Trailwalker 3/4 of team 140!

19102008(001)
Originally uploaded by Marcel_Ekkel

Last sunday there was another training session for the upcoming Oxfam Trailwalker.

Finally we had the opportunity to train with the missing teammember. After a few weeks searching Dothan introduced Martin. He had been traveling a fair bit...but there he was.

The route was a part of section 5 followed by 6 and section 7 of the MacLeHose trail. The weather was superb, not toooo hot, little breeze!

It was good that we had another participant who volunteered to be killed on the trails :). Anyway, we kept up a good speed and blasted over needle hill and grassy hill in 4 hours.

It would be great if we can keep a similar speed during the event as it would result in a finish time way under 20 hours. Trick here was ....we started fresh instead of arriving there after 11 hours of walking already.

Only 17 days before the event, and although this will be a tough one I am looking forward to it.

Old Friends Reunion

Old Friends Reunion
Originally uploaded by Marcel_Ekkel

I am currently in Ho Chi Minh city to run a 1 day "introduction in projectmnagement" for one of my clients.

The last time I worked in VietNam was in 1998. During that time I was working on my first entrepreneurial stint...setting up a Nha Trang based scubadiving centre for Vietravel, a VietNam based travel organization.

As I spend regularly time in Ho Chi Minh city, at the companies HQ it was a good opportunity to make some friends there as well.

Over the years I kep in touch with some of my friends from that time. As I was coming over again, I organized a dinner with my friend Thuy and her husband. (Thuy, congratulations on the second baby!)

Whilst having dinner we talked about the "old days" and Thuy picked up her phone to call one of the old friends from those days.

Mr Binh was positively surprised and jumped on his motorbike to meet up in town for a coffee. (The Vietnamese do love their coffees! and interestingly enough...no Starbucks to be found here). It is always interesting to here what people do with their lives.

Mr Binh for example is now married with a young son and is working in Sales in a steel company. Completely different then when I met him. Young out of Uni party live loving person working in the travel industry.

Anyway, it was good catching up and sharing old memories.