I began this blog in November, 2007, specifically as a calling card in the hopes that it would introduce me and help me get to know other participants in last year’s Challenge. It has since become the unsatisfactory collection of maunderings its one or two readers now see before them, but it began, joyfully and successfully, as a blog to help me make friends and ask questions for my participation in the TGOC.

Last fall, I attended a local event and ran into a keen outdoorswoman I hadn’t seen since just before I’d left for Glasgow. She asked enthusiastically about my walk across Scotland, and I had to tell her it hadn’t gone as planned. She reacted as if I’d told her we’d had a death in the family. Which, I must admit, is pretty close to the way I felt heaving myself onto that bus at Invergarry.

But time heals all sprained ankles, and I’ve been cheerfully following by blog what sound (and look) like terrific crossings by friends I met on the trail or after bussing around to Braemar and Montrose. Envious congratulations to all, and cheers to director Roger Smith, who showed me such kindness last year. I’m still holding out hope for 2010, but another possibility has opened up. What do you think? Crossing Scotland in May? Or tramping New Zealand in January?