Anna attended The Tiffin Girls School, before studying Psychology at Royal Holloway, University of London. Franny talks her way onto a fishing boat, and she and the crew set sail, travelling ever further from shore and safety. From the Shetland Isles, Anna’s run - which took five months - took her down the northeast coast of Scotland towards Inverness, before heading down to Glasgow and Edinburgh via Aberdeen. The intrepid explorer, whose partner is Gloucester's own 'Adventureman' Jamie McDonald, has previously cycled through all 50 US states and run the length of New Zealand, has been obsessed with running without shoes for a while now.

Anna McNuff has run more than 2,000 miles across Britain – in Anna McNuff has run more than 2,000 miles across Britain – in

If you couldn’t have guessed from the hair, bare feet and the scale and obscurity of her challenge, Anna McNuff is an extremely energetic human with a matching personality. Read everything you can get your hands on by Anna! And then look for the Adventure Man books her partner writes; he's just as warm and crazy! The book takes a look at the mysterious Tarahumara tribe who live in the Mexican canyons. They’re reputed to be the best distance runners in the world; in 1993, one of them, aged 57, came first in a prestigious 100-mile race wearing a toga and sandals! My favourite genre of books is outdoor adventure books. There’s just something about really getting lost in someone else’s adventure, its ups and downs and the scenery that they’re exploring.

She is an incredible person who finds other incredible people as she adventures and then writes about it (and them) all with humor, humility, whole hearted love, and the weirdest joy. I started with A Walk in the Woods (probably my favourite) and also polished off Notes From a Big Country, The Lost Continent and The Life and Times of The Thunderbolt Kid. The group are waiting for Anna McNuff. And they let out a huge cheer as the floppy pink hair and bare feet of the acclaimed outdoor adventurer bounds across the street to meet them.

Barefoot Britain: A running adventure like no other: 4 (Anna Barefoot Britain: A running adventure like no other: 4 (Anna

Whether you’re an armchair traveller or an outdoor enthusiast, these adventure books are sure to capture your imagination and take you on an unforgettable journey. The group come from all walks of life. Some drop off after a mile, Anna giving them a huge hug to send them on their way, some stay for five miles then head. By the time we near 10km the group has roughly halved. But it’s clear a lot of the group are there to go the whole hog with Anna on the 22 mile stage – and that I, regretfully, am not one of them. Much Better Adventure’s Stuart Kenny after running with Anna on Barefoot Britain. McNuff has completed a multitude of challenges, the smaller of which include running the length of Hadrian's Wall (86 miles) dressed as a Roman soldier, running the length of the Jurassic Coast (96 miles) dressed as a Dinosaur and rollerblading 100 miles around Amsterdam. I think now I’ve been through so many cycles of ups and downs now that I’m starting to roll with it a bit more. Being able to talk about tough days openly is not something that comes naturally to people. And often before I post something where I’m crying in a video I’ll have this barrier which wants me not to do it. It’s showing vulnerability. But then I realise that’s the only way you’re going to help people. Everybody feels like that. And I want to show people that I feel all the same things that they do.I wanted to do a run where I felt that level of terrified and excited and the thought popped into my head – ‘why don’t you do it in your bare feet’? Straight away another little voice said ‘that’s mad!’ And I thought, hang on – if I think it’s mad then maybe it’s a good idea?” Starting on the Right Foot And with that, and a trademark McNuff hug, I retire from the group and watch the 10-strong remaining runners head further south down the map of Britain. One is running in their barefeet, all the way to London. After two decades of racing, training, speaking, and touring, Jurek felt an urgent need to discover something new about himself. He embarked on a challenge to break the speed record for the Appalachian Trail.

Barefoot Britain: A Running Adventure Like No Other by Anna Barefoot Britain: A Running Adventure Like No Other by Anna

She started working in marketing and, conditioned by structured training programmes and organised competition, did an Ironman, some ultra runs and the Swedish swimrun race Ötillö. ‘But I realised what I really wanted to do was just GO,’ she says. In 2013 she cycled across every state in the US and one Canadian province – 11,000 miles over seven months. She has been running five days a week, sometimes marathon distance, sometimes shorter, along a route that’s enabled her to inspire in person as many of the UK’s almost half a million Girl Guides as possible. That’s meant treading on sheep poo and thistles in all of the UK’s National Parks, but also chewing gum and kebab wrappers in plenty of cities. She says she isn’t an evangelist for barefoot running – ‘You should run in whatever you’re comfortable in’ – but that was the element that changed the challenge from being tough but achievable into something genuinely scary.It’s not the most upbeat of novels but it is a fascinating read and a really interesting insight into one of the most disastrous years on Mt Everest. When we were travelling across the US in our van I read a lot of books by Bill Bryson. I’d read The Road to Little Dribblingwhen it first came out and loved it. If you want a humorous look into the UK from the eyes of a foreigner read it for sure! Whilst in the US I thought I’d read some of the books by Bryson based in the States. McNuff appeared on series 8 of CBBC's Operation Ouch - sharing her ‘brilliant body’ with Dr Ronx on an episode about barefoot running. Her Barefoot Britain run was also documented via a series of popular YouTube videos in 2019.