Farley Mount - Bike Ride

14.7 miles accordng to my speedo. We chose the route on the basis that traffic in the New Forest would be likely to be awful on a bank holiday - and I was curious as to how I would find it as we last did this route just over 1 year ago.

All good news:

• I didn't manage to keep up with Husband, M and C&M, but I did not walk any of the uphills.
• The downhill bit I remembered as being ultra scary was very do-able - to the extent that I wondered if the path was the same one!
• An uphill section that Husband and M remembered as being horrendous last time was also OK - a bit slippery, but I think we've nailed the technique for getting over tree routes.
• Weather - we hit a couple of showers (including hail) but nothing long enough to get us properly wet.

Nature stuff: I could hear a buzzard but didn't get a glimpse. Bugle is in flower and there were some pretty wild strawberry flowers close to the start. No bluebells left!

Gym & Gardening

Got to the gym on Saturday - 30 mins on the bike, 15 on the cross triner and then some weights.

4 hours at the allotment today - weeding & digging - good way to clear my fuggy hungover head.

Great Manchester Run - so slow!

Position was 19,099th out of 25,000 entries and time was 1 hour 26mins... ah well!
Middle Sister achieved a very creditable 53mins 52 seconds and Brother in Law to be in 49mins 23 seconds. Given that 10kph feels like a sprint to me, I'm very impressed.

Gym last night

30 mins on the bike, 15 on the cross trainer.

No cheese no chocolate no chips no life

Embarked on the dreaded "D" word today - resurrected my membership to the www.weightlossresources.co.uk website which I've found suits my aversion to diet sheets/plans and the weight watchers opaque points system. So long as calories in minus calories out (i.e. exercise) = less than 1500 calories per day, I'm OK.

Blog title is misleading as I will still be ingesting cheese and chocolate - but will be exercising restraint! I think it suits me because I feel that it allows me to enjoy food by having what I fancy.

Anyway, back to exercise - some interesting numbers - the calories that are expended doing everyday type stuff (based on 20 minutes and applying to somebody my weight):

Ironing 42, Hoovering 74, Laundry 45, Weeding 111, Digging 190, Mowing 164, Supermarket shopping with a trolley 74, Going up & down stairs 201

Hmmm - is ironing less appealing than going to the gym?!

Fat Bird Goes to Lake District

Part 2 of our hols!

Wednesday: Slipped in a very brief gym visit before driving up to stay with middle sister & family. Glad that Husband convinced me that we did have time. 10mins on the X trainer, 10 mins jogging and then some weights.

Thursday: Very pleasant 9 mile bike ride around Claife Heights on the west shore of Windermere. Resorted to walking quite a few of the ups and a couple of the scarier downs. The rain held off, but it wasn't the brightest of days. The ride was very much 2 halves - the first included a long climb to the brow of the heights in rugged looking upland landscape. The second half was a gentler whizz along the shore line, with some gorgeous bits of mossy oak woodland, carpeted with bluebells.And we also had a toddler paced amble later on - my 17 month old nephew did lots of pointing excitedly at absolutely everything - sheep, goats, tractors, vans, river, trees, ants....

Friday: Dragged Husband out for a half hour consitutional walk before dinner. It was a good opportunity to scope out where Middle Sister's wedding will be in August - a spot with great views of the countryside east of Kendal. I was pleased witht he light in both the attached photos.

Saturday: Grizedale forest - we did a 7 mile circuit (more would have streched my nephew's tolerance of being in a bike seat too far) although Husband and Brother-in-Law-2b did escape off for 1 stretch of the downhill course. Now have plans to go back there on the Friday before middle sister's wedding to do the full downhill route and to see a few more of the sculptures in the forest.... I used my sister's bike for the last part - it's a very fast, urban bike - big slick tires, no suspension and beautifully built. If I ever find myself doing lots of road cycling, it'd be tempting to trade up my hybrid to something similar.

Sunday: Great Manchester 10K Run - completed it, albeit following my "I haven't trained enough plan" of walking alternate kilometres. That worked much better than attempting to run all of it & resorting walking after 5K as I didn't feel as if I had failed. Plus, having the shorter targets for each bit I ran worked very well.

Middle Sister & Brother-in-Law-2b did brilliantly. I was able to see their final sections due to the staggered starts & parallel bits of the route. Seeing Middle Sister bounding along, looking very comfortable with only 1.5k to go was a fantastic sight!

It rained - which I prefer to blazing sunshine - but that did mean driving back down south with wet feet in soggy trainers!

Fat Bird goes to Wales

Went to Bala for a few days - staying in some holiday cottages with Husband and 14 friends. The cottages were very pleasant - www.cyffdy.com for more details.

As there were so many photos from last weekend, they are in a separate blog: http://fatbirdgoestowales.blogspot.com/

It was a great weekend - lots of active stuff combined with lots of eating and drinking so hopefully, no overall detrimental additional strain on the zips of my jeans.

Friday: Went to Coed y Brenin - which is apparently well known as a good place for mountain biking & did their Sports route. The hardest 9.3 mile route I've ever done! Lots of custom made downhill stuff that's designed to challenge you. Husband and Z flew down, whereas I "made my own way" - lots of walking, paddling, panicking & general wimping out. And it was Z's first time ona mountain bike - insult to injury! Gorgeous views of a river carving its way through the hillside. More details of the route are on www.mbwales.com


Saturday: Quad Biking - which should have been a 0 exercise, but clinging to the handlebars and gripping the saddle with my thighs thinking "I'm going to die, I'm going to die" for nearly 2 hours caused some aching bits afterwards..... Laser clays were definitely 0 exercise but my tired arms struggled to lift the gun!

Sunday: Back to Coed y Brenin & repeated the Sports route as I'd decided that "intermediate" was the limit of my ability and all the others were "advanced". Glad that I did repeat it as I was much better than the first time - especially on the final downhill. Tried out the technique picked up from New Zealand (drop saddle, hang arse over rear tire, keep pedals level) which really did work. Still felt like the coward that I am - but improved.
Then went white water rafting at the National Whitewater Centre near Bala. Not a coward with this - I think I'm fairly practised as I've rafted there quite a few times. Good fun, good company and very soggy.

Gym - did it!

25 mins of jogging, 15 mins on the cross trainer and..... some weights for the first time in ages. I'd been put off by the machines not being quite the same as the ones at my home club, Hampshire, but decided that I was being stupid. Just pleased that I managed to remember my card this time - and that I got away from work before 7.

I've realised that I should now be able to make my much missed body combat class on Tuesday night at my home club- aka Buffy Aerobics - woo hoo! I have found a class close to work so after the Manchester run, will see if I can switch to that.

Really enjoying the WS book ("Fat Girls' Guide to Life") even though it's american and is a novel length rant - and I love her assertion that it's better to be fat & fit than slim & sedentary.

We dig dig dig

4 hours hard labour at the allotment - digging, weeding and sifting soil. I didn't realise why my husband was taking a close interest in my soil sifting technique until afterwards when he confessed to having been fixated with the way my chest was moving around as I shook the sieve....
My thighs hurt!

Another failed gym atempt

Sat through traffic jam on the M1 last night to get to the gym - only to realise when I was there that my card is at home - and as it's not my home club, signing in wouldn't be possible! Still had 20 mins of walking at lunchtime - up to Monsoon to buy much needed summer skirt.
Have added my sister's blog to the links on the right - along with my stitch obsessed buddy's.

French Exercise Volume 3

Tuesday 2nd May
Our only "proper" walk. Having gazed up at the ridge of hills south of Fougaron for 3 years, we finally made it up onto it. To save Husband's ankles, we drove as far as Fontaine de l'Ours to minimise the length of the walk by starting at 1100m. It was still a good hour uphill to the Tuc de Tucol - at over 1500m it definitely qualifies as a proper hill! Terrain was steep beech covered slopes with the occasional bit of limestone poking through. Again, I took the poles up and Husband used them to come down - I'm impressed that he managed the full thing comparatively pain free. Took about 45 mins to descend.
Superb views from the top of the Pyrenees proper - snow capped and looking like proper pointy mountains.
Nature Stuff: Deer and red kites. From the summit, we saw a pair of vultures riding the thermals, drifting over the valley. Wild daffodils and stunning blue gentians (I think!) also on the summit.

French Exercise Volume 2

Monday 1st May
Husband's knee and ankles were still hurting so we did plan a zero exercise day of visiting Albi and Cordes, both NE of Toulouse.
Didn't quite work out like that. Albi was much more than just an incredible cathedral so we spent a good hour or so just walking around looking at dyers houses. Not exactly hard work, but I reckon it counts!

Cordes was a different proposition - it's on top of a hill and traffic is banned so a walk up to reach the town was kind of inevitable. Good 20 minutes of uphill on cobbles followed later by a much easier descent. Husband's legs kind of held out!

French Exercise - volume 1

Sunday 30th May - Did the very pleasant walk up to our barn from Fougaron for probably the last time. Exercise wise - a good half hour of uphill walking at a level where I was glowing well and where Husband was asking me if I was OK! I used poles uphill and passed them onto Husband for downhill - a system that worked well as he still feels self conscious about using them before his ankles hurt. He still managed to knacker his knee though.

Nature stuff - Saw a pine martin! It shot across the path ahead of us - just about clocked the body length, head shape and big fluffy tail. Plus primroses and violets. The woods were looking beautiful - new almost lime green sweet chesnut leaves contrasting with the dark conifers. And the stream was as picturesque as usual.