So i am in the lounge at Frankfurt airport waiting for my flight back to Manchester. Note any typo's are due to my lack of experience with a German keyboard....... and not my usual bad spelling......
So training wise nothing much to say - i used the gym at the hotel which was well equipped so managed a good work out, but no walking..... getting a bit nervous about the lack of walking.
Everyone keeps telling me it is easy just wallking, nothing to go on about........
why am i feeling a few nerves then......
so brief I apologise......back with more tomorrow.....
Thursday 23 September 2010
Tuesday 21 September 2010
Continued support
Tuesday it is, sat in the lounge at Manchester en route to Frankfurt. Today I have meetings with one of our Web suppliers, and then tomorrow and Thursday meetings in our German office. I have packed my gym kit, so I must make time to get into the hotel gym at some stage over the next 3 days.
I received more donations yesterday, so thanks to Keith & Ann for keeping the total rolling, it is much appreciated, and if you still haven't dipped into your pocket yet, please do so, the panic may be starting to creep in.
Actually my fellow trekker from across the road to me has not been see for a while, I am thinking he may be disappearing only to resurface after the trip!
Reading the news about the gentlemen's game of cricket, and how England and Pakistan were fighting over cheating allegations I am thinking how will people's moods be affected by the altitude, will we get stressed easily, tempers fray..... best take something to keep us calm.
So 3 days in Germany home for 2 days then off to Japan, which is eating away at training opportunities, so I need to come up with a final training plan otherwise I may not walk again until I get to Tanzania !
I received more donations yesterday, so thanks to Keith & Ann for keeping the total rolling, it is much appreciated, and if you still haven't dipped into your pocket yet, please do so, the panic may be starting to creep in.
Actually my fellow trekker from across the road to me has not been see for a while, I am thinking he may be disappearing only to resurface after the trip!
Reading the news about the gentlemen's game of cricket, and how England and Pakistan were fighting over cheating allegations I am thinking how will people's moods be affected by the altitude, will we get stressed easily, tempers fray..... best take something to keep us calm.
So 3 days in Germany home for 2 days then off to Japan, which is eating away at training opportunities, so I need to come up with a final training plan otherwise I may not walk again until I get to Tanzania !
Monday 20 September 2010
One man and his dog
So if you are in the Manchester area, it is raining again - which actually sums up most of the weekend.
Last night I had a rather sleepless night as my mind was churning over all the things that I hadn't sorted out yet for this trip. I did originally think I was almost done, but obviously panic must be setting in. So I think another sit down with the kit bag is required this week, and assure myself I have what I need.
So no training this weekend, other than a gym session this morning, the weather, and several urgent jobs on the house dissuaded me from walking. So some tile repairs in the bathroom and new kitchen sink taps (after having to remove the whole sink first !) occupied my weekend. We did also go to the Hayfield Sheep Dog Trials, which was good fun.
If you have ever accidentally come across one man and his dog on the TV, I say accidentally as I can't believe people sit down with the intention to watch it, then it all looks very professional, man and dog in harmony.
So welcome to Hayfield, where I must say I only watched a few competitors, but here it was more man and dog struggling to get sheep to do what they want.
The first competitor fell foul of the random sheep selection, unfortunately it appeared that the ones he got had been on sprint training for the past few months. The dog could hardly keep pace with them, let alone direct them. Consequently then went from one end of the field to the other, avoiding all gates, before the dog had managed to get near them.
Competitor number two was somewhat more successful, this time his sheep selection brought out a more docile collection, however in this case man and dog were not so well in tune, and the dog had them down the field and back up successfully missing all the gates, he did however manage to get them into the pen with no trouble at all.
Anyway after a few more we departed to walk around the other show stalls and features. However there are two competitors we saw later that did bring about a smile. The first one, has a set of sheep who clearly held no fear for the dog or the man, a stand off at the pen led to the judges calling the proceedings to a close, before it turned dark. Sheep and dog and sheep and man face to face in a stand off, none of them moving an inch.
The second one, was even more funny, having successfully collected his sheep from the top of the field, drove them down and through the first gate, round the pen and back up the field to the second gate, perfect, maybe he was a potential for the TV, but then........
sheep rapidly followed by dog, jumped a fence at the top of the field, and disappeared from sight, I assume local rules then called for disqualification as the judges asked them to leave, but the dog was having not of it, successfully chasing 3 of the 4 back over the fence, one sheep doing a 360 degree summersault, then despite shouts and whistles from his owner, went back over to retrieve the last one. He obviously didn't care about the rules.
So no training trivia, but at least you can all go away thinking about what you missed in Hayfield, maybe I could try some tips with the other trekkers up Kili - Come by, come by, down down........
Last night I had a rather sleepless night as my mind was churning over all the things that I hadn't sorted out yet for this trip. I did originally think I was almost done, but obviously panic must be setting in. So I think another sit down with the kit bag is required this week, and assure myself I have what I need.
So no training this weekend, other than a gym session this morning, the weather, and several urgent jobs on the house dissuaded me from walking. So some tile repairs in the bathroom and new kitchen sink taps (after having to remove the whole sink first !) occupied my weekend. We did also go to the Hayfield Sheep Dog Trials, which was good fun.
If you have ever accidentally come across one man and his dog on the TV, I say accidentally as I can't believe people sit down with the intention to watch it, then it all looks very professional, man and dog in harmony.
The first competitor fell foul of the random sheep selection, unfortunately it appeared that the ones he got had been on sprint training for the past few months. The dog could hardly keep pace with them, let alone direct them. Consequently then went from one end of the field to the other, avoiding all gates, before the dog had managed to get near them.
Competitor number two was somewhat more successful, this time his sheep selection brought out a more docile collection, however in this case man and dog were not so well in tune, and the dog had them down the field and back up successfully missing all the gates, he did however manage to get them into the pen with no trouble at all.
Anyway after a few more we departed to walk around the other show stalls and features. However there are two competitors we saw later that did bring about a smile. The first one, has a set of sheep who clearly held no fear for the dog or the man, a stand off at the pen led to the judges calling the proceedings to a close, before it turned dark. Sheep and dog and sheep and man face to face in a stand off, none of them moving an inch.
The second one, was even more funny, having successfully collected his sheep from the top of the field, drove them down and through the first gate, round the pen and back up the field to the second gate, perfect, maybe he was a potential for the TV, but then........
sheep rapidly followed by dog, jumped a fence at the top of the field, and disappeared from sight, I assume local rules then called for disqualification as the judges asked them to leave, but the dog was having not of it, successfully chasing 3 of the 4 back over the fence, one sheep doing a 360 degree summersault, then despite shouts and whistles from his owner, went back over to retrieve the last one. He obviously didn't care about the rules.
So no training trivia, but at least you can all go away thinking about what you missed in Hayfield, maybe I could try some tips with the other trekkers up Kili - Come by, come by, down down........
Friday 17 September 2010
More injections
So last night was Rabies 2 injection, this went nicely into the bruised area of my arm from the previous week. So we have determined now only 2 more injections required, anotgher Rabies one, then another Hep B one and we are done. We can then discuss Malaria and Swine Flu!
So for those who are still sponsoring, thank you so much, the total is now over £5,000 with gift aid, which I am pleased with, and I hope it will go up more with a further push in these last few weeks.
Training wise things have been quiet this week, two trips to the gym only so far..........and not so much walking........
Since my lack of blogging I have obtained a book on walks in the peak district, so did try one in Castleton which included the hike up Mam Tor, but since have read this is not very challenging. Hopefully despite business travel I will have time to get a couple more walks in before we go.
There is only 4 weeks to go !!!!!!
So for those who are still sponsoring, thank you so much, the total is now over £5,000 with gift aid, which I am pleased with, and I hope it will go up more with a further push in these last few weeks.
Training wise things have been quiet this week, two trips to the gym only so far..........and not so much walking........
Since my lack of blogging I have obtained a book on walks in the peak district, so did try one in Castleton which included the hike up Mam Tor, but since have read this is not very challenging. Hopefully despite business travel I will have time to get a couple more walks in before we go.
There is only 4 weeks to go !!!!!!
Thursday 16 September 2010
Michael Portilo
Today I am in London for a conference on cloud computing "wow" the thing of the future, and many would have us believe it is fully here and now. Anyway I digress, at breakfast I had the pleasure of meeting Michael Portilo, who's claim to fame is that of a conservative heavy hitter, but also more recently did a tv series on railway journeys.
Today is also another injection day - OUCH - this will be my fourth visit for injections ! and I have at least another 2 to go after this. I find it hard to believe how many different live virus strains must be running around my body. They have included top up of polio, diphtheria, tetanus, then Hep A and Hep B (of which the latter is 3 separate injections), yellow fever and rabies. I am at a loss what tonight is, but I think it is the second of the 3 rabies ones plus two others.
Has this helped my health - err no, I still have aches and pains, still got a cold a few weeks ago, and currently have the dreaded ear infection back! So medicine isn't always the cure.
anyway dashing to get to my conference so more tomorrow......
Today is also another injection day - OUCH - this will be my fourth visit for injections ! and I have at least another 2 to go after this. I find it hard to believe how many different live virus strains must be running around my body. They have included top up of polio, diphtheria, tetanus, then Hep A and Hep B (of which the latter is 3 separate injections), yellow fever and rabies. I am at a loss what tonight is, but I think it is the second of the 3 rabies ones plus two others.
Has this helped my health - err no, I still have aches and pains, still got a cold a few weeks ago, and currently have the dreaded ear infection back! So medicine isn't always the cure.
anyway dashing to get to my conference so more tomorrow......
Wednesday 15 September 2010
Long time....
Let me start my once again apologising for the lack of updates. This has definitely been the longest absence I have had from blogging, and I will not go into the hundreds of excuses I could give. However I would like to say thank you to the followers in Droyslden who have stimulated me back into action!
30 days to go, yes that is correct I now only have 30 days before the great event, so I am sure you want to know if I am ready.
NO.
During my absence I have made a lot of progress in terms of kit, visa’s, vaccinations and training, which I will give you a run down of in the coming weeks, at the same time the donations are still dribbling in and I am expecting a torrent before I actually depart.
So for my final month of preparations – I am in London this week, Frankfurt next week, Japan the following week, which will give me just over a week to do any final preparation! Now I haven’t planned that well have I.
So enough of that and now for some updates.
Today I thought I would start with the Visa…. Yes believe it or not Tanzania is worried about immigration problems !, therefore all visitors must have a visa. Since I cherish my passport and I am never sure exactly when I need to use it, I didn’t’ want to risk sending it off in the post. I therefore took it in person, arranging to collect the following day. Now here is an interesting fact. Tanzania foreign office only accept cash – yes you have to pay in cash. When I dropped off my application and passport it seemed very quiet, but the following day at collection, there was a huge queue of people, tailing down the street all waiting to collect. Now when you consider we were given collection times, I came to the conclusion that Tanzania house is definitely a cash laden place at the end of each day.
What was also interesting is that despite making some errors on the form, he quickly corrected them with a biro, and the only thing he was interested in was if I had the cash.
Anyway the end result is a Visa where my picture looks more like a monkey than me. I would attach a scan but that could end up being copied and used by other visitors!
So advice if applying for a Visa , don’t worry about what to put on the form, don’t worry if you don’t have a photo you can use someone else’s just remember the cash.
I wonder what do they do with all that cash.
30 days to go, yes that is correct I now only have 30 days before the great event, so I am sure you want to know if I am ready.
NO.
During my absence I have made a lot of progress in terms of kit, visa’s, vaccinations and training, which I will give you a run down of in the coming weeks, at the same time the donations are still dribbling in and I am expecting a torrent before I actually depart.
So for my final month of preparations – I am in London this week, Frankfurt next week, Japan the following week, which will give me just over a week to do any final preparation! Now I haven’t planned that well have I.
So enough of that and now for some updates.
Today I thought I would start with the Visa…. Yes believe it or not Tanzania is worried about immigration problems !, therefore all visitors must have a visa. Since I cherish my passport and I am never sure exactly when I need to use it, I didn’t’ want to risk sending it off in the post. I therefore took it in person, arranging to collect the following day. Now here is an interesting fact. Tanzania foreign office only accept cash – yes you have to pay in cash. When I dropped off my application and passport it seemed very quiet, but the following day at collection, there was a huge queue of people, tailing down the street all waiting to collect. Now when you consider we were given collection times, I came to the conclusion that Tanzania house is definitely a cash laden place at the end of each day.
What was also interesting is that despite making some errors on the form, he quickly corrected them with a biro, and the only thing he was interested in was if I had the cash.
Anyway the end result is a Visa where my picture looks more like a monkey than me. I would attach a scan but that could end up being copied and used by other visitors!
So advice if applying for a Visa , don’t worry about what to put on the form, don’t worry if you don’t have a photo you can use someone else’s just remember the cash.
I wonder what do they do with all that cash.
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