test walk coming up

The Chuseok weekend is upon us, which means I've got four days in a row during which to do something. Since I need to get a large-scale practice walk in, a sort of shakedown cruise for my new backpack (purchased last year, and sitting in my closet for a year, doing fuck-all), I'm thinking that this weekend will be the perfect occasion to pack up, test my pack weight and new belt-harness system, and see what four straight days of encumbered walking will do to my achy feet. The ache does worry me a bit, and I'm fervently hoping the pain doesn't flare up into crippling agony while I'm on the path. If it does, I may have to abort the walk, which would be a damn shame—both in the sense of "too bad" and in the sense of "something to be embarrassed about." The latter sense has to do with how my unwise diet, combined with diabetes, may have ended up ruining my feet. At fifty, I'm finally paying the price for still eating as if I were in college, and there's no longer a way to keep that fact private. Shame, indeed.

But we'll see how things go this weekend. I've chosen the round-trip Seoul-Yangpyeong-Seoul path (passing Hanam City and Paldang Dam), which is 120 km in total. Days 1 and 4 will be comparatively easy at about 25-27 km; days 2 and 3 will be the long days of at least 35 km per section. I might or might not have photos of this upcoming hike; the forecast is for rain, which is going to suck. Along with hoping my pain levels are manageable during the big walk, I'm praying to the dieux ouraniens for clement weather during the month that I'll be out on the Four Rivers trail. There could still be some typhoon activity, and as I've written before, cold rain is the worst for a hiker's morale.

But that's the future. One day at a time. One day at a time.