City Walk 2022 - A Quest Like No Other
City Walk 2022 - A Quest Like No Other
Every year that I do this (since 1994!), I get asked many of the same questions. Why I am doing it, or why again. I get awed looks and eye-rolls. If I encounter a stranger, they very often wonder, what cause I am supporting?
It's complicated. In the past, I might have directed you to a previous blog post where I wax eloquent about my reasons. This year, I realized that the reason has managed to change a little bit every year. So, the answer, you may ask? Connection. To nature, the city, myself, family, and friends. This walk has gone from an individual pursuit, to an exercise in team building.
So, what happened this year?
03:34
I had an alarm set for 4am, but as is so often the case, when you are keyed up you don't really wind up needing the alarm.
I got up, grabbed the clothes that I had laid out the night before, posted on the City Walk Discord channel, and made an espresso.
04:00
Leo and Wen were not able to sleep with me grinding coffee and getting my gear ready, so they got up and helped organize the "starters" as they began to arrive.
04:38 - Departure
05:00 - South Berm
As promised, we did not need to climb any fences. A long detour could have taken us around, but we sacrifice a couple of walkers to the ticks instead 😬
06:40
First support call arrives with socks for Anthony
9:00 Brighton
This is where I lost a lot of the starting team, last year. This time around everyone was tired, yes, but still going strong.
Normally, there is at least one location where "shenanigans" can be said to have occurred. Such activities, while they bolster the spirits of the group as a whole, have from time to time, been blamed for the untimely departure of one or more walkers.
We need only think back a few short years to when a fateful tumble down a massive pile of dirt sent Anthony home, or how last year Vin blamed his knee pain on a jaunty leap from atop a chain-link fence.
Playing in Brighton. The slide was a little faster than Dave anticipated.
This year, I took the burden upon myself (as I so often do) and made mischief on behalf of my family and friends. The large rusting metal "wheel" standing near (in?) a construction zone was too much for me to pass up.
Some were disappointed with how slowly the wheel turned, but come on--I'm 50 years old.
We called on Eric for his second (and last) support trip of the day, before handing the mantle off to Liz.
11:30 NE Swale (starting to "feel" it)
Although no one would admit it, yet. A dark and quiet mood was settling on our little fellowship. By the time we were ready to enter the swale, we had called for Liz to deliver a much needed change of foot ware for several of us. I took the opportunity to switch from salty to sweet and sour snacks.
13:45 Lunch Losses
Wendy, you are amazing. The picnic was perfect, as always. We were joined by Leo, Jodi, Jodi's Mike, and Kahan.
I always appreciate the idea that others can both support and enjoy the walk with as much or little effort/time as fits on any given year. This year, I had many phone/FaceTime calls from Anwyn and James, as well as plenty of physical company on the walk. So, while Jaime and Jodi and Leo and Wendy were waiting in the wings, I was perhaps less needy than usual.
Special shout out to Finn on his first walking stint, this year. He was delightful company (as were you Jaime )
16:00 YXE
For the second year, I routed around the south of the airport. The long, gravely section of road is always my least like portion of the walk. I was not sad to see it stricken from the record. Who knows what the future may bring, but COVID has softened some of my more extreme instincts. Surprisingly, sometimes, removing all the fun from something means that you don't want to do it anymore.
18:00 Any Excuse to sit
Sitting down--indeed any version of stopping--becomes very alluring as the day goes on and the distance adds up behind you. I called a halt to the walk to examine a large field of clover. I used to look for 4-leaf clovers a lot when the girls were younger and at one time I had a collection of seven of them pressed in various books. On this occasion, Vin and Anthony and I sat in the cool grass and failed to find anything particularly unusual. I think Vin did manage to find a 5-leaf, but was relatively unimpressed. I don't like quitting and pressed us to stay longer and longer as I frenetically searched. Eventually, I knew we had to move on and I apologized for taking so long and thanked them for indulging me in my search. Vin cocked an eyebrow and said, "isn't that what this entire enterprise is about?"
Whoa! He was right. While everyone is really participating for their own reasons, the whole thing is to help me satisfy that deep inner craving for adventure. Mission accomplished. I felt so grateful at that moment for all the support I get to do this. Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you.
19:00 Ice-Cream proves too much for Anthony
I think it was shortly after the clover hunt, Anthony observed that walking extreme distances wasn't so bad. You just had to be careful not to stop after a certain point. It wasn't so long after his fateful statement that the fates lured us into a DQ for dipped cones. We made it out, but in the mean time, I suspect the constant adrenaline of the walk wore off and Anthony was slammed with the pain of a blister between his toes that he didn't even realize that he had. Defeat by ice-cream doesn't really seem so bad.
20:15 God-light Golf Course
Leaving the DQ was good. We had been walking West for half the day and the constant solar glare in my eyes was getting me down as the sun began to lower in the horizon. Turning back to the East was great relief and a bit of a pick-me-up with only 5 or 6km remaining. As I walked past the golf course, I thought of last years mechanized escort. I looked to see if I could find the course custodian--in case it was the same man--but, there was not a sole on the course. Not sure why it was empty on this particular Saturday. Couldn't have been the weather. It was stunning.
21:20 82,368 step (59km) bubble bath
Wendy really is too good to me. She asks me to text 15 minutes before I am home so that she can run a bath with candles and a cold, cold drink at my elbow.
Afterwards
I've been mulling things over for several weeks now. Just as I was attempting to finish writing this post, I got a call from Heather Morison -- a producer with the CBC. We talked for 20 minutes and she asked if I would agree to be interviewed on the radio. As a storyteller, how could I resist. Not sure I was particularly coherent. Oh, well. At least I didn't have to tell her what I wanted for intro music, she made the perfect choice.
The web article is also quite nice and makes me very happy:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatoon/lord-of-the-rings-inspired-man-quest-1.6504638
Comments