Polar Races Training on the Welsh Sand Dunes

We had rain, gusting winds and a heavy frost during the night! But I slept surprisingly well in my Arctic sleeping bag despite only having a very thin foam roll mat to sleep on!

After a tasteless re-hydrated breakfast of porridge, we packed up the tents and drove to the Merthyr Mawr Sand Dunes.They are a huge network of dunes, rolling over towards the Ogmore/Porthcawl coast, and once the largest sand dune system in Europe. The dunes also claim fame to the highest single sand dune in Europe, known locally as the 'big dipper' (I think this is the one we ran up and down yesterday!!)

We loaded 5 way points into our GPSs and spent the next 5 hours dragging our weighted pulks up and down the dunes - it was exhausting, particularly as we did not have any poles! It was great to be reassured by Jock, that this is harder work than pulling the pulks on the snow in the Arctic, and the hills in Wales were much larger than the rubble at the North Pole.

Team Polar Slugs celebrated a tough weekend with another visit to the Ogmore Farm tea rooms before heading our separate ways home.

When I unpacked our tent this evening to dry out, it was still covered with frost and ice!

Back to work for a rest tomorrow!