Our greatest achievement of the academic year 2013/14 was to start walking to school every day. The journey is a little under two kilometres and it takes us between 23 and 25 minutes. We started in November which was hardly a propitious moment but the children had been to a talk in the library on saving the planet and Michael insisted that we start walking. The great advantage of beginning in November is that the weather is unlikely to get worse. Between November and June, there was only one day where the weather was so wet that we decided to take the car. We also discovered that lots of the other children who lived locally were walking in too. It was all very positive. Between walking in in the morning and cycling home in the evenings, I was, if not fit, then at least used to moderate exercise.
Since the end of school and the beginning of my parental leave, I have largely spent my time sitting down. I cycled out to my friend’s bookclub on Sunday (about 35 minutes each way on the bike) and arrived with legs like jelly. We climbed up to Prince William’s Seat the weekend before. I note it is tactlessly described as a “short easy walk” by the tourist authorities. All I can say is that I panted all the way up and spent the next two days stiff as a poker. Great views though.
I suppose that the only comfort I can take is that if I get unfit so quickly, then maybe I can regain my mild previous fitness levels with relatively little effort. Sigh.
