N ow that the blog’s fully up and running I guess I’d better start to document what I’ve been up to as far as preparing for this rather daunting task ahead of me?

After having pottered around in the new boots for a bit, and wearing them for a couple of days the other week whilst visiting my brother, last week I undertook my first proper long walk in them. It wasn’t something I was looking forward to – the process of breaking the boots, and my feet, in – but I knew I had to start it sooner rather than later, even if there were a million and one other things I had to be doing.

So, I took a walk in to Reading to do some shopping last Monday: a nice 13 mile round trip not including the shopping bit. All in all it didn’t go too badly; it certainly could have been a lot worse.

The walk in took 1 hour and 40 minutes but about half way in a toe on my right foot was beginning to give me some pain and the outside of my left ankle was getting a little sore too. I carried on and made it in without any more problems and did all my shopping and had a very nice lunch with a good friend.

The walk home was a little harder as the soles of my feet were beginning to burn a bit and my knees weren’t doing too good with the rigidity of the boots compared to my normal trainers. Still, I made it back home in 1 hour and 45 minutes. Total time on my feet in the boots was 6 hours and 30 minutes including all the shopping.

Taking my boots off and checking my feet showed that the underside of the little toe on my right foot was one big blister – ouch! I also had the beginnings of a couple of other blisters on the soles of my feet and my left ankle had been rubbed raw in one small spot. All quite painful but let’s be honest, this was always going to happen breaking in a new pair of boots so I wasn’t too disheartened by it all.

What the walk has shown are the exact spots on my feet that need to be paid particular attention to when it comes to the walk, strapping up or putting plasters on to [hopefully] stop the rubbing and pain; that and the fact that I need to make sure I wear my knee supports more. One thing I have to make sure I do from now on is walk slower! I don’t need to be walking at close to 4 miles an hour during the actual walk so I need to train myself to walk slower. Obviously, carrying a full pack will slow me down but getting used to a slower pace now can only be a good thing.

Walking that distance in the boots was completely different to my normal trainers that’s for sure. I seriously doubt I would have noticed the miles in my trainers, but the new boots – rigid as they were – really did make a huge difference to my feet and knees. Let’s hope things get better the more miles I manage to get under my belt before the actual walk!