Boltby Nightmare

The long run was really enjoyable today as I tackled the new route mapped out for me, that is until I entered Boltby Forest near the end of my run. Many years ago I did some mounting biking around Boltby Forest and with different levels of trails to follow it was fantastic. Then over the years the Forestry lot have done a good job of ruining all the wooded paths with a bit of help from motor bikes. The last three times I have tried to navigate myself around the old paths I have ended up somewhere totally different to what I had planned. So this time I thought I would take the easy straight forward route back to the car park that is until I stepped into the forest. I thought seeing as I had a map I might as well have ago at navigating around the pre-planned route, a few junctions seemed to be missing and I ended up slightly off track but with map in hand I planned an alternative route as I knew which track I was in. I was busy looking for a left hand turn and covering way too much ground so I thought I would just take the next left turn. I came across a path and took that which took me somewhere, I have no idea where but it was somewhere. After running down a never ending fire break that was heading in the wrong direction I went cross country which was one hell of a job in a Forest only to find another fire break. I followed that until I came across the main track, no need for the map as I knew which way I needed to be heading, oops ! That was one hell of a long loop I ran to get back to the main track back to the car park. The run had taken 2 hours 40 minutes in total with another section added on. It all added to the adventure of finding new routes another another thirty years of this and I'll know them moors like my training route manager.
I should be Ok for tomorrows training route, a 4.7 mile time trial around the streets of Thirsk to gauge what shape I'm in at the moment. 27 minutes plus being one of my worst times last October and 24 minutes 52 seconds being my best just before Edinburgh Marathon 2008.