Sunday 31 May 2015:
First of all thanks to everyone who supported this project, who donated money to The Children’s Society, who joined me for the walk or gave me a lift, or who just followed my blog and/or tweets. It’s all greatly appreciated.
So, I started and finished the big walk yesterday. The weather was ideal – while there was direct sun most of the morning and into the early afternoon, it was mostly overcast, but not dark. There was periodically a cooling breeze, and the day was dry.
It being the end of May, and knowing I’d be out in the daylight for 15 hours I made sure to wear a hat and suncream which I topped up every four hours.
By the end of the walk although the soles of my feet ached a little, as you’d expect, I had no blisters, no sunburn, and no other pains. In fact, if I wanted to (and I did, I wanted to make-up time) I was able to jog short distances.
In the second half of the walk I did lose around an hour, but that wasn’t a problem, and I expected to take a little more than my projected time anyway.
Early on I was joined by my brother Joel from the start round to Besses O’ Th’ Barn, and also got a lift from Joel and his partner Emma to the start point. We got there in plenty of time, and I did a brief telephone interview with Eamonn O’Neal for BBC Radio Manchester. Eamonn also acted as unofficial official starter.
Later on, from Drury Lane/Manchester Road (just outside the M60 from Hollinwood Metrolink), my sister Hannah and her baby daughter Jessica joined me on the mainly downhill walk to Ashton, and from there along the Peak Forest Canal to Woodley Tunnel. They were then picked up 10 minutes down the road outside Bredbury Station by Hannah’s Partner Marshall.
All three later picked me up from the end of the walk.
While I’d expected the walk to be 14 and three-quarter hours, as mentioned I did lose an hour, so it took 15 and three-quarter hours. That’s starting at 6.30am, and finishing at 10.15pm.
The only thing that really went wrong was my camcorder developing a fault. For a while, after only using it twice for short periods, it showed the light indicating it was in use despite the viewscreen being closed, and was unresponsive when I tried to use it. Whether that drained the battery or there was another problem, after the indicator went out the camera claimed it had a low battery. It had only been charged the previous night.
Even so I managed to get quite a lot of video on my phone, and still didn’t use up all of its battery. But then I got much less video than I otherwise might have.
The walk was tremendously enjoyable, and I’ll certainly do it, or something of similar or longer duration again.
I have a lot more journal to write, and I think some outstanding to add here. The next stage though is to get all my photos, audio and video downloaded, and start editing some art from whatever I have. At a guess I have around an hour plus audio, probably somewhere between 45 minutes and an hour’s worth of video, and about half a dozen photos.
Having unwisely decided to walk round the M60 (Manchester’s orbital motorway) in one go, my progress in preparing for the walk is recorded on this blog. It’s personal, and ranges across aesthetics and art, memory, and whatever else was crossing my mind at the time, in addition to the more practical information.
To find those blogposts scroll back up to the top, and click on that box with the three lines in it, which opens out the menu. Then click on your chosen month under Archives. All the entries under that month then appear, with the most recent at the top.
My JustGiving page is: https://www.justgiving.com/Matt-Dalby.
The walk took place on Saturday 30 May 2015, starting at 6:30am and finishing at 10:15pm.
If you’d like to talk to me about the project message me at: sonicobnox at gmail dot com with the subject line Matt’s big M60 walk query.
The Big M60 Walk Twitter: @MattsBigM60Walk
See below my estimated timetable of the walk. In the event I lost an hour in the second half, but completed the walk easily. I was able to jog if I wanted, and when I got home made some soup and sat up for a while before going to bed.
If I do the walk again next year then I’ll alter the route between leaving the Woodley Tunnel and Sale, and/or do it counterclockwise in order to avoid having three hours on pavements at the end. Which is by far the longest section on roads.
Matt's big M60 walk 