I should really be stuffing things into a rucksack, but it’s much more fun to play with computers. Tomorrow three friends and I set off for a reprise of the first walking trip we ever did together: the central section of Hadrian’s Wall.* The good folks who live there have now installed a footpath all the way, so there’ll be no more dicing with death and fast cars along the sections where the paths used to run out.

There have been other changes over the last 14 years. Gone are the pre-walk planning meetings, the warnings from our families to ‘be careful’ (of what?)  and the intense discussions about whether or not to take a hairdryer (yes, this is an all-female expedition). Gone is the grim determination to carry ALL our stuff with us from one stop to the next. It seems that one’s willpower decreases over time, in inverse proportion to one’s ability to sniff out teashops.

Photos, should there be any in which we all look suitably windswept, will appear here in due course.

(*if either of the editors is reading this,  you should know that I WILL be working on the amendments to book 3 in the evenings…)