This will confuse Adrian. He’ll have no recollection of the opening image nor a few to follow. There are four orchids that are known to flower early, potentially popping up in March. Working from home on Friday meant an early finish and the chance to head into the Capel Nature Reserve to see what I might see. It was a bit toasty, being the hottest part of the day and after close to an hour I gave up. There was however a splash of colour with small shrubs called Pink Summer Starflower (Calytrix fraseri) brightening up the place:
The above is endemic to the south-west of Western Australia, whereas the below is not. The Golden Orb Weaving Spider (Nephila edulis) occurs in Cocos Keeling Islands, Papua New Guinea, New Caledonia, New Zealand and Australia. I kept looking forward and down as I continued my search. Fortunately the web of this spider is in excess of a meter across, and caught in the right light the silk glows a golden colour, so is easy to spot. Harmless as it is, I still didn’t fancy having a spider with a body up to 4cm long suddenly appearing on my face:
The name edulis is Latin for edible, which was given when in 1799 French biologist Jacques Labillardière observed native people eating this spider during his travels in New Caledonia. While not prepared to try this delicacy I was up for braving a plunge. Enticed by a seemingly calm ocean, I gave it a go a couple of times on Friday and Saturday going in with eyes wide open. There may have been no waves, but the distance the water swept up the beach was a tell-tale sign that the swell was still up. Surprisingly the clarity wasn’t however too bad:
Before jumping in for the second dive a pod of dolphins swam past, and I missed my chance to see them while in the water. There was very little else to see, and there were even very few fish. So quiet that I only took four images during the two dives, which has to be a record. Three of which were of this Striped Stingaree (Trygonoptera ovalis). By no means a new find, but in view of the season I’ve had I got pretty excited. Each time I come across a stingaree end up needing to again familiarise myself with the distinguishing features of each species:
This one has a few, including being pale along the midline and down the tail and rear of the disc being heavily fringed. I may not recall all the details of the orchids, marine creatures, and other finds I come across and write about, but do however have an uncannily good memory for the holds and gear required on routes. This came in handy on Sunday when Adrian, who has finally made it into the post, asked about the lines I pointed him to as we climbed at Wilyabrup. Admitting to me that he generally doesn’t like running it out too much on trad:
To be more precise it is more the uncertainty of knowing where the next gear will be. With the routes we picked he certainly showed he was happy to run it out, when he knew where the placements were. At times running it out in excess of six meters. However, once he had to move past that point, and where the route was hard to read, his head would start to play games and hold him back. Endeavoured to explain what to expect as he got higher, the height worked against us as it started to make communications that bit more tricky:
This resulted in him backing off a couple of the steeper routes and offering me the lead, after giving it several good attempts. When I went up and placed the gear, he would say ‘oh you meant there, I’ll lead this one next time’. While some people like to have more knowledge of what they are in for, I have previously seen Adrian jump on some solid routes he has no knowledge of without fear. So I personally felt the mind games that were plaguing him today had been heightened because he was a tad weary:
The slower pace resulted in us not packing the routes in. Neither of us were particularly concerned about that, and we both enjoyed the climbs we got on. With no one else about we had the pick of the crag. Joking that other people would turn up as we were walking out, which would be when the sun hits most of the walls and gets uncomfortably hot. And sure enough on our final line, as we climbed out with packs, other people started to appear. We tried to work out their logic and gave up, we simply couldn’t see it:
Sandbagged 