
The Coastline Runner with Lady Mayor Jenny and Great Yarmouth Mayor Adrian Thomson and staff of the Pier Hotel, Gorleston.
During the #TheCoastlineRunner initiative I don’t listen to music as I run, I listen to our environment instead, but in my head this time was 'Born Slippy (by Underworld) and I recommend you click here, start listening and then read on.
Why this song?
To get to Great Yarmouth, I took the National Express from Victoria, London.
A new passenger got on with his young son at Thetford, and hoisting things into the overhead lockers, said “Agh! I’m not used to this…. since being banned from flying…..” and the scene with Begby on a coach down to London in the film Trainspotting (here) immediately came to mind. But I was wrong – he was an excellent passenger and Dad – and we had a fine journey. Anyhow, that moment fed that song into my mind for all of S9 on Saturday, 30th April.
a) Short thought and 10 points: if I had counted the fibreglass heavy chunk of marine litter from a ship that I brought from the shoreline in S6, we would have hit weight targets of shoreline plastic collected – the aim is 1kg per 1 km ran.
However, we need to collect well over 100kgs of plastic to truly close the Norfolk Chapter.
Returning to Gorleston beach during a summer weekend of the school holidays with the Norfolk Beach Cleaners Collective, is one option, told us by the Gorleston lifeguards but can you point to any other ‘shoreline plastic hot spots’ in Norfolk? Please tell us at https://www.instagram.com/thecoastlinerunner/ . We need to stop more plastics from entering our seas immediately, as well as advocating for systemic changes to stop the tap from flowing….

S9: Saturday, 30th April – the data - already reported here
1. Start: The Pier Hotel, here, at 12:30
2. Finish: Lowestoft (Ness Point here)
3. Distance: 15 km
4. #TheCoastlineRunner initiative total distance: 195 km (180 km + 15km in S9)

5. How arrived: coach to Great Yarmouth and then local bus to Gorleston
6. How departed: Train from Lowestoft
7. S9 CO2e emitted: total CO2e emitted for this #TheCoastlineRunner endeavour is estimated at 200 kgs of CO2e (180 kgs + on Saturday 20 kgs, which was the coach to Great Yarmouth from London – train from Lowestoft (here) to London + 7.3 kgs new running shoes (here) because of quite severe Morton’s Neuroma in my left foot).
8. Plastic rubbish/trash observation: The lifeguards at Gorleston say there isn’t really a shoreline plastic problem, until the school holidays start, then it is “plastic mayhem”. This run had to include running on the A47 to Hopton and through Corton, and that made me want to give up! The amount of deliberate road littering is truly awesome and shocking, with a lot of McDonalds cups and containers, plastic bottles and cigarette ends.
9. Marine litter: very slight - some ropes and bits of polystyrene containers
Consumer litter: crisp packets, McDonalds cups, balloons, sweet wrappers and 3 dog poo bags
10. Shoreline plastics litter collected: by S9 40 kgs collected and correctly disposed of (we will investigate the truth of Lowestoft (non-recycled) waste system. b) Short report:
The Mayor of Great Yarmouth and Mayoress, greeted me and gave me a cup of tea, before our 2 minute beach clean (#2MinuteBeachClean – here).
Beach cleaning the day before, they were inspired by school pupils at Caister.
Mayor Thompson with wife Jenny, the Mayoress of Great Yarmouth Borough have such commitment to the community of Great Yarmouth. It was very impressive, indeed.
To complete the Norfolk chapter weight-wise (1kg of shoreline plastic per 1 km ran, as reported in the EDP here) we will return to Great Yarmouth with the Norfolk Beach Cleaners Collective (here) to complete Norfolk.
Help to achieve this is going to be provided by Mayoress Jenny (pictured below), who will be keeping the One Bag Zero Waste bag to fill with unrecyclable plastic waste, and deposit correctly. They are dish-washer-machine-cleanable too - I have washed mine numerous times!

On Saturday, I made it to the most eastern point of the UK, Ness Point (here).


Follow The Coastline Runner initiative here “#thecoastlinerunner” and Instagram here. To sponsor the initiative click here, a JustGiving platform link Previous known traditional media reporting so far: April –
https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/gorleston-coast-runner-dog-poo-shock-8934106
https://www.greatyarmouthmercury.co.uk/news/gorleston-coast-runner-dog-poo-shock-8934106
EDP by chief reporter Chris Bishop.
09:05 BBC Interview Radio Norfolk, with Kirsteen Thorne @kethorne1 here - BBC Radio Norfolk Interview (From 03:10:49 to 03:19:23)
Lynn News (coastline-runner-starts-next-stage)
Lynn News (a-shore-thing-for-the-coast-runner)
November 2021
7. https://www.greatyarmouthmercury.co.uk/news/the-coastline-runners-second-norfolk-leg-8479126
8. https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/the-coastline-runners-second-norfolk-leg-847912610/11/2021
9. BBC Radio Norfolk, 16:20 Stephen Bumfrey
10. https://www.northnorfolknews.co.uk/news/luke-douglas-home-coast-runner-cromer-8492262
11. https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/luke-douglas-home-coast-runner-cromer-849226219112021
12."coastline running sounds epic!" says Emily Maitlis (BBC) https://twitter.com/maitlis/status/1461771051738845194?s=20
13. https://www.fakenhamtimes.co.uk/news/luke-douglas-home-coast-runner-cromer-8492262
14. 29th Nov - 17:45 interview BBC Norfolk
October
15. https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/the-coastline-runners-race-to-zero-8451690
16. https://www.greatyarmouthmercury.co.uk/news/the-coastline-runners-race-to-zero-8451690
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