Somewhere, out there, invisible, hidden in the seemingly impenetrable darkness, lies a monster.
I am struck by the thought that we have all paid good money to be woken at one am on a cold winter's night/morning, dragged out of warm sleeping bags to plunge in to this strange darkness. We can only see two to three metres ahead in the circles of light formed by our headlamps. Our guides try to keep us close together like processional caterpillars as they lead us over eight km of rough rocky mostly "up" track. We near the top of Mt Sonder at first light and within a few minutes, the sun bursts over the horizon. We have already redressed in all our layers of clothing removed during the exertion of the climb. I have seven layers on my body and two on my legs. The coffee poured warm from the guide's large thermos goes cold very quickly while I am taking photos.
Mt Sonder's pyramid shaped shadow falls across the plain and up in to the sky.
Oscar must love his job! (That is the 'villian' on the left in brown) What other 21 year old gets to drag people of their parents' age, out of bed before sunrise and order them to do things when they are half asleep? (I hear all you younger readers going "Pay back!! Mum and Dad!")
On the walk back down Mt Sonder, the guides allow us to spread out. We can now see the views we had missed out on during the ascent.
Walking down is a totally different experience to walking up. We can see the steep drop off the escarpment which we had walked along the edge of, in the darkness, totally unaware of its existence.
They say Mt Sonder, when viewed from a distance, looks like a pregnant woman lying down on her back. We had climbed all the way up her stomach to the top of her left breast. It is apparent that our guides have tricked up in to climbing her, by starting the walk in darkness. She is one tough lady and some of us would have chickened out if we'd been able to see her from the bottom.
But we all made it to the top, and completed the return trip in seven hours, apparently the fastest group Oscar has taken up her.
However, there was some serious nanny napping of the sandy beach of the Finke River, both before and after the sumptuous brunch cooked up for us by Shannon, Aran and Oscar.
I will admit that I too enjoyed a nap lying flat on my back on the sand, using my pack as a pillow, after soothing my feet with a paddle in the river. It was heavenly.
Bare feet in cold water on the sandy river bed was gave our feet the best massage.
Waiting for brunch - the full fried eggs, bacon, tomatoes, zucchini, mushrooms, crumpets and toast. It might have been lunch time, about one pm by this time, but who cares, best brunch ever!
Where is Ralph? We could always, always hear Ralph talking, non stop...except now - his batteries finally ran out and needed a recharge.
apple crumble
There was no late night partying for our last evening of the trip. Unlike on the first week's camping trip, when guide Annabelle had to be 'Mum' and tell us to go to bed, we were all too tired. It was all over by 8.30! It was a long day and we are not young!
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