 seconds behind one of them (and 10 seconds behind the speedy one) with a time of 27.52. I am rather pleased with that- I have only run quicker than that once this year (my pb at Panshanger) and because of the crowds at the start I wasn’t pushing it as much as I could.

Look at the huge queues for scanning! There ended up being 273 runners, not too shabby for the first event. The tail runner came in at 41 minutes too, so a very speedy one (I think I have been around 55 minutes for my tail running).

I stayed around until the end, chatting to people from my club, and cheering in the other runners. One person gave the RD feedback about there not being any km markers (I had wondered but I also thought perhaps they were there and I didn’t notice them- Carrie said that they didn’t get any as they are not included, but they are in talks with the owners of the land to have permanent ones- I think I have seen pictures from a few National Trust ones which have them, and I think it’s a fab idea. When I decided to head home (packing loomed) I passed Neil and Eleanor Draper (they are from Garden City Runners and I often see them at Panshanger- they were interviewed on marathon talk before – lovely and inspirational people)- so I asked them how they had found it they had really enjoyed the route which was good to hear. It’s strange as since running around those fields with Sweatshop it’s one of my favourite summer running places, but I suppose lots of people still don’t know about it.

Also, I love looking at the results, and it was great to see that it was parkrun number 1 for so many people- hopefully one of many! That was my 8th different parkrun venue (70th run)- I heard someone say that once you have been to 20 different ones you count as a parkrun tourist! A few more to go then! Although there is one at Stevenage starting next weekend, but I don’t think I’ll be able to get up there until July as I am either away or volunteering at St Albans, Panshanger and Ellenbrook. Busy times ahead!

So, onto the packing. We’re moving house on Tuesday this week, and some boxes were delivered on Friday so that was basically our weekend planned for us! We had packed up a few boxes before, but had soon run out of space to store the packed boxes. Yesterday I parked my car outside so we have spent the day packing, and putting the boxes into the garage (I normally keep my car in the garage). We had to pop out to get a few bits of food for the next couple of days, and I bought us a cinnamon swirl from Starbucks to share as an afternoon treat after a lot of packing. This was very much needed- perhaps running 5 miles was not the best preparation. Mary’s page about moving has been very useful and I’ve been writing all the boxes down in a note book (although we are getting a company to actually move the things), and we are now up to box number 40. How do we have this much stuff? And where did it all fit? I’ve also been trying to do things like change my address for a few places- we have signed up to the Royal Mail re-direction as I am sure things will slip through the net.

Any moving tips?

Track session round 2

This is a rewind to last weekend! Our club had hired out the local track (at 8am on a Sunday), and then we were heading to brunch afterwards in case anyone needed more of an incentive!

It was such a hot morning, and of course there is no shade around the track, so our leader decided to ease off on us a bit.

Pictures from our facebook page- look at the concentration!

We did plenty of warming up- a jog around the track, lots of kicks, jumps, lunges and other things (very technical terms here).

Then we did a version of what we had learnt before- a 3-2-1 session where you run at 10k pace for 3 minutes, 5k pace for 2, and then as fast as you can for 1, with breaks in between. We only managed this a couple of times before it was time to cool down, stretch (including laying on the track!) and head out to brunch.

It was really good fun! Hopefully our club are going to have a more regular session (they mentioned once a month) which would be great as we do sometimes do interval style training, but it’s much easier on a track than on uneven pavements where you have to dodge people and dogs and things too.

We had booked at Bill’s (the same as our festive run and brunch) and it was lovely to have a chat- some of the ladies had run the London marathon so it was good to hear their tales (mostly- as someone who avoids public toilets at all costs I did not like the sound of the she-wee things in the starter pens…). It was so warm I went for a juice instead of my regular breakfast staple of tea, and had the most delicious French toast with a chocolate peanut butter sauce, fruit and a berry sauce- it was so good.

Although I turned my Garmin off, it seemed to keep tracking where I was, as it tracked my drive into town, and then my drive home- more records I shall never beat….

Also, look what arrived earlier in the week! A marathon talk hoodie! It has my Brighton time on it from last year- I really wanted a Brighton marathon hoodie but I didn’t want to buy one before, just in case it was bad luck. Then they stopped selling them on-line, so decided to get my MT one personalised. I love it! Although it is very huge- I emailed them as there was no size guide on the Xempo website, and they thought a small would be OK, but it is very large and I think if I were to get another one, I would try the XS. Better to be too big than too small though.

And this came too! I had signed the two of us up for the May the Fourth virtual run, as Andy is a big Star Wars fan- it was a couple of days after the Cakeathon so I didn’t run very fast, but it’s the doing it that counts. Good old Virtual Runner UK!

Are you a fan of track sessions? What is your ideal brunch food (and drink)?

A parkrun double!

I was really looking forward to this weekend! Today our club members (and friends and family) were all invited to the final tester event of our new parkrun, before the inaugural event next weekend. It didn’t start until around 10am, and would not count towards our parkrun totals, so when I mentioned this to Dad we decided to aim for a parkrun double (like they do on New Years Day). We would go to Panshanger (9am start) and run it, then jump back in the car and head to Hatfield for the 10am start.

We got to Panshanger with plenty of time and managed to park fairly near. They have slightly changed the start and finish now, to try to ease congestion. The start is narrower which I think in theory should help, but we started fairly near the back as we wanted to take it steady, and we had a lot of stop-starting still. We chatted the whole way around and enjoyed it. The change to the end meant instead of running straight up the hill, you run diagonally up the hill, turn, and run diagonally up to the finish, facing the opposite way. We finished (31.08 and 31.09) and I was surprised to see my token number- 248! I think that is the highest number/ lowest placing I have ever been. It was very busy, and we found out later it was another record attendance of 396 runners. We then joined a queue to have our chips scanned and the queue seemed to be moving very slowly- the lady on our queue was having trouble and needing to scan each one several times- normally not a problem but we had places to go!

We got back to the car at 9.45, so headed off asap! Because the actual car park is reserved for volunteers and other park users, the parking listed on the course page is a side road- I was quite shocked to see how many people had double parked (including some people in a massive van)- it made it quite tricky to leave and my dad does not have a big car.

I had told the club my plan of a double, and I messaged them to say we were en route (they said they would wait- phew!). We got to the car park at about a minute to ten, and then ran the short distance (couple of hundred metres maybe) to the entrance to the field. We passed the finish area and one of the marshals gave a massive wolf whistle to the people waiting further up at the start line so they knew we were coming. Luckily some other people were just parking up so we weren’t the last! Dad had not run a 10k for a few years (although he did the 5 mile on Easter Monday) so we aimed to take the second one steady too. The RD had a quick reminder of the rules and briefly described the course, and then we were off!

Taken on my run on Wednesday- I loved that huge cloud- this is the path towards the field of cows.

The course itself is lovely- I often run around those fields anyway, and it was basically a short loop at the start, next to a sort of river bed, before doing a big loop of the fields (through the cow field- thankfully they weren’t there today, but they might be some weeks), and then finishing along the old taxi-way. Very flat, although the ground was rutted in places so marshals were warning us to mind our ankles. It was great to run around- I knew most of the marshals so it was good to have a bit of a personal cheer, and again I ran with Dad so we kept up the chatting. We did consider a sprint finish down the taxi-way, but then the wind was so strong we didn’t think we would manage it. However, when we were close to the finish we decided to go for it as everyone was cheering!

I was number 12! My highest ever placing! I mentioned to Dad that I had managed my lowest and highest placing in one day! Impressive! We didn’t get an official time, but the results were uploaded and we were sent a screen shot- we finished the second parkrun in 28.55- not too shabby! We hung around for a bit afterwards, chatting to the other runners and volunteers- quite a few of the Panshanger team were there supporting. We were even recommended a few other fairly local (e.g. 50 minute away) parkruns that we will need to add to our list.

It did confirm my thinking that I should not attempt the Panshanger/ St Albans double, as we only just got to Hatfield for 10am, and St Albans is another 15 minutes from there, so it’s only for the speedy runners.

I did though get confused over my Garmin and Strava. I don’t use Strava on my phone, I use my watch and upload it to Garmin, which then transfers the data to Strava. This usually works well, but I had a problem before when I did two runs in one day- even though I press stop between runs, it seems to keep going.

So my Garmin one had me running 6.2 miles in 60 minutes (pretty much bang on compared to my parkrun times).

But the Strava had me running 13 miles- in the middle they have no pace because I turned the watch off. I had a look at this before but you can only delete the beginning or end of a run- not a chunk in the middle, so I guess I am leaving it. It sort of annoys me because it messes up my monthly mileage (although we are going on holiday at the end of May and there will be no outside running for fear of lions, but the hotel does have a treadmill so perhaps I will try to run those missed miles then so it all adds up in the end?), and also my pb’s- I now have a 10 mile pb of an hour! I will never be beating that!

Next Saturday is the official first one and I am looking forward to it already! I loved the course, plus it is only a mile from home so my aim is to jog up there as a warm up. Although we are moving house the week after, so I’ll only get to do that once, then it will be back to driving again!

This afternoon after a little walk around town I did some excellent report-writing procrastination, otherwise known as baking (using up ingredients so we don’t have to pack them)- orange and ginger brownies, and peanut butter, cranberry and chocolate cookies.