WE DID IT! Warning this is a long blog!!

At midday on Sunday 20th July 2008, Miss Catrin Anna Morgan, Miss Helen Elizabeth Griffin, Miss Charlotte Hazel Ann Clayson and Mrs Niamh Elizabeth MacLeod walked the final furlong at Brighton Race Course…not that interesting maybe, except as we took each other's hands and staggered to the finish, we knew that we were less than one kilometre from completing Trailwalker: a 100 kilometres super hike over the South Downs. We spied our families and partners whooping by the finish line and as we laughed and cried simultaneously, we somehow found the ability to run to the finish line. Team Tree D had finished, all four of us had walked every step of the 100 kilometres, and we had done it together.

TEAM TREE D

I don't really know where to start when describing the journey we had just completed.
Anna, Hel, Charlie and I met each other in September 2001 at Manchester University. Our halls of residence were called Tree Court D, hence the team name. Four very different girls, from different places; we became firm friends, best friends, and over the last seven years we have laughed, cried, danced and drank together. They are the best friends a girl could ask for. We could not have got around the course without one another. We all had our highs, we all had our lows, all had our fears and our difficulties and we helped each other through it. We kept one another going when the last thing we wanted to do was keep going. We started this challenge as best friends, we ended this challenge as best friends and a whole lot more besides. No words can express my deep, deep admiration for my three team mates; we drew on strength and reserves we did not know we had, and their kindness and their ability to love and encourage is invaluable. I've heard before that if you can count on one hand the amount of true friends you have in your life you are a lucky person. I know that there are three fingers that have the names of Anna, Hel and Charlie on them.

SUPPORT

For those other spaces on my hand I'm going to have to grow more fingers to include our support team. There is absolutely no way that we would have got to the finish line without them. Again words fail me in expressing our gratitude. They were nothing short of phenomenal. Claire and Karl braved school holiday and Friday M25 traffic to come and join us on the Friday night, bringing with them a car boot so full it looked like they were going to emigrate - they could have bought shares in Lucozade they had so many bottles of it for us!! Ed was with us from the start, joining us at Waterloo at 5pm on Friday, forfeiting the annual teachers end of term pub trip and stayed with us at every checkpoint to the end, sacrificing sleep and warmth to be there for us - he ignored his deranged wife screaming at him at check point 8 and kept us smiling. My mum and dad (Malachy and Oonagh) cleared the shelves of Sainsburys to supply us with every food desire we had ever wished for and more! It seems a long time since we strolled into checkpoint 2 to mum cheering us, and dad blasting Elevation from the car to keep our spirits up! Claire, Karl, Ed, mum and dad greeted us at checkpoints 2,3,4 and 5, treating us like queens - they treated our feet, fed us delicious food, kept us laughing and encouraged.

As the evening closed in, and we passed the half way point, the support team passed on the baton to Dan and James, with Ed joining them as a check point executive, having done the previous four already. As the temperature dropped and the sun went down, the boys stretched our tired muscles and calmed us down as the tiredness made us confused and forgetful, I lost count of the times I 'lost' my phone/camera/socks/torch! They helped us in every way possible, and did not moan at all about the freezing cold night they had to put up with. They put up with our tears, they played the Rocky theme tune to keep us pumped up, they hugged us and they loved us - truly loved each one of us. Thank you is insufficient, they are heroes in every sense, every single one of our support team.

WALKING - THE FIRST 20K

So to the walk itself. We set out at 7am on Saturday morning, well 5 past 7 - we missed the 'official start' as we were still pinning our team numbers on to our bags and fuelling up on Lucozade Sport for the journey ahead!! The first 10k was the only part of the course we hadn't walked during the course of our training but we got on fine, weaving through the crowds and settling into our pace. We reached checkpoint one ahead of time. Sun cream applied - Anna for the first time in her life wearing factor 50! and I slapped so much on, I looked like Casper! Onwards to Checkpoint 2, and our first big hill, it was short but definitely not sweet…it was extremely steep and after applying sun cream, the rain started to lash down!! One hill down, and rain macs on, we ploughed on, arriving at check point 2 again earlier than expected where we are treated to sausage butties made with Frank Parker's award winning sausages!!

CHECKPOINT 3 & 4

Refuelled we headed off. The next stint was a shorter one of 8.3k and fairly level. However, in our training we all found that 25-30k is when the feet start to hurt and true to form, the next check point was spent giving some love and attention to our eight feet. As the afternoon developed, we thanked the weather for behaving itself, it was in the early 20s and a slight breeze - perfect for walking. Mini panic over when Charlie's sunglasses were found in the portaloo at checkpoint 3 (Claire bravely entering a portaloo despite avoiding them at all costs in normal circumstances!) we kept the spirits up with Charlie entertaining us with an award winning version of Delilah - Tom Jones should be scared! CP3-4 was where we previously got lost but no such trouble this time, it turns out the instructions had said left when it meant right! CP4 was reached in the bright afternoon sun, and the rare sight of Ed draping a Welsh flag over him to cheer Anna in! The Killers blasted from the car and several muffins later, we set off to CP5.

CHECKPOINT 5

Arriving at checkpoint 5 would see us hitting the half way point of 50k and be the longest distance we have all covered in a single go. It was a 12.5k link making it longer than the others so far, and included a substantial hill that we had all kind of forgotten about, Anna and Hel introduced some power tunes via their i-pods and got quite the march on! Charlie and myself went more organic, and sang along to Jackson, which ensured much hilarity and we messed the words up and played the roles of Johnny and June Carter Cash superbly!! We met my mum and dad, Claire and Karl and Ed just before the actual checkpoint, as it was too full for them to get in!! Undeterred, they set up camp on the roadside and mum produced a personalised lemon cake which gave us all a boost! It was delicious!

CHECKPOINT 6

The next 20k of the course for me was my nemesis, it involved two particular difficult hills that I had really struggled with during our training. The first one was long and twisting so it was hard to know when and where it finished. I managed to get my breathing sorted and made it to the top at a steady pace and without having to stop. It gave me a huge confidence boost and revived my spirits. It was a beautiful evening and some spectacular scenery, we went great guns from check point 5 to 6, getting so ahead of our timings that we had to wait for the boys to catch us up!! 60k in, this was a big checkpoint. It was 9.30pm, we had been going for 14 and a half hours and the sun was about to set. From now till the end, we would be spending nearly an hour at each checkpoint as the tiredness set in and we needed more TLC than ever before. The boys were amazing, they got us bundled up for the night walking and stretched our tired muscles. And off we headed again, this time with fleeces and torches.

THE DARKNESS SETS IN - CHECKPOINT 7

The sun had set at the checkpoint and it was now completely dark. This next leg was enormous one for all of us, it was dark and had the biggest hill in the whole of trailwalker. We had chatted to some 'vetrans' of trailwalker (nutters) on the route who told us that if we got as far as checkpoint 7 then we were home and dry, we would complete it. This was where we would need each other like never before, mentally it was what people call THE WALL. For me, this section was huge. The darkness took me by surprise even though I'd known for over six months that we would be walking at night - it was fine once I got used to it, but I did find it a little unnerving. Added to that was THE HILL. This was the hill that had been featuring in my nightmares for the last six weeks, the hill that I nearly threw up at the last time I climbed it. I was terrified, and pleased it was dark so my team could not see my eyes welling up every so often. I made it to the top, and somehow managed to do so only stopping once to catch my breath and managed to keep my breathing even throughout. The power of prayer is an extraordinary thing and that, along with the love and support of my team (walkers and supporters) got me to the top. Helen stayed with me from the bottom to the top and helped calm me down when my emotions and relief took over at the top. Charlie and Anna started the hill after me, which really helped psychologically as I wasn't holding anyone up. They powered up the hill like the troopers they are. Reunited as a foursome, we continued to check point 7 to warm food and hot drinks.

The '1K TO GO' sign was a very welcome on, and a loud 'Boom Boom Boom, Let me hear you say WAYOH' was necessary! The warm foot and some tea were much needed. It was one in the morning, and freezing. The boys distracted us from the pain and tiredness by filling us in on their games of 'guess the song' and the drinking games they played without the drinking! They wacked the heating on in the car and let us sit in there to warm up, whilst they stood and shivered in the field. We headed off again, wearing:

vest top
t shirt
long sleeved top
fleece
rain mac with hood up
hat
and socks on my hands - in my tiredness I couldn't find my gloves for love nor money (they were in my back pack!!)

CHECKPOINT 8

I (insanely!) quite enjoyed the next stretch - endorphins from reaching check point 7 I think. I was quite happy to sing to myself, and some of the teams I passed even hummed along to my version of The Bare Necessities. It was quiet on The South Downs despite the amount of people on the course. Walking in the dark saps your energy so talking and conversation were hard to maintain. You know you are true friends when you can have comfortable and supporting silence, knowing the girls were with me kept me going. All that said, checkpoint 8 was a real low for us all. A few tears appeared as our bodies made it clear what they thought about the cold and the tiredness. Once again, the boys did a sensational job with Rocky music and hugs helping us get back out on the trail. We left as the sun was rising.

DIGGING DEEP - GETTING TO CHECKPOINT 9

The next stretch was incredibly difficult. It was 12.5k, and at times it felt like it would never end. We were running on empty, down on energy and wondering when this would all be over. We were torn between sensing the finish getting closer and knowing that it was still hours away. The terrain was fairly easy, crossing fields and with very little hills, but we were walking towards the horizon which never seemed to get any closer. The course was sparse with few people in front and few behind. We were all emotional, having to ditch the i pod as the songs were reminding me of people I love and making me emotional. We took more breaks on the side of the course for breathers and pep talks. Thank you to a fellow trailwalker who told us that we were doing great, that she was amazed we were still a full team and that most other teams were suffering from drop outs. It reminded us how important the teamwork was, and how we were such a strong team - we pulled each other through this section, and even finished in high spirits. Rousing songs were the call of the day. Anna belted out the Welsh national anthem, I blasted out Put Em Under Pressure from Italia 90, with an adapted chorus, a chant of Everywhere we go did wonders, Hel provided the Shoop Shoop song and we revisited old favourites of Delilah and Jackson! We approached the 1K mark with a huge sense of relief. We knew we were hitting the final straight. Some of our support team appeared sooner than anticipated, James and Ed had walked back from the checkpoint with water and tea and coffee to meet us. Their smiling faces and hugs all round did us the power of good - as did the promise of breakfast, we powered up the hill to the checkpoint, delighted that that section was over.

SOME SPECIAL GUESTS

Helen's parents, Michele and Paddy, and Claire and Karl joined the boys at checkpoint 9 which added much excitement to the checkpoint; it was great to see them all. There was one very special guest appearance though. Charlie had not only done an amazing job as our team leader, she was doing it all with no family at the checkpoints - due to the British Open clashing with trailwalker they were unable to come down to join the rest of the gang. However, Charlie's boyfriend, Cormac didn't let that stop him. He got a bus from Manchester at midnight on Saturday, travelling all night to London, and without passing go, he jumped on a train to Lewes and got a cab to be there to surprise her. The fresh blood led to a party atmosphere - well as much as it can when you have walked 89k and are on the top of a hill! We had a delicious breakfast and James stretched out all our muscles - painful but essential! Dan got over his confusion of what punnets are and passed strawberries and raspberries round, and we left in good spirits, knowing there was only 11k to go!!

THE LAST 11K

We set off in high spirits, with shouts of grrr and 'Awooga'. We had one big hill left, but we'd done it before in training, we could do it again. Its bark was worse than its bite. We had got so good at dealing with the hills that Hel and Anna powered up it and were happy enough to wave at me and Charlie following them. Charlie sang her way to the top such was her fitness - she wasn't even out of breath! I had enough in the tank to encourage another trailwalker - I never thought I would see the day where I could encourage someone else!! We ploughed on to checkpoint 10, which was Gurkhas only, no support team. We had a quick break and continued on our way.

This is a good place to say how fantastic the Gurkhas were - they were all over the course, providing a smiling face, an encouraging word and applauding our efforts. The Nepalese people are generous and gentle, amazingly strong and we are all so very glad that half our sponsorship money is going to The Gurkha Welfare Trust, a very deserving cause. Likewise Oxfam were equally fantastic, little signs on the route round helping to keep our focus and create conversation (although some of the conversation suggestions were a bit complicated…I don't know why the universe is still expanding!!) Plus, their slogan of 'Humankind' felt very ironic as we were pushing our bodies to the absolute limit!

We ploughed on, all it was about now was getting to the end, with a little bit of surprise competitiveness thrown in…we met a group of girls our age who walked a lot as a hobby, they had also started at 7am. They were a nice bunch of girls, but something unspoken in all four of us didn't want to finish behind them. We upped our pace with steely Helen leading the pack, we pushed it till it could hurt no more and we eventually approached the racecourse. We were shouting for the 1k to go sign - where on earth was it? We eventually saw it, and the surreal disbelief of what we were about to achieve hit us. The pain in our legs and our feet disappeared and all eyes were on the finish. You know the rest…we had done it, seven months of training, several sleepless nights, an enormous amount of support and £3,500 raised for two excellent causes. Never again will we struggle with the question 'tell us something interesting/unusual about yourself?'

FINAL WORD

We finished in 29 hours, 4 minutes and 13 seconds officially, but as we started at 7.05am, I think we will call it sub 29 hours!! It was a huge achievement for all four of us, individually and collectively as a team. As our bodies recover, I don't think any of us will ever forget this weekend, what we achieved and how we helped each other through!!

Ironically, the first time we ever met, feet was on the agenda of our conversation - I was looking for a plaster for my foot as I had cut it on a glass from a frame broken when unpacking my stuff at university. I was in Charlie's room and we were introducing ourselves to a chatty Welsh girl across the hall. We then heard hustle and bustle, and Hel made her entrance - quiet and discreet as always, she was pushing a huge cardboard box and was a mass of blonde hair. Helen's mum told her yesterday that after she left her in Manchester, she said to Paddy, Helen's dad that 'those three did seem like really lovely girls, I think she'll be ok'. Seven years on, those three lovely girls and Helen achieved something amazing, and you know what- I think we did ok.

And they're off...

And so here we are. The day before Trailwalker and less than 24 hours until we begin our nomadic walk through the hills and valleys of the south downs. The last proper night's sleep has been had, the bags packed and re-packed, the lists checked over, chocolate bought, carbs loaded and song sheets printed.

I never thought this day would come round so quickly, and I can't believe how fast time has gone since we all signed up to do this crazy challenge. But 7 months later and god knows how many hundreds of kilometres walked, D-day is upon us and the countdown is now in hours and minutes, not days, weeks or months.

This will probably be our last blog before the start so a big thank you to everyone who's supported us so far- practically, financially, emotionally - however you have supported us, we couldn't have got this far without your help! and to all those of you who are coming along for the ride on the weekend- a great big thank you to you all and we are looking forward to you spurring us on when we are feeling like we can't go on!

We are all nervous about the challenge to come, but I, for one, am excited about starting (and finishing) and really getting my teeth into this mighty walk! There will be lows, I'm sure, but I know they will be well worth it...and will make the highs even better!

Well we're all equipped and ready to go to battle- map in one hand and percy pigs in the other..what more could we need!?

See you on the other side...

Rain....

Let's hope the BBC Weather men have it wrong...Otherwise its waterproof trousers and soggy feet for us on Saturday!

Down to Days...

We are now counting the days, rather than the weeks and months to trailwalker. I think it is fair to say that the best part of last week has been spent panicking! We all agree that this is the scariest thing we have ever done - scarier than not being able to walk in heels for her cousin's wedding four days after trailwalker (Hel - although she is pretty scared about that!), scarier than taking on Jeremy Paxman in an argument (Anna - she won!), scarier than walking down the aisle (Niamh), scarier than living in a foreign country for a year (Charlie) and it is even scarier than trying to persuade Anna out of bed to go to lectures in first year of university!! (I'm so tired!)

But with a few days to go, we have sorted our support team, started carb loading (eating lots of chocolate!) and are becoming obsessed with all things trailwalker - checking our fundraising, checking our blog, checking oxfam's website - it goes on and on!

Another obsession appears to be a preoccupation with the weather - let's just hope that bbc weather does not let us down, which shows cloudy sun and 18 degrees for the weekend, no rain and no 30 degrees scorchers please.

Other obstacles appear to be:

1) Why are waterproof trousers so hard to find and so expensive?
2) Warm hats and gloves are hard to find in July!
3) Portaloos for 30 hours fills several of our team with dread (more so than the walk itself)

All four of us spent a relaxed weekend doing very little, I think all of us like the 'tapering' part of training! Hel, Anna and Charlie took the chance to explore Oxford Street for the first weekend in a long time, only to discover that the tube is full of unhygienic people and Oxford Street is not as pleasant a place to hang out as they remembered. Niamh took the more sedate route of meeting friends by Tower Bridge spending the afternoon watching a wedding party get more excited and drunk. We all had a lovely Saturday evening celebrating Anna's birthday, which is our most civilised birthday to date - we must be growing up! In reality, I think the half glass of wine we all drank kept us in check.

So 4 days to go:

Shoes - check
Blister plasters - check
Tents - check
Motivational quotes - check
Song sheets - check
An amazing support team - check

4 scared but capable ladies - CHECK!

We're good to go, see you on the other side.

ps. We have a sweepstake of who will cry first - I know who my money is on!

The countdown is on..

We all braved the soggy London weather and hot sweaty tubes this evening and ventured to deepest darkest South East London to the Primark of the sports world....Decathlon.

For the uninitiated, this is the place to go for bargain priced sports wear, camping gear, bikes, compasses and all other associated activity and sports related goodies. For those in the know already, you know the score..

So, a final shop to get ourselves fully kitted out for the challenge with walking poles, whistles, extra socks, energy snacks, waterproof trousers, torches...and high visibility jackets. Yes, that's right. Those things which you might find people wearing on building sites, or which you might wear when directing incoming planes onto the runway. Not the sort of thing we would normally spend our Wednesday evening buying, but that's dedication for you.

A mad dash before closing, a forty minute walk and eight soggy feet later, we arrived back to civilisation in the form of a pub in the city to thrash out the finer details of timings for each check point, support crew details, who will be meeting us where and when...and most importantly our food wish list for the weekend.

Job done, details finely tuned, sausages on order and back home feeling more organised and ready to face the challenge. Question is, is the challenge ready for us?

July 4/5.. Darkness, Deers and Diversions

....so the challenge really is now on. We spent this weekend honing our finely tuned walking, compass reading and orienteering skills, tackling night walking and some more big hills...or so we thought...

Friday night- a balmy summers evening. Ideal for sitting outside, sharing a drink or two and stories of the week with friends, relaxing after a hard week at work and easing yourself gently into the weekend. Well, for us four, we had to spurn all social invites (of which, of course, there were many) and headed round to Mrs MacLeod's for some dinner and last minute preparations for the evenings walk. Yes, at last we had decided the time had come to spend some time walking under cover of darkness in preparation for the big weekend..

The darkness came sooner than we had imagined, with the electricity getting cut off and whilst Niamh valiantly went to rectify this slight hitch in the evening's plan, the rest of us could only wait with baited breath in anticipation of the walk to come..Crisis over, and food poisining averted we set off for the night.

Imagine the scene- four young women, who would normally be spending their Friday evenings very differently and wearing slightly more credible clothes, dressed in shorts and tracksuits, big cagoules and fleeces, with very attractive and sturdy walking shoes and socks on, setting out for a Friday night on the town...or walk round the town. We did an 11 km loop around Hampstead Heath area, passing through the nicer parts of London - Belsize Park, Highgate, Hampstead, but even that didn't detract from the fact that we looked completely ridiculous. For those of you who know London, you will know this already, but those of you who don't, it's fair to say that no-one gives you a second glance in this crazy place. There are so many different people in London, with different senses of style, "cool" and how they want to live their life, that if you pass the man who sits by the canal in Camden Lock, tattooed from head to foot and with about 50 piercings on his face alone, you wouldn't even give him a second glance. So when we were strolling around the neighbourhood after midnight on Friday, it's fair to say that we did feel slightly self conscious at the fact that not one, or two, but so many more people blatantly stared at us in the street and gave us funny looks...we must have looked a right sight!

But back home from the trauma and to bed for 1.30, and up at 6.30 to catch the train down to the South Downs again on Saturday morning. Again, the rucksacks were packed and re-packed, walking gear donned and we had all had a better sense of what was to come. We had walked the South Downs before, not this particular section, but we knew that despite not looking our best, the clothes we were wearing wouldn't attract as much attention as they had the previous night. Challenge one of the day had been faced and overcome.

After a sneakily steep hill right at the beginning of the day (ow!), the rest of the day was fine-the weather was cooler and breezier than last time we were on the downs which was a relief for us all. We each took a turn at reading the map, honing those compass skills, and trying to stick to timings and become more disciplined with our breaks... I think its fair to say that at some points our map reading skills were fantastic (being dumped by our taxi driver in the middle of the countryside and managing fairly quickly to work out where on earth we were and which direction to walk) but at some points perhaps they were not their best - wandering aimlessly along a track, chatting away and only realising we had been walking the wrong way for about half an hour when we attempted to enter a deep forest which seemed to be guarded by a wild deer...unless the South Downs Way had become a bit riskier since we were last there, leading us to dark places reminiscent of Harry Potter plots, we were pretty damn sure we were lost.. Re-tracing our steps took about an hour out of our day and timings started to wane a little, from us thinking that we were 45 mins ahead of time at one point, to catching our train 2 hours later than planned...

It's fair to say we all felt a little dejected after that, but we persevered and despite blistered feet, tough decisions to make over whether we would rather be an Olympic Gold Medallist or President of the USA, or whether we would rather give up meat or alcohol, heated debates over whether tables on trains or patches of grass in the countryside were preferable to eat sweets from, we came away achieving a lot and still being in relatively high spirits, if completely knackered. Our map reading skills have improved immensely and we all now know how to use a compass and, let's face it, the biggest thing we have learnt is realising when we are lost, how we are going to sort that out and get back on track....and not get lost again.

All valuable lessons to learn, and better late than never with only 11 days to go....