Expo-sed

One thing you must do before you can run the London Marathon is turn up in person at the "Expo" at London's ExCeL, in order to sign your life away and collect your running number and timing chip. The Expo runs for four days in the lead up to the race on Sunday, and I went yesterday, taking my little sister along for moral support. She ran the Marathon in 2003 (in four hours 20 minutes...!) and was amazed at how much the whole thing has changed since she did it, not only in terms of the numbers of people but the organisation and logistics surrounding the event.

The first thing we noticed when we got off the DLR at Custom House was how many elderly ladies were running the Marathon this year. Good for them, we thought, just goes to show that age is no barrier if you put your mind to it. When we got into ExCeL, however, it became clear that actually most of them were probably going to the Cake and Sugar Craft Show in a different hall! Which my sister would have quite liked to go to instead. 

In the hall, I had to sign in and collect my number and kit bag ("I never got a fancy kit bag," said my sister), along with instructions on how to use the female urinals at the Start... Eeuucchh! (She never got those either.) Then we wandered around the show - loads of stands selling all things running, from bras to shoes to headphones to protein bars and everything in between, together with lots of charity stands and people advertising their own Marathons elsewhere in the world. We picked up a leaflet about the Northern Lights Half in Tromso in January, if anyone's interested in that one?! We went to visit the Pancreatic Cancer UK stand, where the two ladies were thrilled to see us and shake my hand. It was really lovely to meet them and to see how much the money I have raised is appreciated. There will be 110 PanCan runners this weekend, almost twice as many as they have ever had before, so it's great to see that the message is getting out there and people are working really hard to raise awareness and try to help. They gave me a goody bag containing a pair of awesome purple shoelaces for my trainers, among other small items, and we picked up some T-shirts, stickers and clappy waving things for the fans who'll be coming to cheer me on. I also signed the Wall of Remembrance for Mum, who felt very close yesterday. My sister said she could almost hear Mum laughing at the very thought of me running a marathon.

This is the London Course record - not my time!!

Then we went to meet some people with whom I have been on-line chatting about all things Marathon for the past few months in the Virgin Marathon Community. (I know, I know, never meet strangers off the internet! But I had my sister with me as back up and they turned out to be as lovely as I knew they'd be, if slightly bonkers in the way of marathon runners generally.)

Once we left ExCeL, as it was a beautiful day we decided to be adventurous and tackle the Emirates Air-Line, the cable car that crosses the Thames to Greenwich. It's quite high up in the middle and affords fantastic views all around London.

The Air-Line crossing the river in the background

Going up...!

West to O2 and Canary Wharf

East to the Thames Barrier

North to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park

Going down

After that we had lunch outside the O2, then took the Thames Clipper river bus back round to central London. It's a really great trip but it also served to remind me how far the run is on Sunday - as the boat passed Greenwich and rounded the Isle of Dogs, past Surrey Quays and Rotherhithe on the left and under Tower Bridge, at which point I have to go backwards (not literally, no) and run all round the Isle of Dogs and Canary Wharf on the other side, then back to Tower Bridge before going all the way along the North Bank towards the Embankment and Westminster. Yikes!

It was a really super day, and nice to be able to do other things in London rather than just running stuff. I am really very excited now and just want to get it started. I know I am totally relaxed until about 18 miles, but after that it'll be between me and my grit and guts, and two million cheering fans! The weather looks like it will be kind to us, as it'll be dry and not too warm - at least to start with. The weatherman last night said "Pleasantly cool at the outset, but for those stragglers later on it may get a little warm..." The cheek!! Here's to the stragglers!