Bob Hayward & Nick Baldock have now run 29 consecutive marathons out of the 34 it will take to get to John O’Groats from Land’s End and in doing so have covered over 750 miles. This is all in aid of Podge the 13 year old boy who was so badly burnt in an attack last May.

Paying the bank back, many of us will know that feeling, debt. “I owe, I owe, so off to work I go!” Well, in the journey runners case it is a matter of miles not pounds but they assure you nonetheless painful. What is the bank they hear you ask? Well, often when they stop running in a lay by outside of a town or village, you know just a hedgerow, some fields and telephone poles for company, they have this interesting sign – “No overnight parking” – why they don’t know, probably to do with road safety, I mean who wants to wake up with a juggernaut on the pillow next to you (no, a lorry not the mother–in–law). Anyway it means the motor home and therefore they have to move on, to a friendly Little Chef, hotel or camping site. This could be anything from 1 to 10 miles in any direction from their stop point. Ideally in the morning it is easier on everyone if they can run from wherever the motor home is parked, otherwise they have to get up even earlier and drive bleary eyed through dark unfamiliar streets to the exact lay by where they stopped. So if the overnight parking was 1 mile south, west or east of their stop point and they ran from there the bank would owe them a mile, if the overnight stop was 1 mile north of the stop point, they would owe the bank a mile.

Having decided that once they reached Inverness they were on the final ‘straight’ (they say straight in jest because here they zigzag north–west to north–east more than anywhere on the run) they also decided to clear out the bank and by this time they owed it 10 miles. Fortuitously they stayed with Brian & Kathryn the night before which just happened to be 10 miles west of Inverness. Result!

As they approached Inverness the bridge appeared to reveal itself in stages. Initially it looked quite short and quiet in the distance but as they drew near it got wider and wider and the fuzzy dots on the top turned into lots of cars moving to and fro.

On the entrance to the bridge they saw a sign post and mile marker for John O’Groats 120 miles to go. They can do that! They’ve done that in four days before, they’ve cracked it!

A cycle track on the other side of the bridge caught their eye. Quiet cycle track verses busy dual carriageway? Hmmmm! A nano second of hesitation – and off down the cycle track they went. It took them into a different world, on the bank of Beauly Firth, a stony beech, slipways for small boats, shops that look like they’ve not changed in decades, pre war telephone boxes and post boxes that seemed perfectly suited to their location. They stopped to buy Julie, Bob’s wife, a birthday card – happy birthday Julie! and exchanged stories with the lady behind a proper post office counter, none of this high tech computer rich egonometrically correct nonsense, good old formica and aluminium. Here they heard of the dolphins and seals that come and go with the tide. They’re sure if you stopped here only for a coffee your heart would slow down and the world would become a more peaceful place, things would take on a more balanced perspective and most of you would question what progress has done for us. (What’s progress ever down for you? Well, there’s mobile phones, organ transplants, air travel, the internet ... Fair point Reg, fair point, but apart from that what has progress ever done for you?)

They had yet another bridge to cross later in the day (always another bridge – AAB, not quite the same ring to it, do you think?) and on the other side of the Cromarty Firth they had their first sight of seals, as promised by our post office lady and even an oil rig. (Actually in the Firth, may be a refit or dismantling - you’ll be lucky). The locals call this seal Jabba the Hut because of his size and the fact that he hardly ever moves!

Their massage today was from two lively young ladies, Kirtsy & Nick. Surely a fantasy in every man’s dream is being given a rub down by two attractive women. Well, eat your hearts out boys! Kirtsy and Nick gave them a truly serious workout. They smiled gleefully as they inflicted all sorts of pain and torment, in fact they would go so far as to say that they enjoyed their work ... No, they jest, they a great fun and very skilled at their chosen martial art.

Sadly Simon their driver leaves today and was helped on his way back by Ross at Calterton BMW Inverness, one of Bob’s clients, thanks Ross.