Day 202/365

Running home from work across the fields and through the woods, what was I to do when I came across a "CAUTION BULL IN FIELD" sign? With my head torch and a hi- viz shirt on the bull was likely to see me before I saw him. I pulled a stick from the hedge and clutching the stick and  clenching my buttocks I entered the field, I ran very slowly along the hedge scanning the field with my torch as I went, knowing I would have to run across the field as the exit was in the opposite corner. I ran as far as I could before I had to run into open ground I couldn't see any eyes lighting up from my torch so I legged it, which isn't easy after running a half marathon the day before, working an 8 hour shift in a hot factory and carrying a backpack. Heart beating and gasping for breath I made it to the stile, not knowing if the bull was in there or not I ran on, not looking back. Through Charlton and along Snails Bottom to Loocombe Woods, I trip on a tree root but manage not to fall over. As I run I'm unsettling roosting birds and I can hear an owl hooting in the distance. Out the wood and across open ground skirting Shoots Wood I then run down through Holcombe Wood coming out beside Holcombe Old Church, the hairs rise on my neck as I run past the graveyard quickening my pace, the owl hoots again this time very close which startles me. I carry on along the footpaths skirting the village of a Holcombe past the Holcombe Inn and eventually down the pack horse trail to The Duke of Cumberland then up Holcombe Hill to home, 5 3/4 miles.