A Bury-born author will see her book return home to Prestwich next month after it travelled around the UK for almost two years.
Eileen Jones, the author of "How parkrun changed our lives" handed her book to a couple of parkrun tourists in August 2021, at Fell Foot park, Windermere, in the Lake District.
The pair were instructed to sign and date the book with the parkrun location and then pass it on.
Two years on, the book is now expected to arrive where Eileen completed her first ever parkrun back in 2009- Heaton Park.
Eileen said: “It was last handed over in Aviemore in Scotland in January to a parkrunner Debbie Cope, who planned to take it back home with her to Devon.
“But she was touring Scotland in her campervan, so the book reached Bolberry Down parkrun near Salcombe on March 18.”
By chance, one of Eileen’s original relay team, Sue Martin, who had carried the book from Lichfield to Warwick, had already planned to come to Heaton Park and was also planning to visit Bolberry Down on Saturday, March 18.
Eileen said: “It’s just wonderful serendipity, I love the way that the parkrun community operates, networks and makes connections.
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“It will be fascinating to see all the places that the book has visited, probably over several thousand miles.”
The idea was set up in lockdown and 105 runners carried a copy over 330 miles in seven days from Fell Foot, Eileen’s home parkrun, to hand to the founder Paul Sinton-Hewitt in Bushy Park, London.
Each carrier of the book has since had to post details on a Facebook page and from messages on there, Eileen has tracked its progress.
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A second book has also been written, p is for parkrun: a journey from A to Z, which is to be launched on April 1 at the Heaton parkrun, near to where Eileen grew up.
She said: “I did wonder if it would be possible for the two books to meet, for the one on tour to find its way to Heaton.”
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The second book will be sent on a more targeted journey, in the hope that touring parkrunners will get it to visit the 25 main chapter-heading events of Eileen’s book, from Alexandra Palace in London to Zuiderpark in The Hague.
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