Day 36 - 04/06/07

A reasonably long day but we were feeling pretty good at the 30k mark (about 6 in the evening) and it looked like there were some rain clouds heading our way so we decided to start moving at scouts pace. This involved walking for 100 steps, running for a 100 steps and then repeating. It took a bit of practice to get used to running with a pack as it would bounce everywhere but by bending the knees and running in a slight squat we were able to eliminate most of the vertical movement.

It was amazing the difference a pack made when running up even a slight incline - the amount of energy required was noticibly more than a flat road. We figured everyone thought we were strange enough allready so we were careful to make sure no one saw us running with our packs but unfortunately we weren’t careful enough. A young couple had stopped for a rest by the side of the road and asked us why we were running - my best answer was a shrug and ‘to see how fast we could go, plus there might be rain coming’. They were clearly tired from the days walk and looked at us like we were complete lunatics. We walked away but as soon as we were out of sight we started running again. We went back to walking when we could see the town though.

** Quite a few days later we met a french man who had pretty bad blisters on his feet and he ran 6km at the end of one day as it was easier on his blisters than walking.