31May 2021 by Ronny Allan 4 Comments

Ronny Allan

Ronny Allan is an award-winning international patient leader advocating for Neuroendocrine Cancer and cancer patients generally. Check out his Facebook pages and twitter accounts.

At the beginning of the year, I signed up to walk 1000 miles in 2021. I can now confirm, I’m halfway there in 5 months. I have buffer time ….. but only if I keep going. By total coincidence it came on the anniversary of the completion of an 84 mile walk along Hadrian’s Wall on 31st May 2014. 500 miles seems a lot more than that epic journey, but Chris and I did do around 300 miles in training to build up our stamina.

Am I mad walking 1000 miles as a Stage 4 cancer patient? Not quite but working on it (haha). I have several incentives, including:

As a stage 4 cancer patient, I want to be as fit as possible to withstand any rigours I may face in future.
It offers mental benefits which are well documented in the annals of medicine.
I get to see nice sights and places while I’m walking, this adds to the positive mental effect.
I enjoy photographing some of the sights and posting the pictures on my Facebook page Ronny Allan
…….. I like a challenge!

For each 10 miles I get to colour in a number on this map of the UK, i.e. a virtual walk across the UK to track my actual mileage. At 500 miles I was in Cumbria so Northeast England, Wales and Scotland still to go – can’t wait! Cumbria was the final location on the 84-mile walk completed in 2014 on 31st May 2014, more spookiness! I might actually do some of the miles in those places still to walk (Edit: Some of them were actually done in North Yorkshire).

I’m not sure if the Proclaimers are famous in US but they were on Letterman (…. in 1989!). See that appearance below.

Completed 16th November 2021

Thanks for reading and supporting me along the way – your responses to my Facebook walking posts spur me on! If you’re not following my Facebook page Ronny Allan, you’re missing all the fun!

When I think of the famous song I was alluding to above (…..although I made slight tweaks for contextual purposes), it ties in with another blog post I wrote called “Letter from America”, another hit from the same group. To discover who the group are, you can read ‘Letter from America’ by clicking here.

Check out my Glossary of Terms – click here

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4 thoughts on “I have walked 500 miles and I will walk 500 more (….. sing along)”

cathyshermanfreeman

Love you are doing this . . . So inspirational . . . I’m a wee lass in Oregon with a type of tumor called GIST not known to be neuroendocrine but I think I just proved it is and will be changing how doctors think about my cancer (SDHB mutation dad died of paragangliomas). Love the song 500 miles . . . In January 2020 my husband and daughter (age 35) sang that song in concert in Ashland, Oregon. Little did I know COVID was about to pounce and I’d end up in hospital for emergency surgery in March the night hospital COVID shutdown started thus my husband couldn’t be with me. I played the recording of that song for the nurses and it helped get me through that terrible surgery in which I almost died. Then I had to have another surgery in October 2021 during COVID at our National Cancer Institute when the same tumor tried to kill me again. I’m also a patient advocate but for a much smaller group of patients who have the SDHB inherited/germline mutation of Gist/Para/Pheo.

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June 1, 2021 at 20:39
- Ronny Allan
  
  Nice to hear from you again and glad you’re OK after surgery. Great story about the song!
  
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  June 1, 2021 at 21:12
Shelley

Fantastic accomplishment! You are such an inspiration!

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May 31, 2021 at 20:31
- Ronny Allan
  
  thanks
  
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  June 1, 2021 at 10:35