Finding another uplifting companion

Some of you may remember my first post this month, when I announced my plan to acquire a Virtual Dog to make sure I went walking every single day, come rain, come ice, come mud. My chosen companion was Dilys, shown in today’s feature photo, but she already walks miles every day with her own family. Much as I love her, I think I really do need a Virtual Dog.

Then I remembered Ai Wei-We’s Circle of Animal Heads at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Surely that featured a dog’s head? Up a pole? It did. Here is my Virtual Dog. Sadly, it’s my least satisfactory photo from there, so I’ll include a small gallery of some of the others to give you a better idea of this circle of mainly Zodiac figures up above your head.

My Virtual Dog

I’ve completed 116 miles this month. I felt this was a decent number – nothing to upbraid myself with here. But then I discovered that Jo of Restless Jo and Jo’s Monday Walk fame has upstaged me. She does eight miles a day. Almost every day. I’ll have to up my game.

Square Up

Thank you, Becky, for cheering up a particularly long and dismal January: for giving us the opportunity for uplifting friendships in the blogosphere, and for making us crank our brains up a gear as we tried to measure up to the skills, humour and ingenuity of our fellow participants.

Author: margaret21

I'm retired and living in North Yorkshire, where I walk as often as I can, write, volunteer, and travel as often as I can.

84 thoughts on “Finding another uplifting companion”

  1. Here! Here to all that, Margaret! It’s been a pleasure sharing with you, especially when you trot me round Yorkshire. I love YSP and these are very difficult to photograph. I’ve tried! 🙂 You did confuse me a bit with your Virtual Dog because I thought you must be following some sort of App? But Dilys is gorgeous! And this restless one is probably going to take it a bit easy today. I need to get a walk written for tomorrow.

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    1. Haha! Quite a few people think it is an app. If there isn’t one already, someone ought to make one. Not me though. I’ve loved my Barcelona holiday with you. It’s been a fun blogging month, hasn’t it?

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      1. With a little bit of assistance from Debbie and Becky I’m sure you could get there, Margaret! Team work 🙂 🙂 I do keep meaning to investigate the virtual travel stuff, but I’m too busy walking! And don’t tell Becky, but I have a scheme for April…

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  2. Well done on your walking accomplishment. I’ve swapped footsteps for peddling. Much more enjoyable during summer.
    Keep it up I’ve heard it’s good for you 😉

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    1. Ah, that’s what my husband does too. Me? I can’t ride a bike. I mean, how can something only two inches wide possibly stay upright? So … it doesn’t, and I’m in the nearest gorse bush.

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    1. As I’ve just said to Susan, I’m competing against myself. With so few walks available in all this mud, I have to find different ways to spice things up a bit. And actually, that last paragraph was just about finding ways of adding ‘up’ in 😉

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      2. It is a favourite of ours when i am seeing one of my best friends who lives on the outskirts of Leeds, so fortunately easy for us – and in fact sometimes we have visited on the way home!

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  6. I was impressed Margaret. I like your regularity. I’m way too up and down in my walking and lockdown means lack of inspiration.
    As for your post, well Dilys would win for me. But I like the statues. YSP is still on my to do list. Maybe it will get ticked off later this year. It may be accessible in tier 3.75 🙃

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    1. I’m one of those who has to do things regularly or not at all. I was on daily yoga till it dropped off – and now it’s not daily at all. Yes, do keep YSP high on your list. Great photo opportunities!

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      1. I have become bored with walking, especially right now when the lanes and bridle paths are too muddy and there are restricted options. I don’t mind a quick 10 mile bike ride though.

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      1. If the miles are really your concern – how about a completely different approach? A few years back I ran all the way from the spring of the Rhine in Switzerland to its mouth in Rotterdam. Whenever I ran a few kms, I added it on a map. And I ran from Johannesburg to Durban which was even more fun because they allow google earth there. It took me quite a while to complete these distances but I was surprised that I managed them at all.

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  11. Nice idea to have a virtual dog 🙂 My husband cycles too but he kindly only does that on a Sunday and walks with me the rest of the week. But I just checked my January total and it’s pitiful next to yours, 53 miles! I only share it to make you feel better, it’s not a figure I’m proud of!!

    We’ve been meaning to visit the Yorkshire Sculpture Park for ages – we see the signs every time we drive past on our way to Newcastle. One of these days we’ll stop!

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    1. I take it one of you has Geordie roots: you seem to refer to the North East quite often? Don’t worry about your mileage comparison. I seem to be a bit driven at the moment, as an alternative to thinking, or actually doing anything constructive!

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      1. Yes, my husband’s a Geordie and we go up several times a year (in normal years) We did manage an August visit last year and hope to get up again in May. He has lots of aunts and cousins in the Gateshead area, and we have quite a few friends in and around the area too. I think of Newcastle as a second home these days.

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  14. 116 miles is a very decent number. You’re managing more than I am. People sometimes ask where my dog is when I am out walking. Perhaps I have a virtual one that only other people can see!

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  15. I like the photo of your virtual dog! However, doesn’t he need legs to accompany you on your walks? 😉 From your photo it looks a bit like the head is just floating in air as opposed to being on a pole.

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  16. Thinking poetically, a pig would perhaps be a better walking companion, although you’d have to speak quietly – Pork rhymes with walk. For a dog you’ll have to get more adventurous because dog rhymes with jog! I suppose you could dance around the walks as pig goes well with jig!

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  19. I’m like Andrew, the rain and mud puts me off walking, I have done bu**er all this month. Usually the garden gives me plenty of exercise, but I haven’t been out there either. Altogether a very unsatisfying month. I also say I am taking the camera for a walk. Everyone around here seems to own a dog! Must be a countryside thing!

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    1. I decided that we’d got mud ahead of us for months so I’d better devise a strategy, hence the dog. Way too much road walking for my liking, but better than nothing. It HAS helped my mood.

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  22. Interesting pieces and do they let you rename your Virtual Dog Head and take her home too? I see the YSP is open for locals to visit. How far away is still local? Ipswich is only 11 miles from Sutton Hoo, but I don’t feel I could make that trip as a local at the moment.

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    1. If you think 11 miles is too far, and I agree, we have no chance of visiting YSP. It’s 54 miles! No, I couldn’t take the dog’s head home. But then she wouldn’t be Virtual any more, would she? I’d have to lug her round with me.

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  24. What a great idea to be motivated by a virtual dog to walk outdoors daily. I don’t manage anything like daily walks even with real dogs (lucky for them my husband is more reliable). Walking around the house pushing a brook or towing the vacuum cleaner is not quite the same is it? Although the end result can be quite rewarding …

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