196. Trekking on the Thames

30th August 2014, Thames Path, London

Bank holidays.

Those beautiful weekends of getting to wake up hungover three days in a row rather than two. Or perhaps not this time!

For the first time in history, me and Hell's Bells had decided that spending 72 hours in and out of the pub was no good anymore. Instead, we were going to do something reasonable and actually healthy. Which prompted someone (blonde, not brunette) to suggest walking the Thames Path.

Somewhere along the way we cut down on the ambition level and agreed that maybe doing the full 8 hour walk between Kingston and Greenwich along the Thames may be a bit too big of a task.

Every occasion in a girl's life requires an appropriate outfit. People don't seem to get that. In this case the theme was Girls in the 90's who do sport. In other words, a pink floral trucker cap was the perfect choice to go with and damn it, I stand by that. Plus the cap matched my new hiking boots. They're also pink. They're not comfortable.

Starting off the walk there we were simply beaming with positive spirits and bundles of energy. That lasted for about 10 minutes before pee break number one and blisters one through to four. Well at least those hiking boots were cute.

Another three hours in we decided we could get away with stopping at the river side pub and get ourselves lunch and ice for my blisters. And of course to charge our phones - you obviously can not go for a trek without measuring out the distance and provide evidence that you've had a non alcohol fuelled Saturday out.

We haven't quite established if having chips and dessert with our lunch may have defeated the  purpose of walking a million miles. But it was crazy yummy. It was also amazing to sit down for a bit, admire the views and check out the plastic raft pirates. Apparently these things happen outside of Shoreditch too,

Somehow we managed to leave the pub in the end and keep on walking, although the second half was much tougher than the first. The ice cold rain did not help and at another loo and water pit stop in Battersea Park, we caved after walking for about 5 hours.

Instead begun the fun task of trying to get home from the TFL no man's land that is the area around Battersea to civilization in Shoreditch where dinner and movie night awaited us.

Next time: Battersea Park to Greenwhich.

High spirits pre walk!