Amberley to Truleigh Hill YHA

Plan of the day: checkpoint 4 to 3, 3 to 4, 4 to 5 and 5 to Truleigh Hill of the beautiful South Downs Way and beautiful it was!

After dropping off our bags with Medusa's parents and loading ourselves with energy supplies at Amberley the four of us went forth in earnest. The walk from Amberley to checkpoint 3 quickly showed us what the South Downs had to offer, LOTS of amazing scenery! We were also met by poo and mud which kept our spirits high because of course.....a walk isn't a walk without poo and mud!

This section stayed nice and flat, nothing too strenuous and we all rejoiced when we saw the support crew in sight. Theia was especially rejoiceful at the fact that she hadn't got the OUCH'ers lost, map reading skills were never her strong points. On reaching the support crew we had been happy that we had made good speed, however, we were aware that too long of a stop would put us behind schedule, something we discovered later.

With our hydration packs refilled we continued onwards, heading back to Ambereley.
Our first mission was to climb the everest of mud  that we had so carefully just come down on, oh how that was fun.Throughout this section the views never disappointed us which took everyones breath away, particularly Theia's as she exclaimed a lot!

A few more hills compared to the last section, some woodland and dancing on the move!.Lots of giggling occurred when we talked about 'classics' that we could dance to, such as YMCA, Tragedy (very fitting i thought) and The Macarena.
This section took longer due to the girls of the group needing a toilet stop and after a (not so) brief stop, i blame the ice cream shop, we made our way into Amberley to meet our support crew and lunch!

Amberley to checkpoint 5 and our legs were starting to feel weary. The route was reasonably flat, emphasis on the 'reasonably', it is the South Downs, of course there were hills.
The fantastic scenery remained with the addition of rather lovely views of the posteriors of passing cyclists which the girls particularly enjoyed.

Throughout the day the weather had been very kind to us, dry with sunny spells, however, those sunny spells became more prolonged and 'sunny' and the OUCH'ers became tired. We headed downhill to the outskirts of Washington and met the support team. The decision was made to head to Trueleigh Hill YHA via car to get some rest before another day of walking awaited us...........