GAVIN: A little over two years since I set off from John O’Groats on a blustery, drizzly September morning, I’m once again contemplating months on the roads, trails and pathways of another epic adventure. It’s called Running the Orient. I blame Aradhna.
The book of The Long Run, retitled for publication and out now.
My partner and I were attending a book signing at Waterstones at Piccadilly, London, a week after my own launch of Downhill From Here, the book of my last adventure, published by Sandstone Press in April 2017. I say “attending” but, in truth, I’d pretty much dragged her along. Aradhna is not a running enthusiast and had expressed a degree of skepticism about how much fun it might be to hear ultrarunning legend Dean Karnazes talk about running the Spartathlon, a 153 mile ultra race in the footsteps of his legendary compatriot Pheidippides. That said, I think she found it diverting enough to keep me company while Dean, one of the chief inspirations behind my own epic 1174 mile run, told of gastrointestinal agonies and the peculiarities of Ancient Greek underwear as he ran under the boiling Athenian sunshine.
ARADHNA: The room was full of runners and running enthusiasts. In the Q&A, I think I was the only person actually interested in the book and the writing process. Most of the rest of the time I sat bemused, sipping wine through endless questions about technique and footwear. My interest was piqued again when Dean was asked “what next?”. Having previously attained notoriety for running a marathon in each of the 50 states of America over 50 days, Dean was now going global with an aspiration to run a marathon in every country of the world. He was working with the US government to attain access and visas to each of the 195 UN listed countries in the world and would complete this feat in the space of a year. Now that’s exciting!
That question of “what next?” had been a constant point of conversation with Gavin over the past month. We watched a film of Karl Meltzer running the 2300 mile Appalachian Trail in just 45 days, we looked up the Camino de Santiago and pondered people’s motivations around pilgrimages, and we discussed other highlights and routes across our own Great Britain. To be honest, however, nothing really grabbed me. From the point of view of the supportive girlfriend who was going to have to go along for the ride, what had the romance and adventure that I was looking for? Something new and different, that hadn’t been done before, but didn’t require the intervention of the most powerful government in the world…
After Dean’s talk and Q&A, he stayed behind to sign books and, having been at the front of the talk, we were now at the back of a very long queue. Gavin dutifully stood in line, flicking through The Road To Sparta, while I waited with the dregs of my wine.
Dean Karnazes with a signed copy of Downhill From Here
When devising the plan for Downhill From Here, Gavin had wondered where he could run in the UK and thought, why not all of it? Through our discussions about his next potential project, he had mentioned an appetite for running in Europe. Not only are the trails less well known than in America but more poignantly, following the UK’s move to leave the European Union, he was more focused than ever to show solidarity with Europe. I encouraged this wholeheartedly, shying away from the thought of driving through small town America in favour of the culture and food of Europe, not to mention the huge differences in the practicalities and finances involved in managing a project in the same continent vs thousands of miles away. As I sat holding Gavin’s coat by the queue and wondered where he could run in Europe, I thought, why not all of it?
The route of the 1889 Orient Express – and my epic journey.
GAVIN: I had to admit it was a rather brilliant scheme and immediately excited me… Aradhna had a brainwave – didn’t the original Orient Express train route cross Europe from West to East? And didn’t it take in the kind of cities she would most definitely want to spend a bit of time in (albeit while supporting an exhausted boyfriend). Paris, Strasbourg, Munich, Vienna, Budapest, Bucharest, Istanbul. The list has a kind of trainlike momentum in itself. The contrast between the famous train’s fin de siecle luxury and my own harrowing progress might be interesting too.
Vintage Orient Express poster.
The route turned out to be around 2300 miles long, around double the length of The Long Run (renamed Downhill From Here for the book). Crazily long but not inconceivably so. If I could take 3-4 months off work, it might be manageable. I could run across almost the whole of Europe from iconic Paris to turbulent Istanbul, savouring the flavours and cultures and landscapes en route. And in doing so, show a kind of solidarity with our European siblings as we painfully extricate ourselves from the Union. Britain is still, after all, an island off the coast of France, geographically speaking. No man is an island, said John Donne. Similarly, no island a few miles from its parent continent can define itself without reference to that greater landmass and the mass of men and women who move through that continent.
My only European running experience to date is a half-marathon I ran just outside of Lille with the Ealing Southall and Middlesex running club, back in about 2007. The club had an informal exchange going with members of the Marcq-en-Baroeul running club, where the clubs each took part in one another’s annual races (ESM at that time could only muster a 5 miler; Ealing now boasts an award-winning half-marathon). I found the race itself challenging but fun, the town of Marcq charming and welcoming. Our French hosts laid on a barbecue with local beer and plenty of delicious food and I was even accommodated in the home of one of the race organisers (he gave me a race route preview in his car the night before which frankly terrified me with its endless bends and undulations). All in all, the European runners were thoroughly lovely folk and it was a race I’ll never forget. I now realise that I feel about as European as I do British, even though I probably feel Scottish more than anything. Unpicking these overlapping identities in a book could prove very revealing. What will we lose when we Brits can only define ourselves as European in a banally geographical sense?
Me running the Marcq-en-Baroeul Semi-Marathon in 2007.
And so a new dream was born. Thanks Aradhna – you may have handed me a poisoned chalice (only time will tell) – but you’ve given me my sequel and with you by my side, I think this adventure will prove utterly unforgettable.
NEXT TIME: Meet Roxy, our chariot and home from home.
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