A Winter Walk

There's a lot of Olympics on TV at the moment (and not much else!). Personally, I have to confess I've never taken much interest in sports of any kind. The only winter sports that can sometimes keep me entranced in front of the TV for as long as an hour or two is usually figure skating, and especially ice dance. (I did watch the whole ice dance final the other night.) That has nothing whatsoever to do with any skating skills of my own, though - I never even learned to stand on them, and even less to move about...!

Friday the 13th* was another cold, grey winter day here - of the kind with a flurry of snow in the air all day, even if not actually adding very much to the amount already on the ground. I decided to defy *superstition though, so manged my usual weekly "recycling walk" (about 20 minutes). But I did not feel tempted to extend it any further. (Cold winds blowing...)

Yesterday, I expected to wake up to much the same kind of weather, but was pleasantly surprised to instead find the sun shining from a clear blue sky - inspiring me to actually try a walk into town. Winter seems to be planning to keep us in its grip next week as well (possilby including throwing even more snow at us), and I did need some stuff from the pharmacy again. Besides a refill of some prescription medicines, my recent cold "caught from nowhere" had also more or less emptied my basic stock of various over-the-counter stuff...!

Ever since my unfortunate fall and knee injury back in October, with the long, cold and snowy winter following, it still feels like a long way to walk to the city centre, though. So when I set out, I was thinking that I'd probably better choose the same way into town that I did last time - allowing me to catch a bus part of the way, if I should feel the need for it... 

However - once I got out, it seemed that my legs must have been conferring separately with some braver part of my brain. Because as soon as I had crossed the first street, instead of continuing towards the travel center, I found myself turning down to the river, and my favourite path into town that I have not walked since early October - as it does not include any "escape options" along the way...

It all turned out for the best, though. With the cold dry weather we've been having for weeks now, the gravel path along the river, even with a bit of snow and ice on it, was probably actually a better choice for walking than the pavements along the streets.

I also had the pleasure of seeing the river all frozen, which doesn't always happen - but as I've already pointed out, we've had an unusually long period of temperatures staying well below freezing point both day and night lately.

 

 

 After my visit to the pharmacy, I also paid a visit to my favourite little tea shop by the square (pretty much "just around the corner" from the pharmacy), as I had also again run out of my favourite black tea blends from there. I actually can't recall when (before this winter) I last had to "resort to" buying prepackaged loose leaf tea from the supermarket! ;)  I've been buying nearly all my teas from that shop by the square for 40 years - i.e. for as long as I've lived in this town...

After that, no room in my backpack for any more purchases. But as my knee still wasn't signalling any serious protests, I decided I was likely to be able to walk back home the same way as I had come - through the park and along the river. 

When I reached the cemetery hill (up to the right from the view above) I decided to take the "shortcut" across there. (When walking in the other direction, I had taken a bit of a detour to avoid having to walk down a rather steep hill. But uphill is somewhat less challenging.) 

 

 

Not all paths on the cemetery have been ploughed, but the major ones have. 

 

 

I parked my poles and my backpack on a bench for a photo stop. (Didn't sit down myself, though - too cold for that!) (All photos in this post taken with my phone, btw.)

 

All in all, I was out and "on my feet" for two hours (including the time spent in the two shops). My knee injury back in the autumn happened on October 10th. Four months later, this is the first time since then that I walked all the way both to and from the city centre. With the kind of winter we've been having, I had really given up hope of even trying this until spring. But my knee does not seem to have got any worse from it. I'm still wearing a compression knee sleeve whenever I go out (and a softer bamboo one all night), and use at least one walking pole outdoors (just now both!) And I may have to continue to do that. But being able to walk into town and back has been my primary goal, and having achieved that "already" feels like an unexpected victory! Kind of like my own personal "olympic" achievement - even if it doesn't come with a medal... :)