Strange start to a vacation

I'm stood in the airport in Basel waiting for Marly to arrive. We'll then head south and see where the road takes us in our new/old jeep grand cherokee. Never started a holiday like this before, but the weather is fantastic and I can't wait to get going. Northern Italy here we come.

Final Stage

Well, I made it. The last day was a very hot 42.2km trot up and down steep cliffs and through lots of sand. I finished in about 5 hours and I'm waiting for the general classification to see if I'll finish in the top hundred. My tent is about 50 meters from the email tent and it took me almost 10 minutes to get here, using a very slow shuffle due to my feet. At least |'ve had the full experience, including a hot nail through my toe nail, which was pretty much the most painful experience of my life. But on the up side, there will be beer and wine with dinner tonight (yipee). Well, it's time to start heeling and spend some qality time in London before heading back to Qatar.

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Third Stage Update

I don't have words to describe yesterday. It was the longest ever stage, totalling 91kms (57 miles). I decided to walk 30 mins and run 30 mins, but it was a mistake. I should have run on the easy terain and walked the rest. All in all though, it went well. I hooked up with a fast group after dark, mainly because my head tourch was useless. I came in at about 23:25 after more than 14 hours. I was one of the lucky ones. There are still people coming in now, more than 17 hours later. I managed to go up 3 places and now have to defend position 100 in the marathon stage tomorrow. Oh and the bottom of my feet have pretty much fallen appart due to the walking, which means that I am now moving at a snails pace around the camp.

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Stage update

It was a cold, cold night. My sleeping bag was not designed for a very strong wind and arctic temporatures! So, I slept about 30 minutes. On the positive side, | had another good run today. It was 36kms of mixed dunes, hills and flat with a really evil last 2kms of dunes. I finished in about 4hrs 27 and I'll see later if I've maintained my position of 103 (I was more surprised than anyone that I almost made it into the top 100). Tomorrow is the long stage and I have no idea how to approach it. I'll just do what hurts the least. At the moment everything hurts, but that will get better when I cook.

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Nearly time to go

It's nearly time. Panic, apprehension, gnawing pain in the stomach. I'm feeling all of these right now. I can't work out if they're because I just quit my new job in Qatar due to various issues with the owner and I'm unemployed for the first time ever, or if it's because I'm about to spend way too long in the desert with a bunch of crazy people. Well, whatever the answer, it's time and I'm ready. During the event, I'll be updating my blog on a daily basis (just allowed one email a day) and you can leave me a message by going to http://www.darbaroud.com and going to the "write to competitor" section and look for my race number, 745.

Catching a cold in the desert

Well, I managed to catch a cold in the desert. My head is bunged up and i didn't get enough sleep. Apart from that, everything is fantastic.

On Saturday I ran for the first time in the dunes and it was brilliant. Mountains of sand dive straight into the sea and running across the crest of the dunes is an experience not to be missed. Saturday evening I had dinner on the terrace at the gold club, watched a movie and then fell into a very exhausted sleep.

On Sunday morning, by cold had gone to my head and I was very snotty. So, instead of running, I explored Doha. First to PCONE, which as the name suggests, sells pcs. I must admit, looking round pc shops is a bit of a hobby and this one had a pretty good assortment. I then moved onto what supposed to be one of the best book shops in Doha, but there wasn't much choice, so it looks like I'll be relying on Amazon. After the book store I had a good look around the city center shopping center. I think the best shop is the hobby shop, which sells lots of radio controlled cars and helicopters etc... I had lunch at Starbucks, then went to explore Villagio, which is a shopping center with canals, gondolas and a very realistic sky. After walking around for a while admiring the designer shops, I had dinner at TGI Fridays for 8 euros. Finally, I went home and hung out with my better half on Skype for the rest of the evening. Then finally a little after midnight I went to bed, with the alarm set for 06:30 (another short sleep).

Running home

I got my race number for the mds today. I'll be 745.
After yesterday's fun trip home, I decided to run home today. It's a little over 9kms, which I covered in just over 50 mins with a heavy pack. I have a bit of a sort throat, probably from the airco, or from the very heavy exhaust fumes. I hope it goes away tonight. I'll run home again tomorrow evening, then eventually I want to run too and from work. I opened a bank acount today, which was a strange experience. A representative from the bank came to our office and guided us through the forms. I'll be getting a checkbook and credit card and I'll be paid by check on the last day of the month. I'll have a current account in which I always have to have more than 1000 euros, otherwise I have to pay interes (no wonder they make a lot of money here). It will be wierd taking my paycheck to the bank every month. I hope I never accidentally drop it...
Well, it's almost 23:00, so time to read a little, then get some sleep.

First day at work

In Qatar the weekend is Friday and Saturday, so I had my first official day of work today. Compared to UPC (my previous job) it was quiet. My meeting schedule was empty and I was able to concentrate on the job at hand. I think it will be a great eye opener working here, out of the bureaucracy of a large corporation. I met a potential new employee who was interviewing for a job in sales and we had lunch together. He gave me a lot of good tips and introduced me to a couple of people working at QTEL, which is the main Qatar telephony and internet provider. I left the office at 17:30, and Kate, who works as our PA, gave me a lift to "City Center" which is supposedly the 5th largest shopping center in the world. I then waited about 20 mins for a taxi in a very long queue, then sat in a traffic jam for a very long time, eventually getting back to the hose at 19:00. That's a hour and a half to cover about 7 kms. Tomorrow, I'm going to run home. It should take me about 40 minutes, so I'll add another 5 kms or so on the end. My legs are feeling a lot better now that they're back in action after a couple of weeks of neglect and I can't wait to run again. For now, it's time to read a little and then get some sleep.

First day in Qatar

Didn't get much sleep last night. When I arrived, I found that the pre-paid sim card, which should have worked in Qatar, didn't. To make it worse the payphones all needed special cards and there was nowhere to buy them. Luckily my new boss came along on time. Unluckily, I forgot that my wife was staying with her mother and I left a voicemail on our home phone saying that I'd arrived safely. I then went to bed, only to wake a couple of hours later remembering that she was not home. I then spent a long time finding a wifi signal and managed to send a couple of smss. Today, I got up pretty late, went to the office, went to the 5th biggest shopping center in the world, called the "city center" (not much imagination there). I now have a working pre-paid card. Only thing that sucks is that you need to top them up by buying cards, no online top-up. Anyway, I eventually made it out for a run at about 21:00 and ran for just over an hour. Tomorrow morning, I'm getting up at 06:00 so I can get in a good run before work.

It's pretty weird out here on my own. I'm so used to hanging out with my wife in the evenings. Now I have to hang out with her on the phone, or to save some cash, on skype.

Well, time to sleep and see what the morning brings.

It's a funny old world

I'm in Istanbul airport waiting for a connecting flight to Doha, which is the capital of a very small country called Qatar. Now until not so long ago I new very little about Qatar, but then fate took a good hold and gave my life a shakeup. We'd (me and the wife) been planning on spending some time living abroad in the not too distant future, hence last year's trip to Canada. Then one day in the office a colleague mentions that he's been offered a job in Qatar, but he can't go because of family obligations. A month later, I'm on a flight out to Qatar to have an almost week long live-in interview. That went well and I'm now off to be the CTO of small internet company. I've swapped a job with a fantastic salary, car, very good benefits, security etc.... for a job with non of the above. I do however run the risk of making a lot of money in the long run and I fancied a little adventure along the way. It is of course the perfect place to do my last 2 months of training before the big run. Speaking of training, I've slacked a little in the last couple of weeks. It's more worked than I ever imagined, moving to a new country. Especially when you're moving from The Nehterlands which is one of the most buerocratic countries in the world. Well, all I can say is, bring it on and let's see what the near future holds. I'm guess it's going to involve lots of working a running and skyping with my wife, who will join me in a couple of months.

I think the simple rule from now on has to be "I will not miss a single training session". Let's see how that goes with a new job in a new country................