Everyday I receive a word of the day by e-mail.

Today’s word was maudlin (meaning Overly sentimental)

This made me laugh as its the perfect way to describe what my mood has been this last week. 🙂

Emily started the adventure off last week when she flew out to Trujillo in Peru to begin her volunteer work.

You must read her blog as its just fascinating to hear about her work in the nursery and  living with mama Doris.

Geoff continues the adventure tomorrow when he flies out to Costa Rica. After spending Easter at the beach he will go on a weeks Spanish course.

While on the Spanish course he too will live with a local family, in  Sámara who will speak no English, so it will be interesting to see how he gets on 🙂

Then I finish the adventure by meeting Geoff in lima on 13th June. We shall then fly to Cusco, where we shall spend a week before meeting up with Emily to walk the Inca trail.

As you can imagine it was hard to say good bye to Geoff today, I was very emotional and feel a little sad.

But I am not unhappy as I just have so much to look forward too.

I feel blessed that I have someone as wonderful as Geoff to share my life and adventures with.

Geoff came over today to make sure my fruit tree’s were safely planted and my grass mown.

This time next week he will be in Costa Rica starting his 3 months of travel.

I am feeling very emotional about the whole thing at the moment 🙁 but trying to keep strong.

Here I am standing between my newly planted dwarf apple tree’s which should grow no higher than 1.8m.

In return for doing my garden I treated Geoff to an Indian head massage so we both got a treat today 🙂

These are just waiting to be used ….

Bit early for jam making, suppose I could try making some marmalade or even some chutney.

Any suggestions ??

After living in this house for 4 years and doing nothing in the garden apart from planting a flag pole cherry tree and some Rhubarb.

I finally excepted that I wont be moving on for sometime or maybe even never.

So the result of that was going out and buying a gooseberry bush and 2 dwarf apple trees.

I can taste the gooseberries already 🙂 

The intension had been to get only one apple tree but I didn’t realize you need others to pollinate them, so the end result was 2 trees.

A Red Pippin eating apple, sweet juicy and cox like, also a Blenheim Orange  which is a cooking or eating apple with an aromatic flavour.

Geoff will come over on Wednesday to plant them for me.

Then I hope they bare lots of fruit so I can repay him with endless crumbles and pies.

Next I may even get some flowers 🙂

I often worry that I have not been a good Mum.

I wonder if they could have a better life if only I had pushed them more when at school.

I know I managed the best I could on my own with two boys.

People are quick to criticize but in truth they have no idea what its like.

Even I would not admit how hard it was at times to be away from family and friends and have no help

We have been through a lot together and at times we have hated the sight of each other.

They are now becoming independent young men and I realize leaving them at weekends has been good for them.

They work out how to do things even when “Mum” is not here to ferry them around.

As a result we have a happy friendly relationship.

Nothing prepared me though for the Lovely Mothers day gifts they had for me on my return from walking The Cumbria way.

I expected Money for new walking socks but I also had a huge card… an ornamental pot of flowers with the message “if mums were flowers I’d pick you”…..  and a DVD film called PS I love you. 

When asked why they choose that film I was told because its a book your reading 🙂

So maybe I am not such a bad Mum after all  🙂

Well I have a few days off work so Geoff and I are off to do some walking.

Take a seat and wait a while and I am sure I will be posting some thing soon 🙂

Found this information on go4awalk.com, its interesting / depressing reading.

It makes me think that walking is more for maintaining weight rather than for loosing weight.

“1 pound of fat is equivalent to 3,500 Calories. So to lose 1lb in weight you need to expend 3500 Calories more than you’ve consumed.

The calories expended (and therefore the weight lost) when walking depends on a number of factors – crucially your level of fitness, your weight and the distance walked.

A good rule of thumb is that a reasonably active person weighing 168 lbs (12 stones) walking at approximately 2 mph will consume just under 100 Calories per mile walked.

Putting this another way, on a 6 hour walk over mixed terrain with an average walking speed of 2 mph:

a 14 stones person (196 pounds) will burn 1370 Calories (approx.)
a 13 stones person (182 pounds) will burn 1300 Calories (approx.) and
a 12 stones person (168 pounds) will burn 1190 Calories (approx.)

Perhaps surprisingly, you’ll actually expend a little more energy walking at slower speeds because your lack of momentum will mean that each step is more ‘energy consuming’.

On the other hand, at a higher walking speed you are likely to be using more muscle groups (e.g. by swinging your arms) which will also have the effect of increasing the calories burnt per step.

It’s also possible to increase the calories expended by using walking poles. In fact, this is the source of some of the benefits provided by Nordic Walking.

Predictably perhaps, walking uphill does consume significantly more calories than walking on the flat at the same speed. However, walking downhill also uses more calories because you use energy to resist your downward momentum.

Uphill/downhill sections will increase the effect on your quads (the muscles at the front of your thighs that lift your legs). If you want to increase the impact on your hamstrings, hip flexors and buttocks – lengthen your stride and walk faster.

If you’ve experienced a ‘second wind’ along a stretch of asphalt road at the end of a long, long day – then this may be because walking on asphalt or concrete also require less energy than walking on clay or sand.”

On the other hand if we use our pedometers and walk 3,000 steps over 30 minutes, five days a week — or 1,000 steps for 10 minutes a day as reported in this article bought to my attention by Geoff.

Then maybe walking would be helpful for weight loss.

I suppose we all have to decide what’s right for us and just do what we enjoy  🙂