Vicky Hogg – Weekly JOGLE Update

Aiming for 30 miles a day, Vicky will be providing us with updates every week so we can follow her journey. Here, Vicky tells us how week 2 went in her JOGLE Update: 

For the whole of day 5 I had to walk, to give my knee a rest, and thankfully it is feeling good. I was only half a mile short today, tallying up 29.50 which I was pleased with considering it was a day of getting lost, wrong turns and the last five miles were a mud bath so took forever to get through.

Day 6 was another long day, The knee is holding up, only slightly swollen but it’s the blisters that are giving me the most amount of grief today. I went slightly off route, but the miles remained the same; I decided to avoid the mountains and tough terrain as I would have been on my own for 15 miles, so I chose a cycle path instead. We then booked into a hotel for the night to recharge our batteries and I managed to get an ice bath, which I’m hoping will help the knee a bit.

What a day! I feel great on day 8. I just felt like running, so I did and for a whole 32 miles (except the hills of course). I was grateful to have the amazing Simon Grant come and do some physio work on my body, especially on my knee. He was lovely and donated the session for free to support Dementia UK. Thankfully, I’m only suffering from a tight IT band so it can be managed and there’s no permanent damage. I also had a lovely surprise visit from my Auntie Lorraine and Dave. I feel amazing and ready to take on the next few days.

31 miles in the bag for day 9, slowly adding extra miles to the bag which I’ll no doubt need further down the line. It was far too hot today, so we’ve decided we are going to set off early tomorrow to avoid the midday sun. It was great to have my Auntie and Dave for some company for a short way this morning, which helped to take my mind off the early morning aches and pains. After that, I managed to run most of the way, which usually doesn’t go without me getting a little lost, and today was no exception but I still made the target and the amazing donations are keeping me going.

After an early start to day number 10 to avoid the heat, the challenge then came in the form of hills. Hill after hill after hill, it did eventually flatten out a little. The highlight of my day was crossing the fourth bridge near Edinburgh, but it goes without saying that I went wrong again! I had to jump a barbed wire fence with my dodgy knee and got some funny looks.  It was all worth it to be able to secure an early finish at 2.30pm with another 31 miles under my belt. I spent the evening chilling at another gorgeous campsite, my support crew is changing tomorrow, Carole heads home and Nic takes over.

My emotions boiled over on day 11, that’s not to say I didn’t grab another 30 miles in the bag. The first 10 miles were along a very busy road, so it wasn’t very pleasant. I really hit a wall in the middle of the day and had no energy, and even burst into tears. I will make a conscious effort to eat more as I don’t think I’m fuelling my body enough to get me through all the miles. I never seem to be hungry, but it is definitely affecting my energy. Saying that, me and Nic are now at the pub having some grub. I got all my new kit from 361, Yorkshire tea bags from James and Debbie Wood and a lovely bag of goodies from my good mate Lucy Wright with a lovely note that made me cry just a bit! That’s enough to spur me on – can’t wait to update you all again next week!

Vicky has a JustGiving page: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/vicky-hogg6

Read about the journey here in Vicky’s JOGLE Update:

Beginnings

Read about Stage One