Get Up Go Outside

30 Parkrun Challenge – 1 to 5

So I’ve set myself the challenge of completing 30 Parkrun’s before I turn 31 in December. For those who don’t know, Parkrun is a weekly 5k run which takes place on a Saturday morning. There’s thousands of courses worldwide, all run by volunteers, meaning it’s free to take part!

I’ve not been very consistent with attending Parkrun for a few years, despite collecting up 43 finishes since 2017. It’s been a pretty good start to the challenge though with extra runs over the festive period. Here’s the first 5 runs I have completed to so far, and a little diary entry of how the run went:

My Favourite Photos of 2023

I was sitting drinking a coffee the other morning before work, scrolling aimlessly through my phone, and Facebook popped up with a memories post from 14 years ago. It was a picture of 16-year-old me, crouching down in the woods taking a macro photo of some flowers on my Motorola phone. I’d just realised that the camera on my phone had a macro mode and was amazed by the difference it made to pictures I could take.

Turning 30

I’m a week away from turning thirty. I can’t say I’m too bothered about the prospect of it myself, but it does seem to bother everyone else. Ever since turning 29, I’ve been reminded constantly that “you’ll be 30 next year”, almost as if my life is due to end and I can forget about having any more fun or feeling young.

Cycling the NC500: When Adventure Goes Wrong!

Nearly 2 weeks ago I got back from what I had planned to be a 500-mile self-supported cycle around the north coast of Scotland. I’ll write another post about the trip, covering why I did it and how the first 6 days went, but this post is about the final day of the trip. What went wrong on the 6th night and why I had to finish the trip early.

Returning to the Norfolk Coast

I was sat a couple of weeks ago sipping my morning coffee on the sofa. I’ve got a bad habit of wasting time in the morning just scrolling through social media for an hour without actually paying any attention to what I’m looking at. This morning was a bit different though. Facebook had kindly reminded me that a year ago I was waking up at the coast, three days into my walk along Peddars Way & Norfolk Coast path.

What was my first bikepacking trip like?

I was sitting in a pub in 2015 when I first mentioned the idea of cycling to Paris. I’d had a few drinks at the time, so my friends must have thought I was joking because they all burst out laughing. I was 22 years old and other than a lad’s holiday to Magaluf when we were 18, I’d never been abroad alone before. It was easy to see why they thought it was funny.

I’m Starting a Newsletter – Why Not Subscribe?

I’ve been debating for a while the idea of starting a newsletter. I spend a lot of time doing very small adventures, and they’re usually not big enough to write a blog post about on here. For example, one of my favourite ways of spending time outside each day is going out to water all the plants in my garden. It gives me a small taste of nature every day, 20 minutes to reflect on the day. But how would I write a full post about that here?

A Helping Hand

The third bank holiday weekend of May came around fast. The promise of sunshine all weekend was enough to tempt me into looking at a short getaway, perhaps a 3-day hike or a bike ride out to a camp spot. Maybe I could go to the beach with my camera. Inevitably, plans got stopped, when at the last minute I had to work over the weekend, limiting my available time to just the Bank Holiday Monday.

A day of adventure would be enough at least, until a friend asked me if I could go give him a hand building his shed. The long-term project, which has included salvaging secondhand wood, was halfway to being completed and he needed a second pair of hands to finish felting the roof. So instead of packing my backpack and setting off, I instead got into my car and drove over to his allotment to spend the day helping out.

Our Time Outdoors – Trail Running

Our Time Outdoors is a short documentary series which focuses on a number of hobbies and interests which encourage people to spend time outdoors and in nature. It explores what motivates people to take that step out the front door.

In episode one we meet Justin who spends his free time running through his local trails. A keen runner and finisher of many marathons, Justin’s motivation for running has changed over the years and he now enjoys spending his time running through the local trails of his hometown.

Starting Again

Back in September 2017, I competed in my first Sprint Triathlon, just two weeks after my first-ever 100-mile bike ride. I was training most days of the week, sometimes even twice a day. Swimming, cycling, running and gym work. It was probably the fittest I’d ever been and also the most time I’d spent outdoors. For the next two years I continued to train and race, focused on cutting seconds off each discipline, getting faster and stronger. Weekends were consumed by big rides and long runs. Then during the pre-season for 2020, Covid spread, lockdowns followed and I never got around to booking any races for that year. I was left with nothing to train for and no reason to look ahead.