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Mark Moxon's Travel Writing

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Kathleen

Subject: Thanks!
Posted: 1 Dec 2016 11:39 am


Hi Mark! Thanks for writing and sharing your experience, it's so informative and I loved reading your story.
In September this year I completed the Great Glen Way 79 miles in 6 days.
Every year I do something to raise money for SHELTER and I've really got the bug for long distance walking. Now my kids are up and away I'm keen to plan LEJOG for 2017/18...I wore good walking boots that I've walked many miles in already during the GGW..however, that didn't stop me getting one jet black (it will grow out) big toenail and the other big toe nail about to fall off!! I didn't have any rest days and noticed you had a few during LEJOG...seems like that would be essential on such a long trip..and strangely I hadn't even thought of that!! My question is did you change your footwear or stick to your old faithfuls? Also I wondered where I could download the verification forms that you had signed, stamped and dated (by the way, I loved looking at them - what a great sense of achievement that must've been seeing the days filling up!) This will take a bit of planning as I'll probably do it alone and stay with friends up and down the country as much as I can, in order to keep some of the accomodation costs down. Many thanks again Mark. All the best, Kathleen

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Mark Moxon

Subject: Footwear and forms
Posted: 5 Dec 2016 10:32 am


Hi Kathleen.

I ended up having to change my footwear in Fort William, as I wore out a brand new pair of Berghaus boots (which I'd bought especially for the walk). Here are the sorry pictures:

www.landsendjohnogroats.info/northern_scotland/59_south_laggan.html

They'd actually worn out 100 miles before, but I used Elephant tape to plug up the holes until I could get to the shop in Fort William. I got blisters all the way through, even getting a new one on the very last day, so I clearly never solved the problem of footwear!

As for the verification forms, people ask me this all the time, but the company that did those forms no longer exists. That said, I recently heard from the Land's End John o'Groats Association, who said they were thinking of providing a certificate system, so you could do worse than to ask them. There are links to their website and Facebook page from this page on my site:

www.landsendjohnogroats.info/walking_tips/how_to_prove_youve_done_it.html

Of course, there's nothing to stop you getting the stamps anyway - most of the sheets I filled in were just bits of blank A4 that I drew a grid on and photocopied, as I only got a single two-sided sheet from the club, so if you can't find anything official, just do your own. After all, it's the stamps that are the good bit, rather than the promotional blurb.

Hope this helps, and good luck with the planning! It's all part of the fun...

Best wishes,

Mark

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