I packed in a hotel room in Kashgar last night in preparation for the off tomorrow.

My old mate Mike Wellsted recommended I go for a "big" 30 litre ruck sack. A lightweight Raidlight he said.

It was great for training - with a couple of bags of rice in it and a cluster of power bars....but I've now had my first nasty surprise! The weight of the ruck sack itself doesn't really seem to count any more and 30 litres is about as big as a ladies handbag.... hmmm! (Maybe I can eat a lot on the first day in the desert to try to fix the problem)

Does any body know whether Ken Reid's driver will be meeting us in Kashgar?

This was long day - 10.5 hours for me.

The day started with a climb to Heavens gate - a natural arch in the mountains -about 2700 metres where the air gets a bit thin!. Then it was up and down over about 10 fairly steep hills and out about 10 Km alongs yet another shale river bed. The last stage was through villages and 13 km over rolling countryside- all in 35 degrees C. Feet hurt today , but am in good shape over all.

I dont know what Mountain House put in their freeze dried food - but its clearly not from this planet.I had beef stroganoff soup last night - made with tepid water hmmmmmm

Tomorrow is the long 80 km leg. A bus collects us at 6am am and takes us about 2 hours from the camp site. Have got Thursday and Friday to complete the leg.

It would be nice to have a shower - or even a proper wash. All modesty has disappeared off the face of the earth amongst the entire community.

Mike, Ken, Ted all doing well - but all got sore feet. (Ken still doesnt know why the driver hasnt turned up).

The racers in my tent finished in 7 or 8 hours - Kobi from HK, Fred from Germany and Eric from Hong Kong .

Could murder a Martini  

My last blog from the field didn’t get posted for some reason.

 The long 80 km day was indeed a very tough one. It started with a wake up call at some unearthly hour, followed by a mad scramble to pack and then on to buses at 6 am for a 2 hour journey to the start line.

I taped my feet the night the before, but Mike Wellsted decided he would do his on the bus… except he couldn’t manage it in the rather cramped back seat, so I had to do it for him.

 Shortly after arrival, whilst still on the back seat of the bus, I was drawing off shards of tape and tailoring them to his toes, under strict instruction from Michael of course, when I heard the drum roll for the start of the race. Never mind, I thought, he is a mate after all and I shouldn’t hold it against him that rather than tape up the night before he decided to bathe his feet in lanolin to make them as soft as a babies bum – just so that the tape wouldn’t stick  the following morning…. Oh Michael!!

 Ten minutes late we hit the trail. Not a pair of heels in sight! Ten minutes after that we had to stop because no one had told Mike to go to the toilet before he came out in the morning. Chai Ling is responsible for this on his usual working days and poor Mike evidently got confused because she wasn’t there.

 It took a while before we saw anyone, but slowly we made our way back into the pack again. We traversed some knife- edge ridges and down into an endless flat bottomed valley then off towards snow capped mountains in the distance. At one point we passed a rather well manicured grassed area that could have hosted Wimbledon .

 The next thing I recall was a long uphill stretch on a proper highway, then a long track to a checkpoint where there should have been hot water, but there wasn’t and the check point tent actually blew away while we were in it! There Mike and I caught up with Alex Malandain and Rob Saville. After a delicious meal of pot noodles, made with cold water, we set off again.

 From that point we continued as a foursome, to attack the last 30 KM.  This was very challenging. We were tired and ultimately darkness fell. Alex protested about the rapid pace a couple of times, but through the pain and the tears, she quietly came back a couple of times before pulling in front, to set a blistering pace for us all to follow. She is certainly tough and she actually pulled us!!! Fortunately for me she also has much better eyesight and was able spot the pink trail markers better in the failing light!

 When the light did go, at about 11-30 pm, the temperature seemed to increase further and it became more humid. There was dust everywhere, all highly visible in the beam of my headlamp which glimmered faithfully like a Toch-H lamp, until I realized that the batteries had gone. What a fiddly exercise to replace them!

 After nightfall, the trail was marked with glow sticks, which was great…until the locals realized that these magic little jobbies would be better placed in the bosom of the odd family yurt. They all disappeared within minutes, making our lives a bit more difficult.

 Eventually the four of us made the finish line around 1:30 am on Friday, some 17 hours after we set off (a bit less if you deduct the time spent fiddling with Mike’s feet). Just to stop walking - what bliss. A cut off plastic bottle of hot pot noodles and an Immovane later, it was morning and I was staring up at the tent roof again. I hobbled over to the finish line to see others still coming in - in all sorts of states.

 Ted  Hodgkinson came over the line with a very cleverly calculated 10 minutes to spare before the race days cut off time . He had an ITB injury to his thigh and had walked through a rather nasty pain barrier for 27 hours.

 We lazed around the campsite and rested for the remainder of the hot day and sat in the medical tent to admire the endlessly different ways that that competitors had chosen to mangle their feet. Doc Brian and Carly Pierce worked particularly hard that day.

 I did also enjoy an amusing chat with badly wounded iron man Giggins, who must surely take the prize for the longest stay in the medical tent in the whole event? It was also only then that I realized this was the first campsite we had stayed in with resident biting bugs. Shame I had thrown my insect repellent away the night before, to cut down on weight. 

 A wander round the nearby small farming community was interesting. In preparation for his return from Hong Kong to the Kibbutz, Kobi Itzchaki rather deftly took the handles and reigns, from a bemused farmer, of a Bactrian camel-drawn plough. He actually ploughed a straight line while delivering a commentary worthy of a BBC documentary, whilst I filmed. Clearly a man of many talents.

 The last day

 On the Saturday morning Ted Hodgkinson was first out of his sleeping bag in the Mongolians tent. He stood up and whizzed his front pack across the tent. He then announced assertively to the tent community that he had had quite enough of the Gobi and all who sailed in her, and intended to leave his entire trappings, sleeping bag, back pack and all, exactly where it was. He was going to complete the final stage without anything on his back!  He subsequently re-thought the expense angle and was persuaded to at least take the big bits!

 The second thing out of a sleeping bag was a big cockroach – which came out of mine!

 The start of the 15km final leg was staggered. The slow ones off at 9am; the slightly faster ones at 10am and those super humans amongst us at 11am (Kobi, Fred and Eric). My back pack was light - what a relief. I actually managed to run some of the course which went through villages and along a river bed. I finished in about 1 hour and 50 minutes. (The winner – he did it in just over an hour!)

 The finishing line at a local school was spectacular, with drums beating and the entire village having turned out in fabulously colourful costumes to applaud the competitors. A very emotional time for many and lots of fantastic photographs are on the RTP website. The medals were handed out and there was free beer for all and delicious beef sandwiches!

 I met a lot of great and interesting people on this journey. I made friends and strengthened existing friendships. To my tent mates – the Mongolians – (Ken Reid; Mike Wellsted; Ted Hodgkinson; Kobi  Itzchaki; Fred Lechner and Eric (I’ve miscalculated my food) Chang ) - thanks guys for the support and constant encouragement throughout. Also thanks to my other mates from Hong Kong – Rob Saville; Martin Giggins; and Mike Campbell-Pitt. I can’t forget Tim Wannenmacher , who realized I was in trouble and handed me a life saving bag of salt tablets after my rather disastrous start on day one, with electrolytes I couldn’t swallow.

Although I was not able to read the replies to my blogs whilst in the Gobi, I have read them now and I thank all who took the time follow my progress and to drop me a note of encouragement.   

 I learned a lot doing this. I went through several moments of hating it all and wishing I had gone to the Maldives instead. I went through moments of elation and laughter – even fits of the giggles with my mate Mike Wellsted. I was however constantly spurred on by the recollection that I was not only doing it for me, as part of a mid life crisis, but also for babies in China – abandoned at birth because of a physical of mental defect and left at the doors of orphanages to sink or swim, alone. Those little guys didn’t ask to enter this world, but fortunately there is a group of doctors in Hong Kong that cares and does something about it. The charity is MedArt and the doctors give their time for free – but they need support to pay for operating theatres etc. The children, once repaired, are put up for adoption.

 I need to chase up some of my sponsors, but if everything goes according to plan I will have raised about HK$106,000 for MedArt. So to all my supporters, largely my family, my friends and my work colleagues, particularly those in Bangalore, I say a very special thank you. Your generosity has helped the otherwise totally helpless! 

The adventure is over. I now get my weekends back for myself and for my family, since I don’t need to train on the hiking trails of Hong Kong any more. The problem is that the whole damn thing is addictive. I swore I wouldn’t do it again, because it was a test of endurance and it hurt. This was, I thought, the Hong Kong team consensus, but a number of the guys I mentioned above have already signed up for another one next year. Will I do that?

Probably!