Conference Call

I just participated in an Avon Walk conference call for people coming to Denver from other areas of the country. There were two other people on the call. It was energizing to hear about the walk and hear other people talk about their reasons for walking. One woman in the conference call is a nurse who works with cancer patients. The other conference caller has an aunt who was misdiagnosed and treated for breast cancer. After surgery and chemo her aunt found out she never had cancer. Her pathology had been mixed up with another woman's tests. The woman on the conference call is walking to improve research and increase awareness about medical tests and getting second opinions.

For more information on getting a second opinion, visit this website.

We will have to arrive in Denver on Friday afternoon in order to check-in and provide up-to-date medical information.

We are expected to arrive at Washington Park in Denver at 5:30am the morning of the walk. The actual walk will start at 7am and it usually takes people 10 hours to walk the first 26.3 miles. We will have, however, until 7pm to finish the walk before crews pick up late walkers. We will walk to Littleton.

In Littleton we will stay the night at Clement Park in a tent village. We will resume walking around 8:30 the next morning and we will walk back to Washington Park following a shorter route. The second day's walk is 13.1 miles. The closing ceremonies are at 3:30pm at Washington Park. Families and friends of walkers are invited to the opening and closing ceremonies and there will be places for family and friends to greet walkers along the walk.

Some good news is the route is pretty flat. This is good because I don't have any hills in the immediate area where I can train. The altitude in Denver is also a bit lower than Santa Fe, and the high temperatures during the day in June in Denver are a bit lower than Santa Fe. Hopefully these little differences will make walking the big walk just a little bit easier than the training I am planning over the next months.