It's A Long Way......

THOUSANDS of people walk the 190-mile coast-to-coast walk across northern England every year, but Littlehampton postman Tim Boone went that little bit farther . . .

Almost 900 miles farther, from the south coast of England to the north coast of Scotland, a total distance of 1,077 miles, writes Roger Green.

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And his coast to coast wasn t exactly a stroll he ran the whole way, covering roughly a marathon length a day.

Tim, 45, did the route in two stages, a 207-mile, eight-day trial last year from his North Road, Wick, home to Tring, Hertfordshire, and then the remaining 870 miles to the Atlantic shore of Scotland, which he has just completed in a further six weeks.

The second, longer leg was all the more challenging as much of his original route was closed off owing to foot-and-mouth, making lengthy diversions necessary.

Then, with a couple of days and just 50 miles of his amazing feat remaining, he was struck down by food poisoning, thanks to a dodgy steak and kidney pie, and spent two nights in hospital.

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He was grateful for the support from fellow members of the Arunners running club, who joined him for one or two days here and there. David and Sandra Telling were with Tim for the final leg to the Kyle of Tongue.

Apart from the elation of achievement, my feeling was, I wanted my lunch I was a couple of hours later getting there than I had expected and was feeling hungry!

Tim set out to do as much of the journey as possible on footpaths and bridleways, shunning main roads, so he could see more of the countryside.

He took six weeks off work for the epic run, although in one sense he remained in regular contact with the Royal Mail, having clean clothes and new maps posted on to his accommodation in advance, and returning the old maps and washing as he went along, to lighten the load.

For the full story, see the Gazette, August 2.