Ill-Prepared

So, we are about to enter 2010. The year in which I will attempt to walk an average of 30 kms a day for 70 days. To go back in time from where I am now to where I started. To reverse my steps, in terms of geography and timescale. While recognising that there is no going back from the 70 years of age I will hopefully achieve next July.

Among the things I have accomplished towards this end, in 2009:

More than 4,600 kms of training walks.
The route decided on and maps acquired.
A major sponsor (Columbia Sportswear) on board.
Lots of support on my blog and various forums.
A campervan on order, for base and support vehicle.
A decision to use the walk raise funds for Pancreatic Cancer research.
Significant press coverage to publicise the fund-raising.

Less welcome has been the return of the knee injury which, several years ago, finished my career as a competitive athlete.

Even less welcome than that has been the discovery that I have a serious problem with my eyes, which will only get worse, for which there is no treatment, which will prevent me reading and which means already that I can not see the tracks on the maps for which I have spent a small fortune. Could it be that I will accidentally be retracing Eric Newby’s Small Walk in The Hindu Kush? This is the book I am currently reading and I have been struck, once again, by how very ill-prepared so many of these people were for such major undertakings.