Getting to know you, getting to know all about You

Well what can I say about today's Blip entry it's as if @wee_kirsti was sent from heaven to help me out.

Let's picture the scene I'm off to Slovenia tomorrow for the Scotland game where we have a night in downtown Trieste in Italy, before heading over to Koper for the game on Wednesday and as if there's not enough to do the night before a Scotland away trip, I had to do a round trip to Newcastle today, from where I've just returned.

In addition to my normal travel kit i.e. face cleanser, cuticle remover and camomile tea, you can never get it in these far flung places, I need to pack all the KiltWalk goodies. I've got pamphlets, badges, sponsor forms and rattling cans, the lot and I was thinking, "how am I going to fit in a Blip" and then it arrived in my inbox, so thanks Kirsti you're a star and not just for taking part in the KiltWalk.

Kirsti, of course, has been mentioned before in our Blip pages as we tracked her down last year while at University. We were looking for budding journalists, keen for a story, so we followed Kirsti and a number of others on her course, however Kirsti, while not picking up a story, happily retweeted us and here we are a year later and Kirsti has her degree and we've chapped on her door again, not realising she's now a Real Radio girl, so we were getting her anyway, lol.

So have a read of her story and make sure you stock up with Malteaster Bunnies for the big day.

The Life and Times of a Real Radio Journalist

First of all let's do a bit of "getting to know you, getting to know all about you". I'm Kirsti Walker from the Real Radio news team. I'll be part of the Real Radio team doing the KiltWalk. Joining me are Cat Harvey and producer Michael from the breakfast show. I've also managed to persuade my lovely friend Ella Marshall to take part so we've been training together since January. We're both 22 and consider ourselves fairly fit - may rethink this though.

I first heard about the KiltWalk last year when I was at Glasgow Caledonian University and working for Central FM. The team got in touch through Twitter and although I wasn't able to take part on the day itself, I retweeted all of the details and kept an eye out for all the photos popping up of the KiltWalkers. This year will be my first KiltWalk and I can't wait. It's for a great cause and I've heard it's an amazing day.

I've personally seen the fantastic work done by some of the charities supported by the KiltWalk. I've visited Robin House in Balloch which is run by CHAS. It's a home from home for families with children with life-limiting conditions. The work done at Robin House is amazing and the people there are even more so. I went expecting to leave with tears in my eyes but, although there may have been a few after speaking to parents who were there, I left feeling inspired and more determined than ever to raise as much money as possible to support such a great cause.

So, this was actually our fifth training session. We've been building on the distance since the first week in January and on the 29th we managed a respectable 22 miles so thought the extra four wouldn't hurt. How wrong we were.

It wasn't a particularly nice day. It was dull and there was a bit of drizzle but we ploughed on regardless. Ella and I left Maddiston planning to take a similar route to the 22 miler but decided to add on the four miles at the start. We took the back roads to Linlithgow - mistake. It was wet and muddy and our feet ended up soaked. We weren't about to be put off though. Even the angry dog which almost jumped an eight foot wall to chase us down the road couldn't stop us. Actually it helped us pick up the pace.

After adding on the four miles we were in Polmont. From there we took the Bo'Ness Road out towards Grangemouth, went round Grangemouth (stopping off at ASDA for a well-deserved Malteaster Bunny - if you haven't had one be warned, they're addictive) and headed for Skinflats. So far so good. The rain was off by that point. Feet were a bit sore but we were still in good spirits. That changed when we took the road out towards Larbert as there is no pavement for a good while and we had to walk on the grass and in puddles. So you've guessed it - wet feet again. By the time we were actually in Larbert it was a bit of a struggle.

The occasional peep from passing cars gave us a bit of a boost. We also kept ourselves going by singing Zumba songs (it's the small things) every time we came across a sign saying we'd reached a new place.

The optimism didn't last long. The blisters took over. By the time we'd passed the new Forth Valley Royal Hospital the walking had turned into waddling. We knew there was still some way to go and thought if we made it to the Mariner Centre in Camelon we could have a wee rest. That didn't happen. Unfortunately we had to put in an SOS call to be picked up at Falkirk Golf Club.

We'd only managed 20 miles!

Ella and I are both gutted we didn't managed the full 26 miles or were even able to match our previous 22 but have decided it must have been the fact that our feet had got soaked that hampered our progress. That's our story and we're sticking to it.

We've still got plenty of time to train and will fit in a couple of 26 mile routes before the 8th of April.

You can follow Kirsti (on the right) and Ella (on the left) on Twitter at @wee_kirsti and @EllaxMx

P.S. I don't really pack those things in my case, but I've a funny feeling the comments may come back to haunt me!!