I had a day off from work last week, and with the weather looking cold, wet and miserable, I decided there was nothing better to do than go for a walk in it! As I have written about in previous blogs, I am lucky enough to live not too far from the fabled(?) Surrey Hills, with plenty of walking and cycling lumps and bumps available to get lost in. So, I decided to drive to Newlands Corner, and go for a hilly stroll in the woods.

I followed an eight mile route I’d found on the View Ranger App (very useful!), and had a pleasant day overall, despite rain in the mid-afternoon and plentiful muddy puddles on pretty much all paths. It was the first time I have used gaiters over my boots though, and these were good at keeping the mud for my trousers.

At the midway point of the walk I came upon the pretty Surrey village of Shere and found myself in a kit hire shop, enquiring about any equipment I didn’t want to buy and would rather rent for the duration of the Kilimanjaro trip (a much more economical way of doing it, rather than spending £300+ on a down jacket and sleeping bag I’d possibly never use again). Having been shown example kit they hire out, the woman in the store then looked me up and down and pretty much laughed at the cheapie rain jacket I had on. She then went into hard sell mode, and proceeded to extol the virtues of Gore-Tex over pretty much any other waterproof material. This left me rethinking my choice of outer garments, and I may now need to spend the pennies on a decent jacket. I hope the upcoming Black Friday sales have some good deals..!