The Photoshoot

We’ve decided to push on with getting the publicity for the main event underway. We’ve come up with several ideas for posters, leaflets, and business cards. Our final poster design is available here on the blog for you to print off and pin up to help us raise even more awareness of what we are doing. It’s down the right hand side of the page, you can’t miss it.

The venue for most of the design work was the pub across the road from our office (what better place could there be eh?) Well maybe Alan would suggest the river bank so that he could get some fishing in at the same time. Simon would no doubt suggest a poker night at his place with a spot of Nintendo Wii for good measure to see with that gets the creative juices flowing (not all too sure how it would though). Where as I would definitely suggest an evening down Headingley Stadium watching the Rhinos thrash somebody and then discuss poster ideas after. To keep everyone happy though, we’ll stick with the pub idea. I think at some point everyone has sat in the pub putting the world to rights in one subject or another so to come up with some good ideas what better place to head for?

We decided that we needed pictures to go on the posters so we ventured out, in full uniform for the first time, to Bolton Abbey. On a day when the weather couldn’t have turned out any better, we arrived at Bardon Tower and disguised ourselves as rough, tough centurions. (Well maybe not.) Much to the amusement and surprise of several families, we walked up the hill to where we thought would be the best setting for the pictures. Several cars nearly crashed as their owners rounded corners to see three centurions walking up the road towards them.
Warren Davies, the photographer we had managed to convince to help, must have wanted to hide! You can view his work at www.warrendaviesphotography.co.uk
A big thanks to him for his time.

Next update will be coming soon as we want to fit plenty more practice walks in, including a 2 day back to back walk to try and get used to walking a longer distance over consecutive days. We are also trying to drum up some interest in the papers, TV, Radio and online so keep an eye/ear open for us!

Keep your support coming! Thanks

Rob

Training walk 2 - Leeds Liverpool canal

The next training walk took in the Leeds to Liverpool Canal, from the basin in Leeds to Bingley train station. How long would you expect this to take on the train? Well I’ll tell you, just under 20 minutes. How long would it take to walk that distance though? We covered the distance, a fairly easy walk of generally flat terrain totalling 17 miles in 5 hours. Given that we were able to stick to the towpath that runs alongside the canal we were able to walk at a pretty fast pace. I think at this point it really started to hit home as to just how long a day it would be when we do the 22 mile stretch on day 3, between Chollerford and Gilsland. Not to mention that we’ll of course have all the armour on at that point too! I think it’s safe to assume that walking at the pace we did along the canal would likely inflict severe pain if we attempted it in full armour all day long. We’ll certainly have to learn to pace ourselves much better and look to take things easier on the harder, hilly parts of the Hadrian’s walk. We’ll have to do this to make sure we are able to make it to our check points at the end of each day.

Hopefully by the end of June it will have warmed up a little and will feel no where near as cold as it did along the canal side. It is just the week after our snow walk and so there is still a chill in the air. The snow on the ground has all but melted away with only small pockets remaining, hidden away at the bottom of walls where the warm sunlight doesn’t get to. The canal is frozen over in large areas and is thick enough that you can throw rocks out on to it and they’ll just bounce off without smashing through. We’d tried this out a few times and the walk soon started to form a similar 5 minute cycle of walk, walk, walk, walk, stone, throw, whack!, “Bloody hell, hasn’t even gone through!”…walk, walk, walk, walk, stone….
Daft I know but it passed the time!

Between all the walking and ice smashing we’d pass other walkers and cyclists out enjoying the crisp fresh air. It’s always nice passing people while out walking as you can always guarantee that you’ll get a smile and a nod and a friendly “Hi”, “Morning”, or a good old Yorkshire “’Ow do”. Rob too made a new friend in the form of a small dog out for a walk with its owner. Fido too passed on its own brand of excitable greeting as it bound toward him and headed straight for his leg, I’ll say no more than that though and leave the rest for you to decipher for yourselves!

Mile by mile passed by and we were nearing Bingley station knowing that in around 2 and a half miles, we’d reach our destination for the day and be able to grab a pint before taking the train back to Leeds station. The 2 and a half miles, at our current pace, should have taken us around 45 minutes. Needless to say, the lure of the pub being so close did hasten the final stage of the walk, just a tad.

30 minutes later, beer in hand, we sat back to catch the second half of the Italy Vs Ireland Six Nations game and after that headed back to Leeds, the quick way, chooo chooo!

Simon

Tunics - the making of, and the snow walk

Now the uniforms are all coming together nicely we have decided to begin our training walks. The first one was a bit spur of the moment. The snow was coming down and Alan sent an email around. Anyone fancy a snow day tomorrow? It seemed fitting that since the walk idea was originally from the previous snow day, almost exactly a year to the date, that we would treat it as a training walk.

So on a very snowy morning I set off on a round trip of Leeds to pick the guys up. After several slippery encounters with roads between Simons and Alan’s we finally arrived.

We’d headed north to Addingham, where we left the car and wandered up Beamsley Beacon, finding several snow drifts on the way. At the top the snow was thigh high in places and Alan, being the shortest, struggled to keep up with me and Simon. Though he soon found a way to get ahead of us and began crawling along the top of the snow.

After a brisk stop for lunch we descended via our own path, which took in the places where the snow looked the deepest. Then the inevitable happened as I ran ahead and managed to get both legs stuck in a drift up to my waist, losing balance I fell face first into the snow. Holding out my already frozen hands to stop my fall I looked around to see both Alan and Simon in hysterics. After several attempts at getting me up Alan ended up on his back in the drift too. A hour and half later we were in the car on the way to a nice warm pub.

Rob

The armour has arrived

When Simon told me the armour was heavy I laughed it off.
“Can’t be that bad” I had said.
So when it turned up courtesy of Townend’s Courier Service. (a.k.a Simon and his black Saxo). I was surprised to feel the full weight of it.
By that time Alan had already had his for an hour and text messages from him were heading my way every few minutes.
“Looks good.” “My helmet is too big.”
After cleaning the grease and grime off my armour, I finally got ready try it on.
After receiving several bruises and a few scratches I was able to stand with it all buckled up, only to find I had put it on backwards!!
This walk suddenly seemed like a very demanding task.

Having got the armour, I turned my attention to arming us for the walk and getting material to make the tunics.

Trawling through material shops, looking for the right type of material, didn’t strike me as very macho, so I dragged Alan along to make it less embarrassing. Disturbingly we began having conversations about how soft the material was and if it was the right colour. I’m sure legionnaires wouldn’t have done that!

Finally I decided to seek advice from the older generations. My grandparents.
I should have done this earlier as they found some material that was suitable within a week. Kindly they offered to buy the material for us, as a donation to the walk.
So on to making the tunics. Purchasing several cheap yards of material to experiment with proved to be a good idea.

My first attempt fit well, like a glove, a very tight glove.
The second attempt was better a little more fitting for a Roman soldier.
Eventually I turned my attention to making the three tunics, measurements provided by the other two. Miraculously they all fit well.

In the meantime our wooden swords had turned up and I had measured up and got material to make authentic looking scabbards (sword holders if you’re not sure) for the three of us. This is still work in progress – we hopefully should have some pictures for you soon!

Rob