Walking the BIG Walk DAY 2

Me & Kelly at the overlook the bay in Everett.

The next morning came early as we had to be there by 7 pm at the latest. Armin came to pick me up at 6:15 am. Kelly was in a world of hurt from pushing herself the day before and she said she didn't think she could do a whole lot today. I thought she was joking or would work out the soreness after we got going, but she was really hurting. Kelly and I somewhere by a pretty fountain up a bill hill in Everett silly stupid with pain.

We began at camp. Armin waved us on and we scanned in to start the next day. We walked up the long road to camp to scan in along with all the others that either stayed in hotels or at home. It's ironic that you can't be dropped right at camp, but they make you walk-in. The sacrifice we made for our luxury, I suppose.

We found Heather and we all three began this day together, which was an improvement over the day before. Kelly has lower back issues stemming from the birth of her child and was really not enjoying the walk. Heather has hip issues and was struggling and trying to walk it out. I have multiple issues that I call “a girdle of pain” plus knee, back, and neck issues, so any distance walking on concrete is a huge challenge. We all were beginning to struggle more. This day was all about hills in Everett. I never knew Everett was so pretty, but I’d never gone up to the park at the top of a very big hill that overlooks the bay.

Picture of our team "Hey Sole Sister" at a pit stop. L-R. Kelly, Me, Heather

There were blocks and blocks of supporters out on Sat. Some blocks even had their own cheering sections lined up. We had official cheering stops, but many blocks had party after party. Picture below of a spectacular cheering block! It was really something. It was fun to see those “3 Day stalkers” as I call them that set up their own cheering spots with a theme and just follow the walk around all weekend. A crazy way to spend your weekend, but there were times I was truly happy to see those somewhat familiar happy faces handing me a cold shot of gateraid or little smoked sausage to keep me going.


Picture of our team with the "Sole Sister" relief van.
Kelly and I road the vans and walked a lot too, but took a van to the last pit stop and walked into camp from there. So for the planned walk of 21.7 miles we walked about 16.5 or so. It is hard to calculate when you jump on and off vans, but I tried to keep track of where we did and what the mileage markers were. Kelly thought we walked more, but I’m pretty sure we didn’t. I felt a lot better this day and thought I could have walked more, but considering how I felt at the end of the next day was glad I didn’t.

By the end of this day I had a right foot with many blisters. Especially my whole pinky toe and right heel were nothing but one big blister. There really wasn’t much to be done for them but drain and let them air out. This is another reason we hopped vans as the blisters make it hard to walk. I went to medical and they put second skin on the blisters to help them. I certainly saw people’s feet there that were much worse than mine. One lady, who regularly walks 10 miles a day she said, nearly her whole pad of the foot was nothing but a blister.


20 miles back to back is brutal on everyone. Kelly had no blisters, but other things bothered her. Heather was with me in the blister department, but she had taken off out front and we hadn’t seen her since lunch. She was headed out of lunch and we were headed in. It’s like they’d had some silent agreement to trade places from the day before.

Picture taken part way up that last hill into camp. Very muddy!

The last hill into camp was cruel and unusual punishment. We took the van to the last pit stop, but elected to walk the 3.5 or so miles into camp. It was a hill. A muddy path really straight up into the back side of camp. Mickey and Minnie Mouse were waiting for us to take pictures with us at the end. I guess that was the prize for making it up that hill?

When I got home, my husband had heroically spent the day entertaining our 5 year old and had purposely not been there when I got home so I could do whatever I needed to do. Our little boy didn’t understand what I was doing and it was best he was out having a good time with Papa. I did get a 10 minute massage in camp and was very grateful for that, but enjoyed the space to do what I needed to rest. I was in a world of hurt and needed to try to gear up for the next day. I was in bed by 9 pm after I said hello to my family and heard about their day as I knew the next day would be the hardest of all.