The month long hiatus in my travel plans is over at last. Lambing has finished -- with mixed results as usual. I decided not to enter the Black Mountain Roundabout walk after all, mainly because my pedometer indicated an average speed of 2.68 mph during a very un-taxing seven mile walk over my local hills that only involved an ascent and descent of a few hundred feet. I have to face the fact that I'm a slow walker (one of the penalties of being short in the leg). There's no way I could have completed the first twenty miles within the time allowed at this stage in my training. Fortunately, walking slowly is one of the keys to successfully reaching the summit of Kilimanjaro, so I'm naturally ahead of the game in one respect, at least.

Training has suffered, along with blogging and searching for a trekking group, during lambing. Lack of time and energy meant several missed swimming sessions and only one or two climbs up the farm each week with my weighted daypack. However, I think the numerous daily walks up the lambing field, often carrying twenty pounds of sheep feed or a couple of new-born lambs was mostly adequate replacement for my regular training regime.

I'm now in the process of buying a bicycle, which should increase my range of exercise. I gave up cycling years ago when I first moved up here into the hills; my old three-speed bike just wasn't capable of getting me up our precipitous Welsh slopes. Now, I've decided to invest in a mountain bike after borrowing one from a friend and discovering the joys of multiple low gears and suspension forks. Cycling has come a long way since I last sat on my trusty old three-speed. I've been bewildered by the choice of styles available – do I need a pure mountain bike, a trekking model or a hybrid? I've finally whittled down the choices to two models of 'comfort' mountain bikes, and will buy whichever I can get for the best price. Cycling should help build up leg muscle and give a good cardio-vascular workout without putting strain on my knees. I really need to save those knees for Kilimanjaro. Last week, I finally found another neoprene knee brace at reasonable cost, so I now have braces for both knees ready for the Kilimanjaro descent.

My new biometric passport arrived this week, complete with computer chip and dire warnings against damaging the chip. As letting it get too hot, too cold, bent or scratched will all cause potential damage, I can't see how it's going to last the lifetime of the little cardboard booklet. I do like the birds as passport wallpaper, though. Especially the red kite and the godwit, both a lot more recognisable than my own photo, so distorted by bad scanning (the passport office's work, not mine) and superimposed holographs that even my family and best friends wouldn't recognise me.