Nijmegan 4 day march

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The Nijmegan International Four Day March (also known as Vierdaagse) is the worlds largest marching event.
When I got asked if I wanted to go to Nijmegan in Holland for a week with work and I wouldn't actually have to do any work all I would need is spending money I thought what’s the catch "We take part in a four day march to improve relations but we spend eight days out there in total so it's a nice break" I got told, I walk a lot anyway, how hard could it be......VERY HARD!

200km over four days, that’s 50km (around 32 miles) A DAY for four days!

In the previous years that people had entered the march there were always a few that dropped out/were pulled out due to injury, nine of us went to Nijmegan, one person drove the van to set up at various points around the course to cook food/give moral support/bandage wounds and the other eight participated in the walk, we all started off really excited “This is going to be the first year that everyone has finished the march” is what EVERYONE was saying.

Day one down and everyone was in pain, the only people without blisters on their feet were my friend Zak and I. After dinner was the first casualty of the trip “I hurt my leg playing football before I came here and I don’t want to do any permanent damage” it’s amazing how a blister to a man can be life changing. I was told to buy some cycling shorts for the march to reduce the chaffing, they made no difference at all, although I did not have any blisters on my feet I had one directly underneath my......special place, it felt like it was on fire by the end of the day, if anything was going to stop me from completing the march it was that not my feet.

The next morning after breakfast I applied as much sudo cream as I could, whilst walking the day before someone told me to get a few tissues, fold them over and tuck them underneath and that it would act as a cushion, however due to the pain I was in and the copious amounts of painkillers I was taking I didn’t think about how the tissue and cream would react together in a sweaty place for 12 hours. Half way through day two of the march I had to change the tissue as the sweat had made them disintegrate into a million pieces, that was no problem at all however the cream had dried and stuck to the small tissue balls that had formed and they were now stuck to the hair between my legs....amongst other places. Towards the end of the walk every few steps I would feel a sharp pain from that area, the hairs were getting stuck together and pulling each other out, not very pleasant especially when you have a blister in exactly the same place!

We had all developed our own pace and paired up with someone of the same pace to talk to throughout the march, day two claimed its second victim this time a real injury, the only girl on the trip had a huge blister on the back of her foot and went to see a medic for them to put something on it. They popped the blister and drained it and underneath that was another blister filled with blood, the medic instantly pulled her out of the march through injury. I could feel that I had blisters forming too now, I was pretty much eating pain killers like they were sweets to get through, at each stop we would lay down and put our feet in the air as our feet were swollen because all of the blood in them.

At the end of day two one of the other guys said he was pulling out too as he was in too much pain, after dinner and a good night’s sleep we managed to get him to change his mind . At the start of day three he was walking very slowly as he was in so much pain, the march is split into four parts 30km a day, 40km a day, 50km a day or 50km a day with a weighted bag (Mainly the Military do this one). The 50km people start earlier as they have longer to walk but because Jim was walking so slowly the 40km & 30km people began to overtake him, he didn’t realise they were walking a different course to us and that the courses overlapped in parts so began to follow the masses, he had walked about 5km off course before someone noticed he was a 50km walker, he had to walk all the way back and continue around the course the right way, at the next pit stop Jim pulled out and I think anyone would have done the same thing too he had walked 60km.

Everyone was in an immense amount of pain, I now had blisters that were so big that the Compeed plasters were too small to cover them, one of the guys, Tom, couldn’t move his ankle or toes properly but was adamant he was going to finish the march, another guy we called Tuna had done the march many years ago and wanted to get the next medal but he could just about walk too. Two of the older members of the group always walked with a fast pace, Zak and I would never be too far behind them and Tom and Tuna were not far behind us. As we began the walk on day three I could feel one of the blisters on my feet hurting a lot, the pressure felt like it was going to explode, after about twenty steps I felt a ‘pop’ the blister had popped, I could feel it in my sock and I still had 32km to go, not cool.

When we woke up in the morning, after another early night due to exhaustion, we knew that it was the final day, all we had to do was finish today and we would get our medals. The two old boys started their usual fast pace with Zak and I behind, we were in too much pain to look back, when we got to the first pit stop we saw Tuna “how did you beat us here” I said, he was asleep in the back of the van. Darren, who was driving the van shook his head and gave me the look “he had to pull out, he was in too much pain” where was Tom? We waited for quite some time and eventually Tom limped in to have a rest. I asked Tom in he wanted to walk with me and Zak and he happily said yes. Tom was limping badly, he couldn’t walk very fast at all, when we got to the second stop Darren told us we had to walk faster or we wouldn’t finish in time and wouldn’t get our medals. It was time to take action, Zak and I took an arm each and literally dragged Tom along the course, I told Tom if he was in too much pain or he wanted us to stop we would but if he could go through the pain we were going to all finish the march in time.

After the last stop all nine of us joined together and walked as a team over the finish line with time to spare...ish. Now it was time for the celebrations, now we could all party and get drunk and not worry about waking up at 3am to start the march the following morning, we got back to the hotel ate some food and all crashed out until the morning, how rock and roll am I lol. We didn’t miss out on all of the fun though as there was also a party the following day that we went to, although it wasn’t anywhere near the size of the party the day before and the weather was horrible. Out of the eight that started the walk five finished and I’m proud to say I was one of them, when we got home Tom went to the doctor and found out that he had a broken toe and had been walking on it for at least the last two days ouch!

Would I go back again? Definitely, would I walk it again? Hell No!!!

Before the horror that was the Nijmegan four day march we did manage to visit some other places, before we permanently damaged our feet. We went to the south of Holland to a place called Venlo and did some sightseeing there before heading to Xanten in Germany where we went to the Archaeological Park, we saw a roman amphitheatre, amongst other things, all around were people dressed in roman attire acting out how gladiators must have thought years ago, I think the main reason they were putting so much into the acting is because it was freezing and they were wearing very little and trying to keep warm lol.

We also got to visit the world famous city of Amsterdam, I had already been to Amsterdam in the past many years before but this was more of a flying visit, Amsterdam has a lot of bicycles and a lot of canals, oh I nearly forgot it also has a lot of drugs and prostitution lol but that is one of the things that makes this city unique. During the day walking along the canals is very picturesque even around the red light district, yes there are lots of tourists completely wasted from taking drugs in the coffee shops and bars that allow you to take drugs but once you stop laughing at them and the novelty wears off you don’t seem to notice them anymore. You can watch live sex shows or if you want to indulge in the “night time economy” almost every window/door way in the streets around the red light district have different women. Some of the side streets are known for having a certain type of woman for men (or women) with different tastes, you have everything from Latino women on one street, larger women on another street and for those that like something a little bit taboo you even have streets of really hairy women or women that are actually men!

But as I said this was a flying visit so we did not get to see anything like that this time (the shows I mean), although some of the guys did visit a sex museum, the rest of us took a cruise along the canals and then had a coffee before we all headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch, I love the Hard Rock (if you have read any of my other blogs you will know this).

We visited all of these places before the march but on the way home we drove through Belgium and decided to stop off in Gent for lunch, I wish I could remember the name of the place we ate at because the food was amazing but unfortunately I can’t.

That is the story of my little adventure which left me unable to walk properly for a couple of weeks after the march, I hope you all enjoyed!

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