First, a little disclaimer, you should feel no obligation to use any of this information. Realism does not equate to quality, and you should ask yourself “Does this meaningfully add to the story or themes I’m trying to tell” before incorporating any of the details explored here.
Background
This piece is an edited version of my Lessons Learned thought-dump I wrote after arriving home from a 5 day, 100 mile walk from the east coast of the UK to the west along a relatively hilly path. I consider myself relatively active, but don’t have any athletic background, and had performed little-to-no preparatory work for this hike – so I feel like I’m a good analogue for the level of fitness most characters we write. All experiences are subjective, and I would seek out expert advice should you intend to do any long distance walking.
1. Friction is Death
I performed a test walk of approximately 11 miles before starting the trail to see if there was anything else I’d need before leaving the city, and I had noticed the back of my heel could slip side-to-side inside my shoe, but given this wasn’t producing a blister or ‘hot spot’ I ignored it.
By the end of Day 1 and 26 miles, the maybe 5mm of movement that was possible had left a roughly 40x25mm blister on the back of my heel. Despite fixing the root cause by tying my shoes better (tight above the ankle, loose on the bridge of your feet), then covering the area in moleskin and eventually packing the back of my shoe up with gauze, I still finished the last 4 or so miles of the walk using my hiking poles as crutches because I could no longer put weight on my right foot.
I had similar, but lesser troubles with my backpack, with my first day having left two sores on my back just above the hips from where it had been swinging from side to side with each step. Fortunately tightening up the straps negated this, and these had healed up completely by the end of the journey.
Neither of these issues felt particularly prominent as they were occurring, with the aching in my legs being much more front of mind than the feeling of friction on my feet or back. In fact, it was only when I had trouble getting my shoe off that I realized I’d been developing a blister at all! The one saving grace is that despite my malpractice, I was able to stop the blister from bursting, which presents both an infection risk and would have continued to be painful for much longer.
Lesson Learned: Equipment should not move at all against the body whilst in motion. If it does, tighten it, if you can’t, replace it.
In the context of SOTF, I would like to draw your attention to specifically the duffel bags which often get used to store items by the students, which would almost certainly give you a gnarly blister after 10-15 miles of walking from front-to-back swing. Would make a great way to reinforce the thematic elements of someone who is hording resources to their own detriment or similar, with the literal weight of their ill-gotten gains actively injuring them! For everyone else, well, I hope you brought a big enough backpack to hold all your crap.
2. Know Your Terrain
When selecting my gear for this hike, I had done so with the many pictures of the wonderful meandering paths through fields and over grassy hills that populates all the tourist guides. This meant I went with ‘trail runner’ shoes that were breathable and had deep rubber treads, and lightly cushioned socks to keep as much friction with the ground as possible. Unfortunately, the reality of the path was that around 60% of it was through paved urban areas, or gravel covered country roads – which I had brought no suitable footwear for.
This didn’t result in any injuries, but it did make the whole experience significantly less pleasant experience than it needed to be, as the repeated impacts onto hard surfaces would become painful after a few hours.
Lesson Learned (A): Research the exact disposition of each day’s terrain in advance, rather than preparing for the expected average condition
Lesson Learned (B): Carry socks for all potential terrain to cover for any failures in research
In the context of SOTF, consider using footwear or other fashion choices which are unsuited to harsh travel as a metaphor for how your character themselves is unsuited to the island. Also, just a good way to punctuate your story with a bit of generic misery, foot pain when you have to keep walking is just the worst.
3. Use Your Whole Body
On what was mostly a whim, I decided to pick up a pair of cheap hiking sticks in Scotland before starting the hike. Little did I know that these would be both my most beloved piece of equipment, and practically the only reason I completed the hike.
From being able to use them to check if the mud I was about to step into was a half inch or half foot deep, to being able to use them as a chair after stretching some tarp over the top, they had a myriad of uses other than their intended purpose. But the real benefit was allowing me to use my arms and back to move, rather than putting the entirety of the strain on my poor leg muscles. The kinetic chain takes a bit of getting used to (it’s almost like crawling but standing up), but once you get it down it’s so much more efficient.
Lesson Learned: Walking sticks good! Bring them!
Don’t really have any way of making this into something relevant to SOTF. Hiking sticks as a weapon for V9 I guess??
4. Volume > Weight
The majority of the kit I brought to this hike was very selected with the principle of minimizing the weight I had to carry, which worked fairly well, however there was a major aspect I overlooked – volume. Everything fit into my bag neatly when I packed it the first time, but after the trials of the road, suddenly a lot of items weren’t as keen to fold away. Thankfully as I was staying in hotels, this didn’t cause a huge issue, but if I’d been out in the wild trying to stuff my clothes into as compact a package so I can shove my water on top I would have been miserable.
Lesson Learned: Pack to an around 2/3 or ¾ full pack
From an SOTF standpoint, again nothing hugely applicable, but do consider leaving resources in places if your characters are overloaded! It makes for fun scenes for the person trying to hide things in a safe spot, and even more fun scenes if another character snoops it out.
Conclusion
I don’t have a conclusion, really! Long distance walking is fun though, and y’all should consider it. People respect it like a marathon, but you don’t need to get nearly as tired to do it
" or "oh that looks like nice soft turf 
". Very basic stuff that has quite a considerable emotional impact when you are tired, feet hurt, etc.