I set my alarm for this morning, determined to get out a bit early. Well early-ish.I have new bone conducting headphones, that's a very long story but they arrived, they work, they ran out of charge and I charged them last evening. At least I thought I did.
So there I was, in my shorts, shoes laced up, music on and out the door. My plan was to head for the seafront and take pictures of the sea.
4 minutes in to my warm up walk and the headphones ran out of charge and stopped working so I turned around and walked home again.
Put the headphones on charge, made a cup of tea, ate some cheese because that always helps and settled down to read for a while.
But I kept coming back to the run that wasn't yet, I didn't really want to walk down the road again, so where to go? Drive to the sea? Oh blow it, I'll go to the river, I'll run for longer. So off I set, in the car this time, driving north a flash of sunlight streaked across the Downs and I changed my mind again.
This was never going to be fast and there would be a lot of walking and lots of photos.
As I ran, oh so slowly, tiny steps because I was a bit concerned about falling, I saw 2 magpies, so many butterflies, many different wild flowers, I disturbed a couple of skylark's who soared high above singing as I meandered on. grass at waist height in places, barley growing and waving in the wind. Views across to the sea one way and across the Downs the other way. The track is overgrown and in places I couldn't see it at all, I walked those parts. There weren't many others up there, one bike passed and nearly an hour later I passed a couple with a dog.
I went round the big hill and turned to come up and over on the way back, oh! There's a gate, try as I might I couldn't open it so over I climbed, it's been a very long time since I climbed a gate but I still can 😀. Then a bit later another gate, I wasn't sure I was up for climbing another gate but luckily this one opened.
The hill is called Steepdown, and it is, steeper and shorter the other side, I've never been this way before.
At the top there is the world laid out in front of me and all around. Such beauty, a feeling of anything is possible.
And down I ran, small steps, slow and steady, where I wanted to put my arms out wide and run as fast as I could but that way lies injury, so I kept my head.
Back uphill, through the woods, down towards where I left the car and wow I so enjoyed that. Just less than 5k in just more than an hour, but pure pleasure.
I really don't like air conditioning in my car but apparently today I love it, I hadn't realised how hot I was.
Next time I'll wear my trail shoes but otherwise it was perfect.
Run happy or rest well.
The beauty of the beach. 
