10 takeaways from my 1,000 km walk

Exactly a month ago, on November 3 2021, a group of some 30 'crazy' people sang together a song written by one of the cyclists on stage in the Strathclyde University Students' Union's building. None of them flew, drove or took a coach to COP26, the climate change summit hosted by the UK in Glasgow in the first two weeks of November. Instead, they travelled by train, by boat, by bike or on foot. Several amateur singers had watery eyes as they sang together like brothers and sisters some of whom walked for months or weeks to get to Glasgow. I myself walked around 650 kilometres from London to Glasgow, mostly in the last three weeks of October, on top of some 500 kilometres of training walk between July and September. Here are 10 things I have learnt from the 1,000 plus kilometre journey on foot.

• I have appreciated walking a lot more having walked 650 kilometres in more than three weeks and some 1,000 km in less than four months. Walking is such a beautiful and relaxing way to explore different places. It's definitely a lot more fun to chase rainbows on foot than in a car. I would not have been able to capture the picture below in Shap had I driven from there to Lazonby that day in late October.

I have walked through countless public footpaths, climbed over so many stiles, gates and fences, and wandered through many fields. It was such an enjoyable experience most of the time. I will definitely come back and repeat many of the walks.

• Am I going to do the whole walk again? Of course not. Having done it once, I know there were good legs during the whole journey but there were also ones that were not so good. Some of the routes mapped out by Slow Ways had never been tested before and one day I got stuck near a motorway; I was told to turn left to get to Gretna in Scotland which was only a mile or two away but turning left meant crossing a railway where there was no crossing. I also did not want to walk along a road next to a motorway with cars travelling at very high speed. In the end, a policeman kindly offered to take me to our hotel on the other side of the motorway. We were warned by Slow Ways that we ourselves would have to test some of the routes so we knew there would be surprises along the way.

• I have learnt so much from my team members who walked with me. They not only walked but also organised events to bring people together to talk about climate change. Their ability to multitask and make speeches after walking some 20 miles a day was impressive. And while I did skip walking when on driving duty for three or four days (we rented an electric car to transport luggage between destinations), two of my team members did not skip a single step of the 800 kilometre plus journey from London to Glasgow. There was one day in which I managed to walk around 40 kilometres but there was also a day I had to take a bus having walked 30 kilometres because of the pain on top of my right foot. Doing 25 kilometres a day was obviously something my feet were more comfortable with when they had to do long distances for weeks.

• "Failing to plan is planning to fail" is a quote I usually use when teaching my students at Goldsmiths, University of London and this is also true when it comes to walking in all weather conditions. It was not unusual for our team of six core walkers and up to 10 other people who joined us for some days along the journey to spend a whole day walking in the rain; lack of preparation would mean having water coming out of our shoes for hours; this would cause our body to quickly lose heat and our toes to get blisters more easily and seriously. One of my fellow walkers found out that their waterproof gears were actually not waterproof after some hours of walking in the rain. I relied on a poncho, waterproof trousers and three pairs of overshoe covers during the whole journey. I wore trainers all the way and in hindsight, it may have been better to wear waterproof boots so that I would not have to put the overshoe covers on and take them off many times during rainy days or as soon as I step on tall grass in early morning. It was a bit inconvenient but I managed to stay dry most of the time.

• Embracing a challenge is always a positive thing in my view. Our team leader, Sam Baker, did not actually ask me to join the group of walkers for climate change in the beginning; instead, Sam wanted me to help with amplifying the team's message of climate emergency via social media. But I volunteered to walk as I saw it both as a good personal challenge and obviously a good cause to support. We did thoroughly test our ability to walk very long distances over more than three weeks and we also inspired many other people to take immediate actions for climate change. We did grow our Instagram account that had more than 1,000 followers by the end of the walk.
• We have been inspired by so many good people who do care about other people and about our planet. On our very first day of walking, a kind gentleman offered to drive our suitcases from Camden to St Albans, our first stop, as the electric car we had rented to transport luggage was not delivered as promised by Onto. Later that same day, several volunteers helped us to host our first successful climate change event in St Albans. One local councillor told us that evening how he had not flown anywhere in the past 10 years because of climate change worries. An A level student shared how she and some friends have planted hundreds of trees to help reduce the level of carbon dioxide that has been contributing to the warming up of our planet. We went on organising many other well-attended events with the help of many other local organisers. We were even fed and serenaded when we visited the Eco Village in Market Harborough during the second week of our trip.
• I filmed thousands of clips during our walk using the iPhone 13 Pro Max and the Insta360 One X 2. I love using the Cinematic mode on the iPhone 13 to film interviews and using the Insta360 One X 2 on a long stick to film cutaways. We have raised a decent sum to hire a company to make an educational film about our experiences and they are using all the interviews and cutaways in the film. It was challenging filming and then running to catch up with other walkers all the time. We did hire a cameraman for two days and he found it very difficult to do what I did for three weeks until we thought of hiring someone so that I could be in the film as well. And I gave the cameraman a pair of overshoe covers along with a poncho so that he could stay dry in Scotland.
• We have a vegan and a vegetarian in our team and I am neither. But I have reduced red meat consumption to about twice a month. This does not sound like much but if you have read The Economist's Treating beef like coal would make a big dent in greenhouse-gas emissions, you'll appreciate that 'every little helps'. The global food system is thought to have contributed between 20 to just under 40% of annual greenhouse-gas emissions and if billions of people on earth make just a little adjustment to their diet, the combined effect will be huge.
• From our conversations with hundreds of people about climate change, both before and during our walk, we have learnt a lot. The top five learning points are the urgent need to take action right now, to work together, to speak out louder, to make climate change the central issue all the while being fair to people who are already suffering from the effects of climate change without having contributed much if at all to global warming. One activist who spoke at one of our events said the people in Kiribati had changed the '1.5 to stay alive' slogan to '1.5 and we might survive'.
• I decided to go on the walk knowing that my better half did not really want me to be away from home for a month. And I was stubborn enough to just go without even attempting to persuade her to give me more support. I would not hesitate to follow my instinct and support a good cause again but I would definitely try out some persuasion tactics the next time I do something 'crazy'. As George Bernard Shaw once said "the single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place”; I had no illusion at all and the problem was more than "the single biggest". But it's all behind me now. I can't wait to share with you the film once it's done.