‘Walking Has Been A Revelation For Us!'

Three readers share how walking has transformed their lives in unexpected ways – perhaps it’ll inspire you too!

ONE WEEKEND, THREE YEARS ago, my husband Chris went away with our sons Josh, 13, and Jamie, 11, and for the first time in as long as I could remember, I had two whole days to myself. Instead of working or doing jobs at home, I had some proper ‘me time’ and took myself off to the coast for some walking. I used to love long country walks but I’d hardly done any since we’d moved to a city and had two young children.

LADIES WHO WALK

That weekend I did a 14-mile stretch of the Cleveland Way from Whitby down to Ravenscar, staying in a youth hostel overnight. The wind was howling and the rain was horizontal but I put on my walking boots and went for it. It felt so liberating!

When I got home, I posted some pictures of my adventure on Facebook. I said I’d like to make it a regular thing and asked whether anyone would be interested in joining me. Three other mums said they’d like to come, so a few months later, we walked another part of the Cleveland Way from Staithes to Whitby. From then on, I organised a walking weekend every couple of months and with each one, the number of women who came along grew. We decided that our group needed a name, so we came up with ‘the glamoraks’ (glamoraks.com). It’s very tongue in cheek but we like to think we are quite a young and glam bunch – even though we wear walking boots and anoraks!