Day 65 Extra. Columbia

These photos were taken by Ken Critchley, the second of this morning's Walters. One shows Ken and Gerry, Septimus and myself, at Ken's wonderfully compact Romahome at the handover point. The other, at the end of the walk, shows Septimus and myself with our wives Gay and Pat at V-Force One.

I have just had a chat with two cyclists and their backup team. They are cycling from Lands End to John o' Groats and this is Day 4, so they are doing pretty well. My attention was drawn by the Columbia shirts they were wearing.

Columbia are of course my main sponsors. They have supplied me with clothing - in fact I have only Columbia clothing with me - they have decorated our vehicle, they have put out very professional press statements, featured VBW on their website, et cetera. And they are lovely people as well.

The clothing has been most excellent and shown no signs of fatigue. You may remember I seemed to have a bit of trouble with shoes at the beginning of the walk, but I can confirm that the shoes were in no way to blame - it was an injury gained prior to the start, which had swollen my foot and ... (I could bore you with the details).

The Columbia shoes have been splendid. Of course the soles show evidence of my passage, but there is no sign of age in the uppers - they are splendidly put together. I have been wearing this type of shoe for years and will continue to do so post-VBW.