The night before, I left my car in Saffron Walden and caught the bus to Audley End station (~4km away - saving my legs!) and then caught the train to Southend-on-sea.
I set off at first light (just after 6am) from the Palace Hotel, right by Southend pier. Very runnable early sections along the promenade, eventually turning into a mix of muddy woods, country parks and fields for much of the remainder of the route when outside of the towns and villages the route passes through. The route was nice and undulating, but not really any challenging climbs. I walked most of them just to save my legs for the rest of the route.
I took a few wrong turns, mostly in towns when it's hard to spot footpath signs, but also a few times in the open when there were multiple paths to choose from in similar directions. Generally very easy to nav though, with the distinctive pink Saffron Trail signs.
I was lucky with the weather - the day before had been very strong winds and it had rained all night. The day I chose to run the route (Friday the 13th!) still had a strong westerly wind, which meant for most of the time it was a side wind for me. Not too cold either, with a forecast feels-like of 5 degrees C, I was comfortable in just a long-sleeved top (though had plenty of layers in my backpack).
The final 16km / 10 miles were by headtorch through Widdington, Newport, Wendens Ambo and into Saffron Walden.
I originally was going to do this self-supported and top up at the shops in Danbury (~42km from start), Chelmsford (~52km from start) and Newport (~8km from end) but I decided to go unsupported and carry enough food from the start - flapjacks, fruit, huel, nuts, sweets and gels - split into 2 bags, one for the first half and one for the second half. I topped up with 1l of water from the outside tap at Danbury church, at about the marathon-point from the start.
After finishing by Saffron Walden church, I walked back into town to reward myself with some chips and mushy peas - I'd been thinking about that all day!