Travel – Page 15 – Where is Phil now?

Another day, another country.

Day 271, Monday 01 October 2012 – Orange River, Namibia

Another belated post, I had intended to type on the truck as we went, but the roads are rough as anything and typing is impossible, even photo editing is not worth bothering with.

I can see why the other truck was in bed early, they were on the road before 6:00! Compared to them we had a leisurely wake up of 5:30, I was mildly hungover after that combination of beer, red and white wine and whisky. A lesson learnt nice and early on the trip though one forgotten way too much!

I had a walk around as the sun rose and took some photos of the mist over the small river on the farm. I have decided to switch back to shooting JPEG, I have been using raw for a while, but having to do everything in a bouncing truck with little battery life was going to be a pain, though of course I lose some of the detail – a tough choice.

Breakfast was cereal and fruit and I had a great hot shower before pulling down the tents, loading up the truck and getting on the road again.

Our first stop was at the gas station at Bitterfontein, there is a weaver bird colony living there which was cool and we all stopped to take photos. I am not really into birds, but it was a good lesson in shooting moving objects with the heavy 70-200mm lens. I was not overly happy with the results, but the weaver birds have cool nests, so am posting a shot anyway.

There were road works off and on all the way to the Namibian border.

Over the morning the terrain went from rolling farm land, through mountain desert areas which were very much like the Desert Road are in NZ’s North Island – accept huge, and into some very arid and rocky areas. It was great watching it all roll by though we were all staring out the windows waiting for our first glimpse of wildlife. We saw lots of cows and sheep and goats until finally just before lunch we saw a small heard of oryx in the Goegap nature reserve. Yay – we were all massively excited to see them. Though it was another lesson in safari photography as they were quite a way off and shooting with the 2x extender on the 70-200mm was difficult in a truck with people moving around. I am going to have getter better at holding the lens steady. I learnt that the oryx is one of the most dangerous creatures in southern Africa – even though it is only an antelope. People think they are safe but they are very territorial and will defend if they feel threatened, and those horns are huge.

There was this weird old quary site on the road side, from a distance it was hard to work out what it was, it looked like some alien fortress.

Lunch was in the nature park, it was hot and dry and quite beautiful, I have fallen in love with Quiver trees and took quite a few photos of these awesome trees.

I spotted this guy on a bathroom window.

The town of Springbok was few minutes drive away and we had to stop here to change vehicles. A recent South African law change means that foreign registered vehicles cannot transport clients over the border into Namibia, so we had to unload all our gear and jump into the Bundi Adventures van for the trip to Namibia and onto our camp at Bundi. The journey to the border took almost two hours and was pretty hot crammed into the van.

The border crossing was fairly straight forward, though it was interesting that at the SA border police post, after immigration we all had to hand in our passports to the police and then were told to leave the room leaving the van driver alone with the police. Not sure what happened there ! We did get our passports back though.

The last trip the guys did through the border everyone had to unload bags and were sniffer dogged and searched. We were all praying it was not going to happen to us – it was just too damn hot to be hanging about.

The border between SA and Namibia is the Orange River, named after the Dutch Prince William of Orange – not because the river is orange. The camp site was on the Namibian side of the border and not too far from the border crossing. The site was packed with loads of kids and families – it is the first day of school holidays in SA.

After unpacking the van, reloading the truck and putting up tents some of us took a quick dip in the river, it is perfectly safe to do so, no crocs or hippos this far south.

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We all walked up a small hill next to the campsite for a sunset photo shoot, Brett our tour guide, is also doing photography lessons as part of the tour and held the first one on top of the hill. It was interesting listening in and Brett is a good teacher. The countryside is very bleak as well as beautiful, on this side of the river.

After dinner we sat around for a while waiting for the large group of people starting a five day river safari in the morning to clear from the bar area so we could go and have a quite beer and access the very slow internet. I managed to get to read a couple of emails, but the connection died before I could reply to any.

Brett found a small scorpion on the bench seat and grabbed UV light to show us how the scorpions glow under UV. The picture is crap, but you get the idea!

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Brett is a wealth of knowledge about the local environment as well as the beasts and flora we are seeing on the journey, we are lucky to have such a great tour guide.

Day 1 on the road, leaving the city behind

Day 270, Sunday 30 September 2012 – Trawal, South Africa

A very belated post, written five days later from some scribbled notes and photos and totally un-proof read as well.

I was up early, breakfast at 7:30 and packed up and ready to meet the truck and load up at 8:30 . Will our driver was also there to meet us, and we were picking up Ibron, our cook, at the supermarket up the road.

It was very cold, long pants, jackets and beanies were the order of the day and the polyprop stayed on until lunch time.

The truck is a Scania named Malakai and has seen a few years service on the over landing route. Africa in Focus only put a maximum of sixteen on their tours (unlike some who fit thirty!) though there are only twelve on this trip, so plenty of room. We have a side locker on the outside of the truck that Leonie and I are sharing and we have a smaller foot locker for cameras and laptops that also has a safe inside for each pair of seats. A-i-F take security seriously which is great. It took us a few days to work out how things best work with all the various lockers though. As I was one of the last on I ended up with one of the front seats, which have the least leg room – not bad though.

It was a very excited group that got on the truck ( we are not allowed to call it a bus) and we were on the road for 9:00 – on time!

The first stop was Table View, a small bay just out of central Cape Town over looking Table Mountain. The cloud on the top is called the table cloth by the locals.

The next stop was Bayside Mall and supermarket where we picked up a few last minute items and we were on the road for Highlanders wine farm our stop at the end of the day.

As we left Cape Town I noticed a large amount of hitchhikers on the road side from single men to small family groups, this was a feature outside all the towns we passed. It is a hard life in southern Africa. We were soon out into the rolling farm land hills and the atmosphere in the truck was excitable as we left civilisation behind.

We stopped for a roadside lunch at 1;00 and all stood around working out what the process was for assisting Ibron at lunch time and where everything lived in the vast kitchen store on the back of the truck.

Cleanliness is taken as seriously as security and we have to spray a detol solution on our hands everytime we get into the truck. At food times we have to have a soap wash, dettol wash and rince before touching the food.

We stop every couple of hours for a toilet and stretch break, Brett (out tour leader) wants to make sure everyone is drinking plenty of water so encourages lots of breaks so no-one stops drinking. Once we get up into Namibia the air is hot and dry and dehydration can be a real issue.

We arrived at Highlanders wine farm in Trawal late afternoon and had a lesson putting up the tents, which is pretty straightforward. They are four person tents though we only had two per tent, which was pretty comfortable.

Once tents were up and shorts put on as it had warmed up significantly we went up to the bar area for a wine tasting with Sparky the farm owner.

The three people in the middle were with another tour, couple of them were kiwi’s with really thick kiwi accents, funny.

The wines were Ok, I really liked the vermouth though and Leonie bought me a bottle for my birthday. I am going to have to say no-one makes a Shiraz like the Aussie’s though this one wasn’t too bad. I bought a bottle of the pinotage to drink with dinner.

After dinner a few of us chatted around an open fire and had a whisky or two, before heading off to the tents for some sleep. There were two other groups at the site, one filled with noisy young people, I was expecting for them to be partying into the night, but they were all tucked down before we were…

I am pretty sure it was the first time I was sleeping in a tent since my Europe trip in the 80’s!

Cape Town

Days 268-269, Friday-Saturday, 28-29 September 2012 – Cape Town

Friday passed by on the plane to Dubai, I am sure at some stage Saturday arrived and sadly I wasn’t asleep when it did. I am pretty sure I dozed a couple of times on the six hour fifty flight across Europe and North Africa. The flight was pretty good, seat was comfortable and the food OK, drinks were available on request but I didn’t have many as I had a couple of reds at the airport and popped one of my Vietnamese valium before jumping on board. I watched The Avengers and Safe and the rest of the time I spent staring vacantly into space waiting for the flight to end.

Dubai airport is MASSIVE. It was a fifteen minute bus ride from the plane to the terminal and a twenty minute walk to the departure lounge for the flight to Cape Town. The flight was slightly delayed and again the aircraft was very full. I didn’t sleep at all over the nine hours and was seriously bored for a long time, for some reason I did not feel like reading now watching movies, but after six hours I finally managed to stare blankly at a screen until we arrived, pretty much on time, in Cape Town.

Wow- I am in Africa – a new continent and a new adventure is beginning.

I was met at the airport by Stuart, an English guy I had seen on the plane as Gary the hotel owner was out moving his car. Stuart – and as it turned out, all the guests of the small Bellevue Hotel were on the tour. The hotel is in Sea Point, about a thirty minute walk from the main part of Cape Town, there are a number of small cafes and bars along the street so Stuart and I walked up the road for a meal and a couple of beers. The food was cheap and the risotto I had was excellent. We met Simon, who has just completed the reverse trip I am doing coming down from Nairobi to Cape Town. He gave us a few insights in to the trip which was great.

Leonie, who I met in Vietnam at my friend Dan’s wedding and hung out with in Ho Chi Minh City, decided to do the tour as well and flew out from NZ at a similar time to me though she did not arrived until late in the evening – and without her bag, though fortunately that turned up in the morning. We said a quick hello and I retired back to my room for my last night in a real bed for a while.

Saturday was a slow start, breakfast at eight, loads of cereal, toast and coffee. The weather was pretty feral, quite cold with a strong wind blowing, though fortunately not actually raining.

Leonie and I walked in to the tourist Victoria and Albert waterfront area of Cape Town mostly along a sea wall. It was a surprisingly rugged piece of coast line given its location to down town. I managed to pick up a couple of desperately needed pairs of shorts and a camping shop and then we went for a walk around.

We were trying to get to Table Mountain but it was heavily clouded and it just did not see m like it was going to lift, so we decided to do a new first and catch an open topped tourist bus for a hop-on, hop-off tur of the city. It was cold up top !

Downtown Cape Town is not particularly attractive or interesting, it does remind me a lot of Auckland, Sea Point was like being in Henderson! Though we did go to the District six museum for a look around. District Six was one of the central city residential areas mainly populated by African and mix raced people. It was forcibly cleared over many years of the apartheid era, with residents being forced into less desirable locations. Sadly a lot of the places that were cleared and the houses destroyed are still vacant lots.

We caught the bus to the Table Mountain cable car, but the weather was still pretty foul so we decided to take a couple of photos and then jump on the bus back to Sea Point and have a drink at the hotel.

There was a pre-tour meeting at five pm and we got to meet the rest of the group as well as Brett our tour leader. There are five us doing the full six weeks. Dave and Nancy from Canada and Bill from New York. The rest of the crew are Inga and William from Aussie, Stuart, Jackie and Carol from the UK and Sanjeev and Vaishally from the US. Most of us are forty plus so it is a good balance of age and everyone has travelled before, some with vast and interesting experience. It should all be fun!

Gary’s (the hotellier) son Tristian, who had a real fascination with our cameras.

Seven of us went out for a nice dinner at a local bistro before an early night, it was good to spend some time with some of the other folk on the tour before we kicked off.

It was an early night, and a very excited Phil went to bed for a last sleep in a bed for a few days.

A wee stroll in the sun – in London !

Day 262, Saturday 22 September 2012 – London

A much better sleep was had last night and I took the opportunity to doze for a little bit before having breakie in bed and a session on Skype with a friend back in NZ.

It is a lovely day today and with rain forecasted for the rest of the week ahead I took the opportunity to head out for the day with the intention to see some of London’s parks and meet Elias, an old friend from my Richmond days in the mid-eighties.

I walked down to Dartford town centre, past the local – I will try it out before I leave 🙂

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And then strolled through the market, it was busy but uninspiring – maybe an unfair call on Dartford market as markets are not my thing anymore – I have seen too many! The highlight, which I did not take a photograph of, was a stall blasting out and selling reggae CD’s, in a seemingly white middle aged suburb it was rather incongruous – good luck to them!

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I took the train into London, I was going to pick up a tube to Tottenham Court Rd and check out some of the camera shops for some pricing for future reference. However, the line was closed from Charing Cross so I alighted there and went straight to Trafalgar Square – which was on the plan for the day anyway.

What wasn’t on the plan was the National Gallery – it should have been ! I really enjoyed my time walking though the gallery – sadly no photos allowed, but I did sneak a quickie of Leonardo De Vinci’s “The virgin and child with St Anne and St John the Baptist” from 1500.

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Wow ! I have never been a De Vinci as an “artist” fan (ignorance ), much preferring art from the turn of the 20th century. However this drawing blew me away, the detail was stunning and I just loved it. Definitely my favourite piece from the gallery; a massive call given some of the works there. Another big call is – I enjoyed this more than the Louvre, it is smaller and simpler, but it does have a different focus so unfair to compare I guess.

What did I like? Seurat’s “Bathers at Asniers” – I love that painting, awesome to see it in the flesh. It was also great to see some nice Signac, Pissaro and Monet. My favourite Manet – “Execution of Maximilian” was here along with Renoirs “Umbrellas”. I am not a huge Renoir fan, but really like Umbrellas’. It is the same with Van Gogh, I have never been overly excited by his art, I do like “Van Gogh’s Chair” and Flowers is here as well, though that painting is all a bit ho hum IMHO.

I had an unexpected good time at the gallery – and it was a 4 pound donation, rather than a massive entry fee- good on you London!

This chewed up a chunk of my wandering around time, so I stopped for a sandwich and coffee in the sun on Trafalgar Square than walked through Admiralty Arch.

Past the stature of James Cook.

Round to the back of Horseguards Parade.

Past Downing Street.

And on to Waterloo station to meet my old friend Elias. It was great to catch up with him, haven’t seen him since 1987 when I left England. We walked along the South Bank of the Thames for a couple of hours and chatted about our lives in the past 25 years. We headed over to Embankment and had a drink before wandering back to Waterloo so Elias could make his next appointment. I strolled back over the Thames.

And got the train back to Dartford.

It was a really good day, the gallery was fabulous, the walk refreshing and enjoyable and it was great to catch up with Elias, we will meet again when I return from Africa for sure.

Yay – Castles !

Day 261, Friday 21 September 2012 – Rochester

Comfortable as my bed is here I had an awful sleep and ended up not dragging myself reluctantly out until almost nine am. Pretty much when we left to go to the supermarket for the weekly shop. I picked up a few things for my Africa trip as well as a couple of bottles of cheap red to sup on over the week. Back at Jim’s I had a late breakfast, soon followed by lunch – I so love eating!

It was a nice day in Kent, cool but clear and I was keen to visit castles so Jim and I visited the town of Rochester a few miles away. I am reasonably sure I have never been there before, though I am sure mum will correct me if I am wrong!

The castle was started in Roman times and was built on extensively until Norman times in the early 11th century until it was involved in a series of sieges and rebuilds up until the early 14th century. Being quite close to London it was the scene of a number of minor historical events until it fell into disrepair late in the 18th century.

It is quite cool that it has not seen much restoration.

From the battlements there was a great view of Rochester Cathedral.

The old part of Rochester town was quite nice as well and well worth a visit. Jim and I stopped for a cup of coffee, or in my case a hot chocolate as I am not a coffee drinker in the afternoon (or it seemed to my complete ignorance in the morning ) .

I was deeply tired with a cracking headache and yawned my way back to Dartford and had to go and have a lie down when we got home.

I cooked a basic pasta meal for dinner and we watched a bit of TV before I went to bed.

it was nice to get out into the Kentish countryside.

Back to London

Days 258/260, Tuesday – Thursday 18-20 September 2012 – London and Dartford.

I was a wee bit jaded when I got up on Tuesday morning, another early start as I wanted to say goodbye to Mel and Richard before they went to work and I was on the 9:30 bus to London again. I did enjoy the coffee and bacon sandwich at the bus station before though and, as always, uneventful journey into Victoria bus station.

The good news is I am not feeling any ill effects from my run, I do not have any aches and pains and apart from running out of puff halfway up stairs with my pack on my back I almost feel like I could nip out for a run. I was expecting day two or three to be quite sore as it is usually the case after a decent run. It must be a sign I should have gone harder!

For the next two nights I am staying with a friend near London Bridge station in Borough – about two hundred metres from the Shard, the latest tallest building in London. I met Kevin at Dan and Van’s wedding in Da Nang, Vietnam way back in April, Kevin is an old friend of Dan’s and has been living in London for many years. I arranged to meet him at McDonalds which gave me a good excuse to trough a couple of chicken cheese burgers!

Kevin lives on the twelfth floor of a twenty storey tower block and the views over Tower Bridge are stunning, especially at night.

Kevin and I spent the afternoon catching up and then went round the corner to a local pub for a pint or three, it was quite cool out of the sun, but a glorious day to be sitting in a garden bar. This area of London has really gone up-market since I worked around here in the mid-1980’s, lots of young white collar workers striding home from work, young hipsters with beards on single speed bikes, in the pub there was an actor who I have seen recently on TV or in movie, but I could not place his name damnit!

Early evening Kevin and I caught the tube to his partner Phil’s place in Kensington. Kari, a young Norwegian woman they met in India a while back is staying the night and cooking dinner. It was a good night, Kari cooked a good risotto and talked almost non-stop the entire time, it was very hard to get a word in, a very passionate woman.

On Wednesday, after a monster lie in and a massive breakfast Kevin cooked, I went for a walk out along the Thames for a bit. I had intended to walk down to Greenwich and back up again, but did start to notice the effects of the run, no soreness – just tired legs. I also planned on going to visit the Tower of London, which is one of my favourite places in London so needed to save some leg for that as there can be a bit of walking involved.

So, that was what I did next. The new quarter between London and Tower Bridges is quite stunning, all new glass and chrome buildings, but tasteful and heaps of open space. I really liked it, plus of course they left the access to the river bank.

It cost 20 pounds to get into the Tower, outrageously expensive IMHO, but it is a great place to visit if you are into castles and the old English history of kings and queens and battles and plots, which of course I am.

I visited the white tower and its massive collection of arms and armour – I have fond childhood memories of walking round the armour.

And then the crown jewels, my memory of this is massive crowds – not so bad today!

And a general walk around the site for a couple of hours.

Needless to say, I really enjoyed the afternoon, though I was disturbed by the amount of people who voted yes to this!

After the Tower I took a slow walk back along the bank of the Thames and snapped a few shots of the Shard – I just cannot help it, it does dominate, but it is a stunning building.

I had dinner with Kevin and Phil in the flat and for a change watched a bit of TV.

Thursday was a not quite so long lie, but I still didn’t rush out of bed. Today was shot day and I was off to the London Travel Clinic, for what turned out to be two rather than one shot. I was expecting Yellow Fever but I also need a booster for hep A and B, those along with 100 anti-malaria tabs meant it was an expensive morning. But better than being really ill in Zambia I expect.

I took a short walk around Borough market before heading back to Kevin’s and saying my farewells before heading off to my uncle Jim’s house in Dartford. It was great to catch up with Kevin and Phil again, I will probably stay there again the night before I fly out to Africa as well.

Dartford is 35 minutes away by train, conveniently from London Bridge station so no faffing about catching tubes between stations. Both my parents are from Dartford and I have visited numerous times over the years and have pleasant memories of Jim’s. Jim lives in the house he was raised in and I haven’t been here since my nana passed away many years ago. All my stuff had been moved there from my other uncle and aunts house so I spent the afternoon and evening chatting to Jim and sorting my stuff – there is more than I remember!

Go ! 50 for 50

Days 255/256, Saturday/Sunday 15/16 September 2012, Axmouth and Bristol

It has finally arrived, the day I been both excited about and dreading in equal measures. It is 50for50 day, the day I plan to run 55.6km of the South West Coast Path from Budleigh-Salterton (B-S) in east Devon to West Bay in Dorset. This is the furthest I have ever run by a significant margin, though I will say up front there will be some walking!

As forecasted the weather was good, clear skies and not too hot throughout the day, though it definitely did get warm in the middle of the afternoon – as you will see in some of the photos.

It may surprise those who have witnessed me hoover down a massive cooked breakfast that I normally only have a couple of slices of toast in the mornings, even on run days, and today was no exception. Though I regretted this later in the day as I started running out of steam and didn’t feel like eating anything.

Garry has kindly offered to run with me, making sure I do not get lost and keeping me company on the way. I met Garry when he ran a few sections of Tom and Mal’s epic run of the whole South West Coast Path back in June. He is running mad, knows this section of the coast extremely well and is a top bloke. It was great to have him on the trail with me. Garry arrived at 7:00 and we bundled all our gear and food into Tom’s car, added Tom’s four year old son Finlay and set off for the thirty minute drive to B-S and the start line.

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Ah, I love running…

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Garry and I set off at 7:53 on the first leg, B-S to Sidmouth with the number one aim of finding some where to stop for a wee once we were clear of the car park.! The run to Sidmouth is 11.4 k and one I had done with Mal – though at least today we were not running in fog bound drizzle. It was a good section to start on as there are less of the steep ascents and descents that will feature later in the day -it certainly was not flat though. There was a 10km race here later on and the preparation work was under way as well left.

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Fin had some fun too !

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Taking a photo

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This photo!

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The day warmed quickly so the jackets were not on for long!

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I wish, it was still a long way to Beer and even further to beer.

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It took us 1;17 to get to Sidmouth, which I was very happy with and I was feeling pretty good, though had gone the usual cycle of niggles in ankles, knees and hips. Fortunately most of those went away as normal after forty or so minutes of warming up, however my right knee bugged me for most of the day – especially climbing some of the innumerable steps. This is one of the few times I was ahead of Garry.

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When I took my Camelbak off I noticed my jacket was missing from the back, crap ! I was very appreciative of Garry who volunteered to go back and see if he could find it. I reckon he really thought he had just been handed a good excuse to up the pace and get a decent run in, but luckily for me and sadly for him the jacket was not that far away ! After a ten minute stop to fuel and load up on more water we were off through Sidmouth

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Then into one of the more up and down sections of coast to Berry Barton, none of the climbs were massive, but there was a few of them and they were steep, not allowing a lot of easy running to happen. I wasn’t drinking enough on this leg given that it was quite warm now and this would make things a little unpleasant further into the day.

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We had another 10 minute stop on the hill tops and were off to Seaton. This was another hilly section of coast and I started to develop a small blister one of my toes, fortunately and band aid at Seaton was all it took to fix. This leg had us up “The stairway to Heaven” (not) steps

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And though the historic coastal town of Beer – had to take the photo of course.

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From Beer we had to take a small detour on the road as the cliff had fallen away and the path section was closed. The run along Seaton waterfront was nice though I was looking forward to a sit down and a snack. We arrived at the rest stop after just over four hours on the road. A little bit behind schedule but I was still feeling OK.

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The “Under cliff” leg to Lyme Regis was tough, not so much of the heavy climbing, but a long section of small pinches on some lovely single track which I would normally have enjoyed. There was not much to see as we were enclosed for most of the section and I think this impacted on my moral a bit as i could not see progress. I really struggled through here, had a bad headache and was quite nauseous – I think this was dehydration related, and my left hip started seizing up as well. We stopped for a break at the approximate half way and I popped a couple of pain killers. I was not looking my finest !

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Through here I moved into the longest run ever territory, going past 5:01 which was my previous longest from the Kauri Classic event last October. I was pretty low for a while and was glad for Garrys company and the occasional gee up on pace. Dropping down into Lyme was a relief.

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I had a few slugs of ginger beer and a small bag of chips (crisps) and almost immediately started feeling better. The first section of the approx 12k to Seatown was along the waterfront and then rock hopping across the beach and it was nice to ease into a section that includes the highest point on the coast, the 191 metre Golden Cap. I was surprised at how many people were at Lyme, and a wee bit frustrated at the foot traffic !

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There was a couple of “lumps” to climb before Golden Cap.

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By the time we got there I was feeling it, I was Ok walking up the grass sections, but the steps at the top were hard work. In fact I had been struggling with the steps for a while, they are very uneven and it was hard to maintain a rhythm going up them, the grass was so much easier, head down, “one foot in front of the other” mantra going in my head and the climbs were “easy”!

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The run down the other side of Golden Cap saw into the small hamlet of Seatown – and according to my internet research this was 50km, but not the end, I wanted to nudge a bit further into West Bay to make doubly sure I had covered a full 50k. We arrived in seatown after just over eight and half hours on the road and I was feeling a lot better. Tired but good.

Naturally the last leg, about 5k to West Bay, started with a climb!

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And of course there was another one in it ! but I was still running the flats and descents and Garry knew of a couple of sections of trail that by-passed the steeper uphill and downhill sections, with one of these being one my favourite sections on the pass, a nice long gradual downhill bit of single track – or maybe it was just close to the end ! About 500 metres from the finish I started getting a lot of pain in the tendons on the bag of my left knee, it only hurt on the downhill and I was glad when there was a final small climb just before the end !

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And then it was done !!!

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55.6km ! and I was still running, albeit slowly, at the end. It took me 9.5 hours which was more than I really really wanted but inside my 10 hour guesstimate. I was immensely happy to sit down, knowing I did not have to get up again -and even happier when Tom gave me a can of beer 🙂

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It was a great run and I am sure I could have done more if my knee was not tender, though that went away within an hour.

We drove back to Toms for a shower and a rest before Tom’s parents Shiela and Richard joined us for dinner. I spent a bit of time with Shiela during the coast path run as she was supporting Tom as I was supporting Mal, so it was really good to see them again. Dinner was great and I certainly enjoyed a couple of red wines in celebration.

Sunday morning was a slow start, I had slept much better than expected and apart from a bit of tightness going down the stairs I felt pretty good – remarkably so really. After breakfast Tom took me back into Seaton so I could get the bus to Exeter and then on to Bristol.

I really appreciated staying at Tom and Tash’s place, the big day Tom took out to support me on the run and having Garry along with me on the way. When I first decided to do this I was planning on just doing it solo, stopping at shops on the way for food and water – but I would not have made it. Goal achieved due to the fantastic help of friends in the global trail running community.

The buses to Bristol were a none event, at Exeter I had planned on going to Maccas for lunch but once I through my pack on when I got off the bus with seized up legs i could barely walk, I had coffee and chips in the bus station instead.

I walked to Mel’s place as I couldn’t find a cab, so was knackered when I got there and relieved to basically sit down and not move much for the rest of the day. Richard had made a great lunch and we all sat around eating and drinking tea/coffee and beer till the early evening when we sat around drank beer, ate pizza and watched The Hunger Games, an excellent post run day.

Mal – Thanks for the idea, it was a great one and I am so pleased I celebrated my 50th by doing a 50+km run. And secondly, I now know about bleeding hydration pack bladders….. I have used them for about 12 years and never knew to bleed them, next time !

Another big day tomorrow !

2, 1….

Days 253/254, Thursday/Friday 13/14 September 2012, Exeter and Axmouth

I woke up with ringing ear drums and a need for some food. The room came with breakfast, but sadly not a large “Full English”, but muesli and toast seemed to fill the gap. I ordered a taxi for 10:45 and hung around in my room, editing photos from the night before. Naturally the taxi never showed so I started walking towards Brighton Pier in the hope I would find a taxi to take me to the station as I had left it too late to walk – and really I had no idea where it was! I am glad I did as when I did eventually get a cab the station was further away than I thought and I got there with ten minutes to spare before the train left.

When I booked the train to Exeter which is on the same bit of coast as Brighton I expected a scenic route through all the coastal towns – how wrong was I, this train went all the way in Clapham Junction in south London, where I changed and then all the way back out to the coast. Apparently there are no trains across the south coast, oh well ! both train rides were fine, we left on time, the seats and carriages were comfortable and they sold coffee and snacks, I for one have no complaints so far about the standard of the trains – just the price, this was expensive.

I arrived in Exeter in the mid-afternoon and thanks to Google Maps found my hotel, The Georgian Lodge quite easily. I had chosen one that was walking distance to both the bus and train stations.

I had a wee walk around Exeter, down past the old city walls to the River Exe, past the Quay and back up to the cathedral and castle areas before stopping for a pasta meal and a wine that was way too expensive – OK I had dessert as well : The light sucked for photography, overcast and quite glary so I didn’t take many photos.

Friday morning I was up at a reasonable hour for a far better breakfast than Brighton, eggs, bacon, beans and hash browns -YUMBO ! coffee sucked mind : I left the hotel at kicking out time-10:30 but left my backpack there as the bus to Seaton was not until 2:45. The day was flat overcast again so I was not really feeling like wandering and photographing, and to be honest , Exeter was not overly exciting from a photographic perspective. I did walk the past the county prison.

And paid a visit to the cathedral, which was interesting.

I really liked the fact that a lot of the carvings on the outside of the cathedral have been left alone and not repaired, I guess they will all be done in time though.

The roof is the longest vault in the UK and was completed in the early 1300s.

The clock was first installed in the 1400s with the final look being completed in the 1700s, it is supposed to be the clock from the nursery rhyme ‘hickory dickory dock”.

I loved all the hand knitted prayer stool covers under all the seats, a real labour of love.

After the cathedral I wandered down to the remains of the old Roman bridge, the river has moved about a hundred metres in the last couple of thousand years!

After lunch I visited the Exeter museum, which was full of children so I ran away !

Before heading up to the bus station for the hour long ride to Seaton.

I spent thirty minutes in Seaton Tescos buying food and drink for the big day tomorrow (gulp!) before Tom came and picked me up and we went to his place in the hamlet of Axmouth about five minutes away by car.

Tom and his wife Tash have kindly offered to put me up for the two nights before and after my big run 50km run tomorrow. Tom is also going to drive a car round and support me on the run which is just fabbo. I had a good evening with Tom and Tash and the kids, great home made pizza and an early night…

Tomorrow tomorrow, nervous as heck !

Brighton

Day 252, Wednesday 12 September 2012 – Brighton

I am using another laptop this week and thought the last blog post I was writing in MS Word had been saved to Dropbox but it hadn’t, so missing a post, for now anyway. Not that it was particularly exciting of course, but for the sake of my records I will post it later.

Another highlight of my birthday week; heading to Brighton to see (and hopefully photograph) my current favourite band, New Yorkers (by way of Auckland for the bass player) A place to bury strangers.

It seems that going anywhere in the southern part of the UK by public transport means a trip through one of the main transport hubs in London, and the ride from Brentwood to Brighton was no exception. The bus I was taking left Brentwood at 9:45 and went all the way into central London to Victoria bus station before heading back out again to the coast – not that I was in any particular rush, just needing to be there before the gig tonight.

The journey was OK, a wee bit tedious, though it is always good to see a bit more of the English countryside. The bus got us to Brighton on time in the early afternoon. It was sunny but with a very strong wind – which was naturally a head wind for the longer than anticipated walk along the water front to my hotel for the night – the Brunswick Square Hotel, which funnily enough was on Brunswick Square.

I decided to mooch for a while and leave the hotel a couple of hours before the doors opened and do my waterfront sightseeing on the way. I am conscious that I have a massive run in four days time and I need to be doing some decent resting rather than hours of sightseeing. Naturally while I rested the weather turned to crap 🙂

The cloudy and windy skies made for quite a good walk along the front, at least I got some decent photos – I was getting sick of all those clear blue skies in Spain ! As I was going to a gig I decided to take the big Canon rather than the little Panasonic GF1 I have been using. I am so glad I did, I love that Canon and I think it loves me back, I was pretty happy with the images I got this afternoon, though it is a lot more to lug around than the GF1!

The hotel is probably a mile up the road from Brighton Pier and it is a pretty good walk from a photographic perspective, I should probably have taken a bit more time than I did, but I wanted to eat before the show and with doors opening at 7:30 I couldn’t muck around too much.

The Pier is an interesting beast, so typically English, I don’t think there is any other country in the world who could do this as well, I arrived too late to see any fun fairaction but I did like the almost closed feel to it as well.

Helter Skelter – I am not sure if I have ever seen one of these in New Zealand!

And a double rainbow !

I had pizza and a couple of reds at a local Italian restaurant before heading up to Komedia Brighton to see what was happening at the A place to bury strangers (APTBS) gig. I wanted to see if there was a support act – there was a band called Sealings, what time the bands came on – and most importantly, if I could take my camera in- I could – Yes !

I went to a local bar and had a drink before heading back to the venue for 8:00 just before Sealings came on. The venue is pretty cool, small, low ceiling, good size bar and good view of the low stage, it would be a favourite if I lived here. Sealings were pretty good, a young trio – made a lot of noise, which is always good. The lighting was very dim with most of it being back lit, a nightmare to photo and not having shot a band for a while it took a bit of experimentation to get back into the groove, though I was happyish with the results.

APTBS came on about 9:30 – I love noise restrictions ! they played for an hour or so and were pretty loud, though not as bad as I expected. They were also fabulously awesome, playing most of my favourites, with a good chunk from Exploding Head, definitely my favourite album, with a searing version of “I lived my life to stand in the shadow of your heart” which is such an awesome track. The whole show was lit from the back and side of the stage and mostly by strobes, it was a brutal to shoot, a lot of the shots I did get were shooting bursts and hoping to get exposure and timing to coincide. I was also shooting wide open and at max ISO so it was never going to be pretty, especially as Dion (bass ) and Oliver (guitar) barely stood still for half a second the whole show.

I will post some more gig shots in another post.

It was a good night 🙂

Siete Lagunas

Day 216, Tuesday 07 August 2012 – Trevelez

Noisy night in Trevelez, I think Spain must be the noisiest country I have visited ! I am staying on the first floor of La Fragua, a one star hotel that is better than half the three stars I have stayed in, but I am street side. The people down and along were still going at 6:00, just chatting, but in these narrow streets noise travels. The hotel owner started at 6:30 – so noise all night. I did have a solid sleep for an hour until 8:00 though !

I was not rushing again today, breakfast was not being served until 8:30 and I had a big walk planned so wanted to eat well, and what a breakfast. Cereal, toast, ham, cheese, yogurt – best free breakie in Europe so far, I couldn’t finish it either.

My plan for the day was to walk to the Siete Lagunas (Seven Lakes) a glacial lake 600 metres below Mulhacen, the high point of the Sierra Nevada range. As you can see, it is only 8km away but with 1400m of vertical gain the walk up is not going to be dead easy – and nor will the run down. I decided not to take my camera today and just used the cell phone for piccies.

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The first km was pretty much all up hill, quite steep in places and very rocky, definitely a walk and not a climb, but a steep walk. I passed a small herd of a goats on the way, I could hear them tinkling away for ages before I saw them – sadly straight into the sun.

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The view back down to Trevelez

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Yay – flat bits, well flatish !

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I had been wondering what sort of pace I was making, the walk is supposed to take between 6 and 8 hours – a long time for a mere 6km, I know, but I was expecting to take about 5, which conveniently had me back in town for lunch at 2:00 ! I had kinda guessed I was doing between 3 and 4 km an hour and arrived at this sign almost exactly on one hour.

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I reached my first rest stop at the refuge at La Campinuela after almost 2 hours and stopped for a muesli bar and sun block session, there was a group of walkers leaving as I arrived and I would pass them fairly quickly – they were damn slow. I saw a few people on the walk, I had been a little concerned about mountain walking on my own, but there were enough people around to not be worried once I was on the trail.

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This really pisses me off !!!! I mean it was ok to carry it when it was full and weighed 1.5 kilos, now it is empty and weighs nothing it is a hassle !!! Grrrrrrrr. But no, I didnt pick it up either, there is no bottle carrier on my Camelbak and I wasnt going to carry it.

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The view to the top.

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The last 100 metres were really steep and the surface was really loose, I hate this stuff, I seriously considered turning round and not going all the way up, but fought my vertigo and took it slowly, stopping to get my bearings along the way. I am really glad I did as the top was really nice, well it is not really the top, the top is up there, were the patch of ice is ! but the lake and the cows of Sieta Lagunas were pretty cool.

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I had a wee snack and realised I was close to running out of water, before making my way to the edge and heading back, slowly, down the shale bank. The three black dots in the middle are people coming up, they had walking poles and finally they made sense !

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Soon enough I was back on single track and just ran for a while. Loved it !!

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Though I had a bit of trouble with my walking shorts being too lose and ended up running for a while holding them up – the price you pay for losing weight – a happy price of course 🙂
I ran most of the way back down, but some of the sections were really sketchy and I was not in any rush, just enjoying myself. I was very cautious, with what I have planned in 6 weeks I could not afford to injure myself now, and to be honest breaking an ankle at 2500m in the mountains of southern Spain was probably not going to be a good idea anyway !

It took me under half the time to get back down to Trevelez and the whole trip to took 4 hours 15. It was a blast too. Beautiful mountain scenery and great walking.

Back in my room I spent ten minutes lying on the floor next to the open balcony doors enjoying a cool breeze before showering and washing clothes and then heading back to last nights restaurant for lunch. I had the Spanish big breakfast and it was big and awesome : )

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After lunch I read for a while in the cafe over a glass of red and then retired to the hotel for the rest of the day, dinner was a pack of biscuits and another red or three. I had eaten enough today and couldn’t be bothered going out again. Finally some good track and field on TV as well.

The highlight post lunch was working out how to connect my Windows 7 laptop to an unsecured wireless network – internet yes !!!!