I should say, after i left the army i became a "gym nut" so the goals i set, my diet, etc i know how to change and how to increase as needed.
I just wanted somewhere to put out what i was doing, maybe to spur on some others who need it, mostly because if i have an audience who is watching my posts, i will spur myself on more and obtain my goals quicker.
Also with the weight carrying, it will go up as my weight decreases
for every kilo i lose i will put another in my pack. so i wont be putting any undue stress on myself as im already used to carrying that much weight.
Basically it always keeps my body training at this level, and the fitter i get the quicker i will walk so i am always turning up the exercise.
Once i can do sub 4 min miles then i will start to do short jogging intervals within my walks......and so on
My advice is to forget adding weight to your rucksack, your joints only have so many impacts in them when carrying heavy loads.
It also serves absolutely no purpose.
The effort level cardio vascular wise is hardly noticeable and walking even with a heavy backpack is not a good way of adding muscle (too many repetitions), all you're really doing is adding a LOT more stress to your knees and ankles.
Walking up stairs or up a hill would be a far far better solutions, less impact on your joints plus a better cardio workout.
Levels of exercise is always a tricking balance.
On one level walking or very low level activities does use our bodies fat as fuel, on the other though you use a LOT less calories than a high level cardio activity like say cycling or running.
The general thought is that 1lb of body fat is somewhere around 3500 calories, i.e, you burn around 3500 more calories than you take in you lose 1lb of fat.
It's not really that simple in reality but it does serve as a good visualisation.
Diets are tricky, apart from a few exceptions generally they simply don't work long term, the vast majority of people who diet actually end up gaining weight over a 3 year period.
There are obviously exceptions, but generally dieting alone doesn't work long term, think about it, if it did the entire population would be slim.
There is a train of thought that our metabolism adapts to a certain weight after 1 year and will try it's hardest to retain that weight.
There have been studies that show the calorie intake for a person to maintain say 12 stone after losing weight is less than if someone was 12 stone to begin with, simply because the body is trying to get back to the target weight.
So my advice is to forget about a diet, eat sensibly and just concentrate on getting fitter.
If you start to exercise AND diet your body will think that there is something wrong and actually hold onto fat (it's emergency energy supply) so it's worse than if you ate the same stuff before you started exercising.
Getting fitter has many many more advantages than dieting.
After hard exercise our bodies will burn more calories up to 2 days after, so it's not just while you're exercising.
If you're fitter your body will get more efficient at burning calories.
As you get fitter you build muscle mass which uses more calories
Then there are the million other health benefits of getting healthier.
So my advice is:
Start your exercise slow (exactly as you are doing)
Gradually increase the level and duration of your exercise, (very very gradually)
Try and throw in some low impact exercise like swimming and/or cycling
Forget about adding weight to your rucksack, it has a insignificant benefit yet will dramatically increase the risk of injury.
Don't diet, continue to eat what you're eating (as long as you are exercising) but start to eat more healthy foods.
Keep us updated and again, well done.
Cheers
Mark
haha! It's ok mods we are friends (until now!) 
