SUNDAY 12TH MARCH 2006

Perhaps the greatest challenge yet...

A boneshaker it certainly was, not least for Ian whose fancy new supercrosshi-tektrainer3000XPD boots with totalabsorb spongyform foot protection let his feet down immeasurably, duly resulting in the first truly dastardly injury episode of the nightstrider training to date.

Catch the full story below, it all began so innocently...

Cut down in size to just three due to the growing enormity of the walking, the intrepid striders nevertheless begin the boneshaker in the quiet town of Kingston undeterred, even going so far as to glue their shoulders and forearms together in a show of confident unity.

Early into the walk, Aimee engages in a spot of urban breakdown-come-graffiti. She clearly hasn't seen the chief inspector lurking in the background...

With 25% of the walk behind them, the three stumble upon a grand prix behind a hedge, so they take a photo.

There are many fellow striders out today, and it all contributes to make a really nice family atmosphere. This shot was taken by a secret camera borrowed from the Dispatches team, and captures Aimee, Ben and Ian using horses to cover the majority of the 30km.

After rolling around in the hay for a while, Ian starts to foam brown foam at the mouth, and tries to distract us from such by taking a photo.

During an interval in the galloping, the group stumble across this cliched woodcutter, standing atop his last conquest. Hadn't this backward individual heard about climate change and rainforest destruction? Surely he knew we must all do what we can to protect trees?

Still, he came in useful when we couldn't find a proper seat to eat lunch on...

But, with our consciences weighing heavy, we found alternative seating arrangements. Ian was not happy about this. Here he begins to use his particular seating arrangement as a toilet.

Continuing the walk, things were getting muddy...

And only the sacred muffins of moolally kept us all clip-cloppetying forth...

As the going got tough, we realised we were nuts, and reached for more...

At the half-way mark we turned chocolate scavengers. Here Ben steals some chocolate from a passerby who just happened to be unwrapping an expensive chocolate treat but was taking too wide an arc to get it in his/her mouth.

As the walk took yet more twists upon turns, we realised we were in the middle of Thailand, as this shot of a rice paddy shows.

Suddenly, we stumbled across this ominous balloon. It was a bone-curdling (yes, bone curdling) forewarning of the pain about to be experienced by one of our party, as his new superboots began to take their toll and squeeze and pinch his metatarsal muscles to unparallelled anguish... But heroically he humped onwards...

And, as we descended into the valley below us, we knew this was one walk that was going to be cut short due to the foot throbbing, despite the lovely views. We'd travelled 25km or so, same as last time, so all in all not too bad.

Spirits remained high despite the injury, and there was still time for a smooch upon some concrete. Bless.

With the other two cavorting away, I took the opportunity to launch myself up the aforementioned Box Hill... attempting to run to the top, before we all would have to make a dash for the train. Lungs bursting, I just about made it - and, in the mindst of considerable pain - took these shots from the top. Doesn't look very high up or steep, but it sure did feel like it at the time.

After that it was homeward bound, catching a diddy little train home from Boxhill Station. Here's an action shot of the train pulling in.

And that's it, really. It's now a week later and in case you were worried, Ian's foot is a lot better, Aimee has bought some bargain waterproof socks and Ben is having coldsore issues. Bring on next week!