This should be a fairly short post, as I haven’t really done much formal training.
I think I probably started actively hiking more with the TEAR in mind when we moved to Marseille for 6 months. I tried to do at least one longish walk every week (20+ km), but this probably just about countered my highly sedentary work-week. From Marseille city centre it’s only a 35 minute bus ride (only 1.50 euros) to Calanques National Park, which is a wonderfully undeveloped section of rugged coastline. Most of my longer hikes in the park followed the GR98 from Cassis to Marseille (or the other way). The paths and vegetation actually reminded me a lot of the southern section of the PCT, dry and rocky, with scrubby plants.
After Marseille we went back to the UK for a few weeks. Everyone we stayed with there had dogs, so we ended up going for lots of walks, usually two a day. I just checked my phone, during my 2 weeks at home in Wadebridge my daily average steps was over 18000. Every now and then I would get away from the dogs and do a 20-30km walk.
Now that I’m back in Germany I’m doing regular yoga, with some longer walks thrown in. I’m trying to balance preparing my body and not overdoing it. There’ll be plenty of opportunity to gradually build up my hiking fitness on the trail. Naturally I’m also using these last days and weeks to enjoy some good food, and lots of it.
Hi Ben, I wish you the best for starting tomorrow your journey ! I send you good vibes from Marseille, bises, Katy
Hallo Ben,
nice that we can ‘accompany‘ you here on your journey. We (Daniel, Lilli and Emma) wish you all the best for your hike. Hopefully everything went as planned today and your first day was successful. We look forward to seeing your pictures and what you have to tell us.
Greetings from Hollenbach
Good luck tomorrow Ben! Will be thinking of you as you start your next big adventure – looking forward to all the updates – it’s going to be amazing! Love, Mum & Guy x
Thanks for the messages everyone!