Geoff Jones

Inveterate dabbler in business, travel, gadgets & life

Category: Walks

Grand Union Canal jaunt – Day 1

GRand Union Canal armFinally, halfway through the year, the apartment sale is finally totally complete and I’m able to start travelling again albeit currently restricted to shanks pony as having 1/3 of my prostate removed in the HoLEP operation 3 weeks ago makes it inadvisable to do long bumpy bike rides for a while. I decided to stick locally as well  until all the pain when I pee has gone away.

The Grand Union Canal walk from Central London seems a good idea as it isn’t to strenuous but long enough to take a week or so. I still haven’t decided whether to go to Birmingham or take the branch to Nottingham.

Today was a late start as I first went swimming at Jesus Green and then posting my old thermostat that I sold on ebay. So I finally arrived at Kings Cross at 2.30pm.

It was an interesting walk along Regent’s Canal to Little Venice and then along the Paddington Arm of the Grand Union to Alperton finishing today at the demolished Hovis bread factory. Very pleasant except for the constant stream of cyclists bombing along 🙂

My nephew Phillip is kindly putting up with me for tonight, although a first for me was navigating across three bus routes to reach his flat. I ended up getting the busmapper app as the fellow passengers were too friendly bombarding me with all the options. Weird at 67 my first attempt at being on the buses!

Tomorrow it looks like a huge loop and heading south for 5 or so miles to avoid the hills at Harrow.

According to Strava I did 13.6 miles in just under 4 hours. The pictures of the day are here

Tenerife & La Gomera Walking Holiday

1-IMG_5495Sally and I decided that it was about time we gave the two wheels a rest and give the  Scarpa boots & Leki poles an airing 🙂 Sally’s criteria was it had to be warm and hilly! Since Mr T would only allow her two weeks of and it was November we came up with the Canary islands,  particularly Tenerife and La Gomera. So of we flew with Easyjet from Gatwick. Only to discover on arrival that Ryanair passengers from Stansted were collecting their baggage in the airport 🙁

A quick taxi ride (€30) and we were at the docks and straight on the awaiting ship (€56 each way) making it a smooth passage to our apartment in San Sebastian booked a couple of weeks ago on booking.com. We booked the rest of the accommodation as we went, invariably the night before we arrived (Yep, I’m that organised).

The walking & weather were excellent every day with some days outstanding like the walk down the Masca Valley & Las Poyatas to El Cedro (here is a cool site with trail lists)

Here is a table of all our walks with links to the GPS/GPX tracks we did and my photographs:-

2014 DatePlaceHotelRoute gpx (Strava)Photos (G+)Steps (Fitbit)Miles (Fitbit)Ascent feet (Fitbit)KCals (Fitbit)
Mon 3 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánSan Sebastian to El Cabrito45 Pics3112114.2723204247
Tue 4 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánSan Sebastian to La Casetas loop62 pics3120014.3121803861
Wed 5 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánGran Rey to Arure74 pics2255510.3433503116
Thu 6 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánSan Sebastian to Laja via GR131-Stage180 pics2672412.2536704334
Fri 7 NovLa Gomera - San SebastianApartamentos San SebastiánHermigua El Cedro loop70 pics2599711.9230703583
Sat 8 NovTenerife - Santiago del Teide La Casona del patioExplore TF65 around Santiago del Tiede43 pics2567611.814003549
Sun 9 NovTenerife - Santiago del Teide La Casona del patioSantiago del Tiede to Masca Beach91 pics2625912.0414405007
Mon 10 NovTenerife - TeideTeidi ParadorWalk to cable car onTiede
Tiede walk below summit		80 pics150476.96607394
Tue 11 NovTenerife - TeideTeidi ParadorCircular walk below Tiede50 pics2703112.413604771
Wed 12 NovTenerife - TeideTeidi ParadorHike up Tiede to top station of cable car
Portillo information centre walk		46 pics2526511.5945104168
Thu 13 NovTenerife - San MiguelHotel RuralRoques de Garcia loop102 pics2743212.5826603775
Fri 14 NovTenerife - San MiguelHotel RuralSan Miguel - The Camel trail82 pics3287515.084404568
Sat 15 NovTenerife - Golf del SurRoyal Park AlbatrosLa Laguna town walking45 Pics182128.353502909
Sun 16 NovTenerife - El MėdanoFlight homeMontana Roja64 pics166467.658502918
Totals934 pics352040161.52826058200

I can recommend the island for walking & don’t be put of by the horrors of Los Cristianos / Playa de Las Americas ( where I ended up renting a car to make a fast escape) & Los Gigantes. The beaches behind the airport are excellent & quiet. The local bus service is also good although the first buses don’t leave until 10am from San Sebastian.

Here is the story according to Google+

Transylvania Green Way walking tour.

Today (30th Oct 2013)I ventured out of Bucharest to go with Mihal on his two day Green Way walking tour to Transylvania.

1-IMG_7279We left on the train in the morning with our first stop at Sinaia to visit the Royal Palace of Peleș Castle I’m sure culture vultures could easily spend a week here, for me, I just wanted to be on top of the magnificent Bucegi mountains that overlook it., although we did take a peek at the art nouveau exhibition.   Next stop on our whirlwind tour was Brasov where we changed trains for a small independently run train to  Zarnesti .

At Zarnesti it was time for some real walking in the The Piatra Craiului National Park, we ventured up the gorgeous limestone gorge with it’s documented rope climbs at Surplomba & Faleza Arcadel we turned around and walked up the hill to our nights accommodation at Pension Pepino in Magura. The landscape is very reminiscent of what Switzerland mountain villages must have looked like 50 years ago.

Geoff Jones on a rock
Geoff Jones on a rock

After an excellent dinner & good nights sleep  on a glorious day we ventured of again, up a very  steep slope  and onto a fantastic ridge with amazing views down to Zarnesti and across to a very rocky ridge in the distance. A splendid walk accompanied by a dog that followed as from Magura. We descended down to Bran admiring Dracula’s castle on the way. Then it was a bus to Rasnov where we walked up to the remains of Rasnov Citadel. Another bus ride and we were in Brasov and its splendid medieval city centre, another place I intend to revisit!

All in all a great two days of a whistle stop tour with excellent walking. A good introduction to Transylvania and Carpathian mountains. The price for just me was on the high side but obviously if you go as a group  of 4 or so it would be considerably cheaper. Mihal is an excellent guide, very flexible in accomodating your needs and speaks very good English.

The photographs of the days are here and here  and here is a overview of the gps trails.

tracks__1_.gpx-4

Southern Upland Way – Portpatrick to Castle Kennedy

IMG_9367Today with George (who I first met 50 years ago whilst doing the Duke of Edinburgh’s award scheme at Parkgate Iron & steel works) I started the Southern Upland Way. This is a 212 mile coast to coast walk across Scotland starting in Portpatrick near Stranraer.

This is the first time I have pre-booked the trains at either end plus the ten b&b’s in between. Another first is I’m  using my new Polar H7 heart monitor with the iCardio app on the iPhone.

icardioWhen we left George’s house in Kendal it was hammering down with rain. However, by noon when we arrived at Portpatrick all was clear but with a very cold wind blowing hard.

The walk is, so far, well marked although with a fair bit of road/track walking today. The moorland bits were very boggy with no refinements such as gravel or paving slabs like on other National Trails. The Via Ferrata bit is a chain handrail alongside straightforward  steps in the rock.

We did 18.38 miles in 5hr 52min + 1hr 35min stops  according to my GPS as we went into Stranraer to grab some fish & chips before our b&b. This is the rather magnificent deluxe Chlenry Farmhouse (which offers a big meal with wine for £35 each…)

Tomorrow is Bargrennan some 25 miles away

All the day’s pictures are here

The trip statistics are here 

The trip on Everytrail is here