Parkrun Tourism Part 09 - 2025, March to July

All over the place. March to July 2025.

This year we managed 53 (Mark, A3228002) / 52 (Mary, A4975813) parkruns in 32 locations of which 27 were new to us, plus 5 countries of which 3 were new to us. That means over 50% touristing!

So much tourism this year I have broken this summary into chapters.

• Parkrun Tourism Part 09 - 2025, January to March. New Year's Day to our New Zealand trip
• Parkrun Tourism Part 09 - 2025, March to July. Up to my 100th venue
• Parkrun Tourism Part 09 - 2025, August to December. Up to the end of the year including Mary's 100 / 250
• Parkrun Tourism Part 09 - 2025, Epilogue. And in conclusion

March to July Tourism:

• Muncaster Castle
• Crosby
• Black Combe
• Leazes
• Milano Nord
• Fælledparken
• Amager Strandpark
• Southampton

Muncaster Castle 08/03/2025 28:35 [26 / 79].

We may still have been jet-lagged from our Australia / New Zealand trip but Saturday is #parkrunday so it was off to the gorgeous Muncaster Castle parkrun for an overnight stay and another one ticked off the Cumbria list. 

Mary chatted to a number of fellow tourists including Tammy who was celebrating her 100th location (aka Cowell) with her partner Lee. 

An undulating three lap course on a beautiful day with a castle and stunning views.  

Crosby 15/03/2025 30:17 [182 / 320].

In Liverpool for the Liverpool Blues Festival 2025. On #parkrunday rather than do the nearest one we took the Metro out to Crosby to do a unique one.

Firstly, it is one of a few on a beach and secondly it features Another Place by Anthony Gormley, a series of iron men embedded in the sand or looking out to sea. 

The first part of the course is out and back along the beach they use one of the iron men as a turnaround point. They have given him a high viz jacket a helmet and christened him Bing (Bing Crosby, *groan*). 

Afterwards we did the tourist thing, see: City Break - Liverpool 2025. 

Black Combe 22/03/2025 30:00 [24 / 29].

Parkrun with a difference: in a prison - at HMP Haverigg! You can't just turn up. You have to apply in advance and provide your details for checking. All tech has to be checked at the gatehouse. No phone, no smart watch, no GPS devices. It feels weird with nothing but a paper barcode. A perfect sunny day for a parkrun.

Five times round on tarmac, great crowd, very welcoming and lots of jollity.  It is now an open prison people taking part were both prisoners and guards with nothing to tell them apart. They were friendly and we got the impression they were simply pleased to see fresh faces. 

Weather also was kind to us, cool and sunny and the forecasted rain stayed away. You can see Black Combe Fell in the distance which gives the parkrun its name. 

We were with group of fellow Eden Runners plus Sandra, Mary's sister who came down from Scotland to join us.

A great experience and happy to say they let us out again!

Leazes 29/03/2025 29:26 [183 / 281].

We enjoyed Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake at Sadler’s Wells so much that when it went on tour we booked to see it again in Newcastle. When in Newcastle, obviously we do a parkrun! Following a recommendation from Tammy who we met at Muncaster Castle we decided to do Leazes parkrun as Town Moor was off due to the football celebrations. 

St James' Park stadium (home of Newcastle United) as the backdrop.

Lovely park, three laps of a course described as undulating. Another one designed by Escher but in a good way this time as there seemed to be more down than up!  Easy going on tarmac paths. Bigger crowd than normal - probably due to the football celebrations and Town Moor being off. They generally have around 150, this week nearly 300!

Mary volunteered as parkwalker. Her outfit was chosen to match the hi-viz but of course she should have been wearing her black and white set to blend in with the locals. 

Milano Nord 05/04/2025 28:53 [133 / 233].

We were in Milan for my participation in the Milan Marathon 2025 on the Sunday so had to do Milano Nord parkrun on the Saturday, a beautiful sunny day. Not a new event for us - we first visited about 2.5 years ago and nothing much has changed. 

Lots of Brits were in town for the marathon on the Sunday including a huge group of runners and supporters from Sittingbourne Striders. Also a couple from Poland who recognised us from Salento, congratulations to Maciej who did his 400th parkrun that day. 

We had a celebrity with us: Richard Whitehead (Paralympian) in Milan to do his 6th marathon out of 20 this year. He seemed like a lovely person - taking his time for a young boy who wanted to talk to him.

Mary volunteered as parkwalker and had a nice chat with Lisa from Australia who was there on holiday. . 

Fælledparken 29/05/2025 28:42 [252 / 307].

Off to Denmark for a City Break - Copenhagen. Every parkrun country has two special days when they can put on extra parkruns not on a Saturday. For all countries one is January 1st and the other is specific to the country. In the Nordic countries their special day is Ascension Day which is a Thursday in May. Our first Danish parkrun so a new flag for the t-shirt.

Three laps of the lovely, flat Fælledparken in Copenhagen. Unsurprisingly a huge crowd of tourists from all over, the RD thought they might have achieved record numbers today. Fantastic atmosphere, recognising some faces and meeting lots of new people. 

The small world that is parkrun tourism struck again. We met one couple, Collette and Nick, who recognised Mary's Salento t-shirt and told us they would be there in July. Heading off for our second breakfast we met a lad who did his first ever parkrun, after only about 3 hours sleep (suspect beer might have been involved), and was now hooked - kudos to him!  

Amager Strandpark 31/05/2025 29:04 [187 / 379].

The second Copenhagen parkrun was Amager Strandpark. We had always planned to go to this parkrun on Saturday as it was just a 15 minute walk from to our Home Exchange apartment. Just like Thursday, there were so many tourists that we had to queue to have our picture taken with the flag.

Lovely course, around a lake with views of the Øresund strait and the bridge over to Sweden in the distance. 

Large friendly crowd with many big groups who had travelled over for the special weekend. Lovely to recognise and greet new friends: Sue who we first met in Vienna plus Collette and Nick who we met two days before. 

With the parkrun starting with "A", Mary finally got her Namely, i.e attending a parkrun starting with every letter of your name.

Southampton 14/06/2025 29:03 [614 / 1126].

Back to the UK for a flying visit driven by seeing Elles Bailey supporting Rag'N'Bone Man in Southampton, see UK Road Trip, June 2025. The gig was on the Friday so parkrun the next morning.

It was my hundredth tourist location - a serious milestone in the parkrun tourism world known as a Cowell. I emailed the Run Director a couple of days prior and got a shout out and a round of applause.

It was the largest parkrun I have attended with 1,126 finishers, even bigger than Bushy. The multiple queues after the finish line to collect your finish token were so well organised that the results were within seconds of my Garmin watch time.

After that it was time to complete our road trip around the south coast then back to Italy for the next set of parkruns: Parkrun Tourism Part 09 - 2025, August to December.