I spent the past few days in Swift Current, Saskatchewan where I was “teen” sitting my two eldest grandsons. While there, I got to give my new Pacer Poles a good workout on the trail system that wends its way along the creek and passed several parks. I was surprised at how easily I managed the ascents with the poles, a significant difference from my experiences on ascents without poles.
Maureen and I used the poles for an hour a day during the first week we owned them, and were able to easily cover just over five kilometres in the hour. This week we have upped the walking time with poles to an hour and a half covering a distance of eight kilometres. I am hoping we continue to build on this over the spring and summer until we are walking three to five hours on the average for each of our walks. We have adjusted our poles following the first few walks until we found what we felt was the optimum length.
We will be spending several days in Lethbridge, Alberta where we will take advantage of their long trails and hills for our training walks.