Yompa

Central Belters are duly invited to join ITNs Jnr, Minor, Micro and moi at Rugby Park on Thursday 20th July for a spot of Boinging. Yer can stick that bouncy, bouncy nonsense up yer erse... this is the real boinging deal... an away day with the Baggies....

People who write multiple sentences, but forget the old full stop/capital letter routine and instead join them using a comma, it really gets my fecking goat! :008: :004:

People who talk in this daft 'Australian' way of raising their tone at the end of a sentence. It seems to be all the rage darn sarf so remind me never to go there. I'll go mad..... :008:

Incorrect use of apostrophe's (sic)

Henry has set the modern day standard in commitment...

Now let's hope our guys look up to what Henry has said and done and tell Brewster to look elsewhere.

The grass may look greener but that isn't always necessarily so.....

He used to put in an appearance on the BBC (no 1 and 2 in those days y'know!) every week before Grandstand...

Brain boxes not box's, Gringo!

How apt that it should been English today....

:017:

Spotted me while I was hobbling off to the ICT dressing room to see the doc on Saturday and came over... "you must be one of the guys that's walked here from Inverness. Well done". We shook hands and had a wee blether.

Nice bloke.

:021:

I can see it now... "HMV - Sponsored by Virgin" :004:

Before I get onto the March itself, I want to say something about Caley D and Caley Canary.

Caley D came onto the team at the 11th hour when Colin had to pull out of the driving duties for TG and the Canary only managed to get a five day pass to TY a couple of weeks ago. These guys were immense! I salute the pair of you and you are true Generals of the Highland March. Obviously I spent most of my time on the road with CC but every report and experience I've had with Caley D has been first rate. So laid back, so competent, so accomodating... I could go on all day!

The Canary was everything I knew he would be... and more. Fetching, carrying, buying, driving ahead and sussing out routes and checkpoints.... all I had to do was spot the short cuts, overtake him 'on the inside' then text him to pass on the good news... :004:

Next up I must say a huge, huge thank you to Laura Murray at TCS for her quiet efficiency in making things happen. As recently as yesterday morning when Laura should have been enjoying her day off, I had to make one final request to have a medic check out my feet, which by this time were completely wrecked. Half an hour later and Laura had fixed me an appointment with the ICT medics before the game.

And so to the march itself...

Every HM is different and this was certainly no exception. We were treated to the fun and companionship of our mad wee nieces on day one and wow, did they have some fun. I'd love to think that once the pain of the last few miles has subsided, C3 and Lorramess will be down the sales searching out some proper footwear fro next year... ain't that right, girls!

For me, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were days of torture. The waiting was torture, made all the worse by the news drip feeding through that the others were making steady progress down the road. Mind you, as the Megabus drove through all that rain on Tuesday, I did have a wee smile to myself... :003:

Throughout Wednesday, I just wanted to get started. Even the game itself on Wednesday night was a bit of an annoyance because I knew what lay in store afterwards. I'd done a few 'through the night' training walks but hadn't walked all the next day too, and certainly not over the kind of terrain I had chosen (which just happened to be the shortest route).

The night walk was a piece of cake. I'd borrowed Mrs Yompa's head torch and the trek through the forest at Slochd was a piece of cake as a result. When I got to other side of the wood where my route split off from TG's route to Sluggan Bridge, the dawn was only an hour away, leading on to the most magnificent moment of any of my HMs to date.... I was crossing the top of the Monadhliath Mountains as around 5.15am when the first flicker of sun peeped above the cloud way out to the east. In an instant, the snow covered Cairngorm peaks in front of me turned a warming shade of orange and stayed that way for a good few minutes until the full power of the sun’s rays put everything back to normal. A truly wonderful moment in the wilderness!

I’d promised the Canary bacon butties at Kincraig Stores at 7:30am and was mildly surprised to be only ten minutes late for my share. It was a lovely spring morning as we sat outside the shop, me taking on fuel like it had gone out of fashion, and the Canary planning his day in the sunshine awaiting my arrival at Blair Atholl in twelve hours time. :011:

My plan was to walk down Glen Feshie then over the high level Minigaig drovers’ track. Glen Feshie, however, was a huge disappointment. I’d expected a gorgeous glen with an interesting forest path, but what I actually got was about twelve miles of tarmac, a wild headwind and not much to see. Fortunately visibility was good so by the time I got to the top of the climb on the Minigaig (2994ft), I could still see where I was going and had no need to resort to either GPS or compass navigation (all of which slows you down). I felt the little toe ‘pop’ on my right foot leaping across the peat bog of the descent, an injury that was to come back and cause more than a little discomfort the following day…

After I’d passed Bruar Lodge on the way out of the Glen, I was treated to the sight of about 70 red deer speeding their way across the plain like some great herd of wilderbeast…. And then there was my wee friend the white mountain hare, who I’d spotted peeping out of the heather before finally scarpering off into the distance when I got within out five yards…

The Canary and I met up again in the bar at the Atholl Arms Hotel, but it was a short stop as the destination for Thursday was Pitlochry, which we made at around 9pm as the light was fading. Of course, there’s feck all open in Pitlochry at that time of night at this time of year, so it was off to the Co-op to get medical provisions and the chippy to get a fish supper! Alf Tupper, eat yer heart out…. :017:

There have been many defining moments in my sporting life, moments when you find yourself asking “will I or won’t I”. I had one such moment in 1994 when I was cycling from Manchester to Glasgow in a day for charity, only to fall off through lack of concentration at Carnforth, breaking my elbow in the process. On that occasion, I just put a tubigrip bandage on it, got back on the bike and cycled the remaining 175 miles one handed. Well I knew before I set out on HM4 that Thursday wasn’t going to be the the defininf day, as long and as difficult as it seemed on paper. No… that day was reserved for Friday, 57 miles of toil in the sun, about 95% of it on tarmac, and on feet that were by now showing great signs of wear and tear. A long time ago, I learned about chiropody felt and how you can use it to ‘cradle’ blisters so you can keep on… well, keeping on. The Canary emptied Pitlochry of it’s entire supply of chiropody felt (after we found out that Dunkeld didn’t have any!) and the single layer became double once the blisters started touching the ground again. :019:

Anyway I digress…

I’d long given up on the schedule for Friday, as time really didn’t matter. Only one thing counted, and that was MTG, or Miles To Go for short. I got a text from EGG at what must have been half one-ish saying TG had stopped for lunch in Glenfarg. This was interesting because that told me that they’d taken the easier but longer route round the side of Perth and down through Kinross. Easy doesn’t appear in the Team Yompa handbook… I had chosen the direct route down from Forteviot, through the Path of Condie and a couple of private estates (good yomping territory if ever there was…) and had substituted hills for miles. At around the time I double layered the chiropody felt, I reckoned that the pain of running couldn’t be much worse, if any, than the pain of walking so I started jogging. I hadn’t actually intended to do any running during HM4 because of a long-standing foot injury I’d had since last summer but what the feck, I was hurting anyway, so I reckon I probably ran about ten of the last twenty miles of day two, finishing, as Team Gringo had done some three hours earlier, at Cleish Mill, some eight miles from Dunfermline. But more importantly, we were now all back together, swapping stories and experiences, and looking forward with relish to the triumphant march into EEP the next day. :011:

Saturday was a surreal day. Gringo Junior had supplied a trophy for the HM Pool Championship, which he then watched become a two horse race between Caley D and Chumba (the marcher formerly known as Beatonio). It all came down to the last game which the hobbling Yompa had to win (against Caley D) to secure the trophy for Chumba, but alas it wasn’t to be and Caley D, the dark horse, went home with the HM4 championship. :001:

And so on to EEP. I went on ahead of the rest in order to get my feet looked at. I was up on the couch in the ICT dressing room with the players looking on as the doc (painfully) removed the dressings. Cue Liam Keogh… “look at the ******* state of that” with that cute wee chuckling smile on his face. Then a few others came over, had a look and gave it the “oh my gawd…”. :010:

By the way, news of the March is clearly spreading, albeit slowly. On my way through the stadium, I came across Jim Leishman chatting to a couple of ICT officials. “Is this one of the Marchers”, he asked, and we shook hands. The reception we got from the Dunfermline supporters was quite out of this world and I cannot thank Dunfermline Athletic enough for the magnificent way they treated us yesterday. As somebody said in passing… “there are some true football supporters”. :021:

And so on to next season, HM5 and beyond…. Now, how do we get to Gretna…. :004:

I've gotta hand it to you two... you kept each going a long way and your presence certainly added to an eventful and enjoyable first day. You've now got 51 weeks to train for next year (We're giving you this week off)!

By the time you get round to reading this, the guys will be almost through with day two (assuming they've finally escaped from the Winking Owl) but here's a quick resume of day one...

The day dawned bright by cold down at TCS and sporting a wide variety of headgear, the marchers set off from the stadium at 8:20. Gringo had clearly had a bad hair day back at the cave whilst Gringo Jnr resembled some kind of failed rock star. Nessie appeared to have laid an EGG whilst the only 'normal' end to ender was Beatonio, although he of course had a stooky on his arm courtesy of a footballing accident a fortnight ago (probably explains why he seemed to be carrying the regimental flag for most of the day!!!!).

Along for the day the group had ITN Junior, a 'veteran' of days six, seven and eight last year, and the 'groupies'... Lauraness and C3 from the Familyness. Suffice to say at this stage that whilst the Charlie's Angels heargear made it through the day, the wings were well and truly clipped come Moy!

The early miles were uneventful as the regiment made it's way up the west side of the A9 (on the verge I might add) before coming under friendly fire at Bogbain from messrs Yompa, ITN Minor and Micro. Once the troop had crossed over the A9 at Daviot and descended the steps and made the river crossing over the Nairn, Minor and Micro joined in the march and walked the next wee while with the main body of troops. I say main body for Gringo Junior had long since shot of the front and wasn't to be seen again until the Tomatin Inn.

By the time everyone regrouped at the Inn around half one, the first reports of blisters came in over the wires. Lauraness and C3 were happy to use up almost half the bar supply of new beer mats to make purpose-built blister cushioning insoles whilst everyone was just happy to get some relief from the midday sun.

The post-Tomatin session was particularly unspectacular, except for a failed final ambush by Team Yompa and Minors (the troops were spotted and taken out by the Gringos not long after the latter had wasted most of their ammo on an unsuccessful attack on a fire-watch platform...

The girls, after a long (and for the most part happy) day in the sun, finally called it a day at 20 miles and climbed back aboard the bus. Everyone else made it to the finish, and special credit must go to ITN Minor, aged 8 who covered 12 miles and ITN Micro, aged 6 who did 8 miles. Indeed, both of the wee ones walked offroad from the German soldier at Slochd to the finish just past Sluggan Bridge on the road headed west out of Carrbridge.

The evening was spent in traditional HM fashion... reliving the highlights of the day over a communal scoff of pasta and stuff in the bunkhouse, followed by a bedraggled stagger by Beatonio and ITN Junior up the road to the Cairn Hotel in order to engage the locals on the pool table, the result of which is better left unstated by all accounts... ;o(

I can't finish this account with mentioning Caley D, or 'The General' as he has now been christened. Someone asked why we didn't have a 'General' ranking in our HM list and it was EGG, I believe, who suggested that it had probably been reserved for the the driver... General Dogsbody of the team. General, you were fantastic on day one. At a time when the troop were spread over a couple of miles, you did a great job of running to and fro, keeping tabs on everyone, and probably the best compliment the team can pay you is to say that no one would have guessed that you'd never driven for the regiment before.

Age 16... buying drink... hmm.... :bawling:

There must be some forty something motorbikers out there able to show these wimmin a good time on the open road....

Might blow the odd halo away mind!

:shock:

The Hawthorns (in a European semi final...) :shock:

Ladies... Romp...

Crikey, I hope Gringo remembers the feckin dog lead for Junior.... :shock:

Yompa to Gringo Junior, on parade, TCS, Sunday morning...

"Captain, show us yer Privates...." :evil:

They'll do the whole lot (if they can stay out of the pub at Tomatin)...

Could we have an Elvis II on our hands, I wonder?

Bye bye Livvy....

I'm in...

I'm a youth... it says so on my profile!

I was just watching these poor bustuds on the telly doing their London Marathon under the watchful eye of Sally Gunnell et al. Now if those folk bought a tear to your eye, consider for a moment that your average HMer is doing a marathon a day for week... while yer average Yompa is doing three marathons on day one and another couple on day two.

That's why we want y'all to dig deep into yer pockets to support the HM, the MFR Charity and Team ICT!

8)

So yow think an MP3 player's going to drown out the racket that we make.... ? :evil:

Be assured that the littlies will be all tooled up and waiting in the woods.... :nuts: :nuts: