unironedman

A mercifully short post this week, as I have lots to do, and time is racing along. The week started in a most novel and interesting fashion, as Niall was in touch to say he was down for a trade show from his native Donegal, and how about meeting up for a natter. And so, on Monday evening, fellow blogger, hiker and cyclist, Niall Harran popped over to the house and together with S, we found our way to the Salmon Leap for an illicit pint or two. You can find Niall’s blog here. Niall is great company, and the hours flew by. We’ll have to do it again sometime; perhaps we’ll get ourselves up to Donegal; S has relations up there, so we’re probably overdue a visit.

It was a busy week in work and the weather has most definitely turned. Plenty of rain (indeed, biblical quantities in Kerry as parts of Killarney were badly flooded). Some running; enough to keep the Garmin challenge topped up, though I fell from my lofty perch as last week’s winner and will finish up with the wooden spoon this week. Just about made the 40k total required, but that was only possible with the half-marathon Gary and I fashioned this Sunday.

We had planned to do the Boyne Valley Camino, but the weather was still looking rather ugly with the potential for heavy rain and thunderstorms, so we opted to get the train into Dublin and run back to Leixlip along the canal. It was bang on 21.1k back to the car park at Louisa Bridge. Plenty of folk out running, particularly closer to the city. Not unusual with Dublin City Marathon on the horizon, but at at one point, we remarked that we could be in a race, given the number of runners with us on the towpath.

Above is a photo-dump of some of the journey, including shots from the train. The view of a city from a train is different from any other. It’s almost like an invasion of privacy, like peering over someone’s garden wall. There were a few stops and starts as we made our way through the inner city, but overall, we kept the pace honest enough, below 6 minutes per kilometre, and came in just over 2 hours. Important to remember that long, slow runs should be slow, as the name suggests.

I am gamely swimming on in the lake, but this too shall come to an end. Once you get the heavy rains, you can feel the chill in the water in comparison to the ‘who left the immersion on’ heat of this Summer. This week alone, I had one swim in the moonlight, and another in the rain. Like most things in life, there is no conscious decision to have a ‘last swim of the year’. It happens naturally. You don’t plan it, but one day you will find yourself standing by the lake, halfway through a run, and you will look at the water and shake your head, and keep on running.