A thought came to mind after climbing at Smiths Beach yesterday, of reversing the situation from several weeks back. Climbing two days on the trot, but this time hitting Welly Dam on the second day. It is a bit cheeky for Howsie to head out on consecutive mornings, as it takes him away from his family. Nadia however gave him the go-ahead for a ‘quick fire session’. Similar to our before work trips. Heading out to pick him up, I stopped on the road out of Peppy Beach in darkness because a kangaroo sat on the road in front of the car:
Either not worried or dazzled by the full beams. I pondered whether to take an image, after all it is just a kangaroo and I see them so often when I drive out in the wee hours. Pondering too long and it lopped off to the verge allowing me to carry on. On Thursday as I drove to work I had a similar situation, not able to move to the other side of the road as a car was coming towards me. Seemingly unaware that I had come to a complete standstill the other car didn’t slow down, and just before it got to me the kangaroo hopped into its path:
With a broken body it was done for, but still alive. Having driven round these road for many years I am prepared for such situations and helped it on its way as humanely as possible. Having had to do it quite a few times, when people have hit and then left them suffering. Despite having driven at silly hours in these parts for decades, it has been an extremely rare occurrence for me to hit one. While at times collisions are unavoidable, it is a shame others do not take as much care. Apologies as that certainly took an unintentional dark turn:
It was my turn to take the first lead today, and the path of my chosen warm climb was blocked by a Cellar Spider (Pholcus phalangioides). Nothing that a bit of working round couldn’t overcome. After completing the climb and being lowered back down, Howsie declared it felt like a ‘pull the rope and lead everything day’, which is why there are draws above him in the second image. Half way up the route he felt like he may have made the wrong decision, when everything felt heavy. Maybe his body hadn’t fully recovered from Smiths Beach yet:
Being a quick fire session, we aimed to pack in six quick lines with not much recovery time in-between. Adding to why he may have also regretted our pre-arrival discussions about raising the bar just a wee bit, and jumping on a few of the lines we do not climb as often. This did not however stop him from encouraging me to take on a few of the climbs we had thought about. But was happy to have a rope above him on those. As I’ve said before it is swings and roundabouts when we head out. Today Howsie was the weary one, another day it’ll be my turn:
Sandbagged 