With Cornelia in Cologne

Apologies for not blogging Friday – yet again my laptop had gone AWOL in the camera car, as had my iPhone recharger, so I couldn’t even resort to my previous Plan B. So sorry that I wasn’t able to update you sooner, but I hope you enjoyed following our arrival on Baldwin’s Blogspot.

So here are the stats: 3 countries, 15 days, 250 miles, an estimated 500,000 steps. Big Ben to Brussels. Me and 4 fantastic but footsore friends.

Friday:

Friday seemed almost too easy. We woke up with less than 10 miles to go, and had to dawdle along to allow the camera crew time to film us. Walking slowly was surprisingly hard – after 2 weeks on the road we had settled into a natural rhythm, and to slow down was at least as hard as walking faster would have been.

We ended as we had begun – in the rain. To slow ourselves down we stopped for several breaks along the way, including a coffee break in one of Brussels’s more elegant hotels. Think W Hotels (US) or the Sanderson (London) – and imagine 5 little orange people traipsing across the achingly chic reception into the bar, dripping rainwater and shedding mud as they go. Yup, we were about as welcome as pork pies at a bar mitzvah.

The waiter sniffed disdainfully as we deposited our backpacks and skis on the floor and settled ourselves gratefully into their elegant armchairs. Belatedly, and with a sigh of resignation, he finally deigned to take our order. Supermodels and smart businessmen looked in bafflement at these oddballs in their midst. We didn’t care. We were warm and dry and about to have hot chocolate.

Restored, we headed back out into the grey winter’s day. Luckily the media had not been deterred by the weather. We had a good little turnout, including several representatives from UNRIC, the United Nations Regional Information Centre.

Frank Koelewijn, who had contacted me via my blog and became our local “fixer”, presented us with lovely orange roses. Baldwin (who hosted us for dinner at his home in Bergen op Zoom) arrived late and breathless, having been sent to the wrong side of town by a not-so-helpful passerby. He may well have covered more miles than we did yesterday in his desperate search around the city.

Interviews and photographs complete, we went for a short walk through the beautiful squares of Brussels, cheerful with Christmas decorations in the gathering dusk. We dropped off our bags at the house of Yves Mathieu, a Climate Project presenter who had offered us accommodation and then headed out by Metro to find Les Larmes du Tigre (the tears of the tiger) – a Thai restaurant chosen by Frank for our celebratory dinner.

The icing on the cake of a very special day was to find Anthony Swift sitting at our table with Frank. Team BB2B has much to thank Anthony for – it was through him and his wife Bex that I met Laura and Jane, and also the Cherry family who plied us with tea and chocolate cake at their home in Essex, many miles and 2 countries ago. Unable to resist the allure of a party in honour of several good friends, Anthony had in mid-afternoon decided to hop on the Eurostar and come and join us.

So the journey that had taken us over 2 weeks took Anthony just 2 hours. Sigh.

Reflections:

But the quality of a journey cannot necessarily be measured by its speed. My ocean rows have taught me, if anything can, that the journey can matter more than the destination.

Sore of foot, aching of limb, and ever so slightly smelly after our long walk from Big Ben to Brussels, I wouldn’t change a single thing about our amazing trek. We set out almost as strangers – I had met Jane just once before we started planning BB2B, Laura likewise, Alison only during the Climate Ride in September, and Mary briefly at the October 24 Day of Action organized by 350.org – but we were all firmly committed to our goal, and supported each other through thick and thin. Not one of us avoided injury and pain, but we jollied each other along and made each other laugh, think, and grow.

Saturday:

I was feeling nostalgic about our time together even before we had parted company. We are now scattering to the four winds – Laura caught the train back to London last night, and Mary will travel back with Jane and her husband Sunday, while Alison and I caught the UN Climate Express train Saturday morning, bound for Copenhagen.

Photo opp in the UNEP carriage of the Climate Express. I'm bottom left, next to Franny Armstrong and in front of Lizzie Gillett of Age of Stupid. Alison Gannett with the dark hair, in the middle. Nora McDevitt, filmmaker, on far right.

As I wrote this I was sitting in Coach 2, while Achim Steiner (UNEP’s Executive Director and UN Under-Secretary General) was sitting in the seat behind me being interviewed. In the morning Alison and I were walking along the train when I spotted Franny Armstrong and Lizzie Gillett (of Age of Stupid fame) in a private compartment so we dropped in for an impromptu interview. They will be hosting a daily internet show from Copenhagen, in which a “horse race” will show how countries are progressing, depending on their declarations regarding climate change. Make sure you check it out – no doubt it will combine their irreverent humour with incisive analysis of the latest developments.

Our short stop in Cologne was enlivened by meeting up with two German sisters, Cornelia and Kirsten, who brought their copies of my book for me to sign. Unfortunately we were running late due to an unscheduled stop for an engine change, so they had frozen on the platform for half an hour before the Climate Express arrived. But we still had time for a quick chat and for them to give me a box of Belgian chocolate truffles – one for each day of our walk. Much appreciated!

Alison and I are did a joint presentation at 6pm in Carriage 9. Dinner was followed by a screening of Age of Stupid (I may well watch it for now the third time – always worthwhile) and a late arrival at Copenhagen around 11pm.

I plan to continue with daily blogs throughout my time at Copenhagen. Much is still TBD – beyond a few presentations, interviews and events, my diary is still very fluid. But I like it that way – ultimate flexibility to seize opportunities as they arise.

Watch this space!

And finally:

I’d like to say a huge thank you to all who made BB2B possible – the families who spared their wives and girlfriends to come on the walk, our Kickstarter backers, the blog readers who contributed comments and good wishes – and of course my magnificent teammates, Jane, Laura, Alison, Mary and Nora. It was special. And now, in Copenhagen, we will make it count.

Laura, Jane and Roz - and lots of mud

We have just arrived in Grimbergen, which is much nicer than it sounds. And most importantly from our perspective is that it lies a mere 10 miles from Brussels. Tomorrow will be a relatively short stroll to our final destination. Funny how your perspective changes after getting used to 15-18 miles a day!

We are now sitting at our hotel hatching plans for our arrival. We have put the word out to anyone we know in Brussels, and our new best friend Frank has also notified the local media. He is here now – having handed out photocopied maps to show us exactly where we need to be and when, he and Alison are now engaged in a major debate on a whole spectrum of environmental issues, while Nora and Todd capture their animated discussion on camera.

While I am writing this blog to put out the word about tomorrow. We’d like to get as much coverage as we can. We’ve walked 250 miles to make a point about our desire for a sustainable future, and to urge global leaders to help enable this dream to come true. The more exposure we can get the better.

Tomorrow we will be walking (or hobbling, or limping!) into the small park at Schuman, proudly wearing our orange jackets and caps, and bearing our signed Earth Balls. We are hoping for a welcoming committee of journalists, TV crews, and people coming out to show their support for our cause.

If you happen to be in Belgium, or know anybody who lives here, please let them know about this happening and urge them to come along. The weather forecast is for dry conditions (phew!) and there will be 5 radiantly sunny (and relieved!) smiles to brighten up even the dullest afternoon.

So we hope to see a good bunch of people there. If we all pull together, we CAN save the world – one step/oarstroke at a time!

Other Stuff:

Please also check out Alison Gannett’s blog. She has loads of photos of our walk – plus an account of BB2B from her own unique perspective. To be honest, I haven’t had time to read it – would be interesting to find out how the view of an extreme skier differs from that of an ocean rower. I know she got a lot more excited about hills than I did!

Alison will be coming on to Copenhagen. We will be doing a joint presentation on the Climate Express on Saturday at 6pm, and have further plans to collaborate once we are at COP15.

Please also consider supporting her Kickstarter project. She is 94% of the way there, with 8 days to go!

Alison - Epping

Much of today has been spent walking through lovely woods of oak and beech as we headed out of London through Epping Forest. According to our navigator Jane, King Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth 1 used to hunt in this ancient forest.  Once beyond Epping we got into rolling agricultural land, criss-crossed by streams and ditches and tiny villages and masses of farms.

We were lucky with the weather. Parts of the Lake District in the north of England are suffering floods after record-breaking rainfalls that one Labour MP described as “Biblical”. The Met Office gauging station at Seathwaite recorded 314.4mm (12.3 inches) in 24 hours, compared to the previous record of 279mm (11 inches) which fell in Martinstown, Dorset in 1955.

We, on the other hand, spent most of the day in lovely mellow autumn sunshine, bringing out the gorgeous golds and oranges of the leaves still clinging to the beech boughs. Only later on did we get a few drops of rain, which coincided with the muddiest stretch of our walk as we squelched along footpaths in the aforementioned “rolling agricultural land”. But, as Winston Churchill said, “When you’re going through hell, keep going.” The same applies to mud. No way to go but onwards.

As we walked I chatted with Alison, the extreme skier who regularly hurls herself off the top of cliffs. She euphemistically describes them as “shower curtain slopes” – which gives you some idea how steep they are. We compared notes on our respective activities – and how we both find that the time we spend in our wildernesses help us to reconnect with what is important. We’ve both had people to say to us that they don’t know how we can be happy spending time alone, so far from “civilization”. I find this interesting.

Much as I love being around people, I really do love spending time alone. I get a bit stressed if I go too long without my me-time. 100 days of solitude at a stretch is almost too much of a good thing, but it’s a great time to step off the world, reflect, get to know myself, and remind ourselves what really matters. So many trivialities fall away when you’re in an extreme environment. The basic human needs of food, water, and rest become all-important – and you realize how little else is.

And you don’t even have to go to the top of a sheer cliff or the middle of the ocean to do it. Just walking through the wilds of Essex (which, to compare it to the US, is probably our equivalent of New Jersey, i.e. not very wild at all) is enough to feel like we’re getting away from it all, that all the clutter of email and internet and everyday life is receding into the distance. It’s not exactly Chris McCandless territory (Into The Wild), but I’m still getting a lovely feeling of reconnecting with nature, regrounding myself on the Earth.

This is a very special time, and I feel very lucky to be here with my fantastic BB2B teammates. Thanks, girls!

Other Stuff:

We seem to be walking through a lot of places that sound like verbs. Wapping yesterday. Epping today. We’re working on definitions.

Today we decided, while eating lunch in a lovely tearoom in Epping – which opened only a week ago, just in time for us – that Epping is what an American does when they steal the spoon out of the sugar bowl to stir their tea, resulting in a sticky spoon with sugar coating. See photo.

Definition for Wapping still open to debate. Any offers?!

I was using my solar-powered pedometer today  (Savage branded ones available on my store, in BB2B orange – only $5.59!). For most of the day I kept it clipped to my pocket, but then got worried it was too vulnerable there to being knocked off and lost. So I clipped it onto my sports bra, safe in my cleavage. Unfortunately I forgot it was solar-powered, and it’s probably rather dark in there. So now I want to tell you my final step count and I can’t. Aha!!! As I speak, the artificial light in the kitchen of our B&B has just resuscitated it. Final count = 29,742. About 15 miles. Not bad going!