Here’s some photo’s from before New Years of camping in Margaret River. 6 of us went down for a couple of nights after Christmas. The reason for the trip was to show Mandy’s sister Crystal around, who was over from the States for a couple of weeks over the Christmas New Year period.
I will do another post tomorrow of the New Years period, which saw us go to 3 music festivals/gigs in 4 days, great times, but I’m glad the silly season is over and I’m looking forward to getting some blood back in my alcohol system!
Enjoy the photos
OK, will get a post done tomorrow of photos of the New Year music gigs/festivals. Hope the New Year treating you all fine and dandy.
Aaahhhhhhh, what a beautiful day it is today! Today is one of those Perth blue skied days, its Tuesday morning, most people are at work, but I am not. But despite all this, the reason today is more beautiful than other days is because I don’t have to go for a run! Yep, no more running for me, no little voice in the back of your heading going ‘Hap you must go running now, if you don’t go now you have to go later, you have a 1/2 marathon coming up, no don’t sit down with your friends and relax, go for a run!‘. LEAVE ME ALONE ANNOYING LITTLE VOICE!
Yep Sunday signalled the beginning and end of my running career. It was about 5 weeks ago that good friend and fitness fanatic Ngaire suggested we do the Perth City to Surf Half Marathon, which for those of you that don’t know involves 21km of running fun.
I have only done one other 1/2 marathon and that was over 5 years ago at Outward Bound, and I have always wanted to have another shot at doing one, so there was no better time than the present, since I have semi “settled down”.
The last 5 weeks I have been doing my best to train, but its usually pretty hard when your at the mines, doing 12 hour shifts doesn’t leave much time (or daylight) to go for a decent run, although I did my best and ended up getting pretty fit. I also totally embraced the psychological form of preparation, (its just easier, and it doesn’t involve running). My goal was to get under 1hr30min, which was pretty ambitious, but I had a good feeling.
Anyway, race day came around, sickness and injuries had depleted our crew, Ngaire the ring leader guttingly for her had to pull out due to a virus. But there were still myself, Mandy, Stu and Sam (the evening before when we were coming back from climbing and I suggested to Sam he take Ngaires race pack and do it, he couldn’t think of any good excuses why not, so he did it – that’s the spirit!)
So where was I, oh yeah Race Day. Kick off, or what ever you call the start for a half marathon was at 7.15am. By this time I had already done number 2′s 3 times. I must have been nervous, why? I don’t know. What makes you more nervous is using a public toilet early on a Sunday morning with no lock on the door and 37,000 City to Surf participants converging on central Perth!
Long story short, well actually its not that long. I hated life for nearly an hour an a half, I crossed the line, continued to dry heave my guts up while concerned volunteers asked if I was OK “I”m OK……..I just need to find a place to die”. Then over the loud speaker booms the commentators voice “and about to cross the line is the second placed female competitor with a time of 1 hour and 27 minutes”. My first thought was, ‘if I had had a had a sex change before the race I could of picked up the womans 2nd place prize’ and my second thought was ‘wooooohooooo I got under a 1hour 30minutes’ and then I continued trying to give oral birth to my insides.
As I was walking to the booth to collect my complimentary water I bumped into a couple of older competitors. He says to me in good natured banter ”your the guy that past me on the last hill wearing jeans and dreadlocks” (I think he was just having a laugh that I didn’t really look like a runner). I had a bit of laugh, but it must be a little bit demoralising when you have the latest Nike running shoes, matching short shorts and singlet and spend your lunch breaks in on-line running chat rooms discussing your training program to have a dread-locked hippie run pass you in board-shorts and a t-shirt from his snowboard season in Canada a couple of years previous. Priceless.
OK, so basically its taken me 800 words to tell you that I did a 1/2 marathon in the weekend.
Nuthing but love Hap
PS All the other competitors our little team totally dominated and reached all their goals aswell, high fives!
PPS Just got the official results back, I placed 56th with a time of 1:26:33.
On my last R&R back in Perth there was a bit of a Shin Dig, a fancy dress party with the theme being Villians and super hero’s, there were some weird and wacky costumes, here’s a few photos, no doubt some of you will recognise some familiar faces, quite a few ex Otago Uni crew here.
Enjoy
PS I did not spend $25 on buying a suede male G-string for the party, I did not lie when buying the g-string and saying it was for someone else, and the mustache is fake
The Ozzie Outback, it really is a harsh environment. Especially coming from little Ol New Zealand, where all the animals are friendly (and yes Ozzies, the sheep are scared – hahaha). Overhere everything wants to eat you or inject poison into you, even the bloody sun wants to kill you.
Although this time of year it really is quite beautiful, blue skies welcome you every morning, the flies and rain have gone on holiday, where I don’t know, but they have gone and thats all that is important. But I wrote this post a couple of months back when the flies were abundant and never got around to posting it, so I will continue to moan about them.
So in the outback, the sun is not your friend, but rather your enemy, unless you are a solar panel. In previous posts I have told you that where I am located in Woodie Woodie, the closest town is Marble Bar which is the hottest place in Australia with the record of having 161 consecutive days over 37.8 degrees celcius! From fellow work mates you hear of the days where the temperatures get up to mid 50′s! All I know is that, its bloody hot when you turn on your COLD water tap and you burn your bloody hand with the water thats been basking in the pipes! (you only do that once)
Luckily for me I am built for the heat, some would say skinny, but I prefer the word, athletic. Working in the outback, it is always paramount that you have communication with base camp, but most importantly water! You never go anywhere without water, and all the exploration vehicles are kitted out with 50 litre emergency water tanks. Drinking water becomes a full-time job, a litre an hour is the recommended minimum, so when working a 12 hour day, thats 12 litres of water! And let me tell you, if your not working up a sweat, that can mean a lot of urinating!
The harsh sun leaves the not only the parched workers baked, but also the land, making it look like that pizza you forgot about in the oven. Just checkout these photos, I got a little artistic and carried away with these but they give a good idea of how aggressive this sun is.
Out here in the outback your patience is tested, if things aren’t trying to kill you, they are trying to annoy you. First there is Spinifex, a plant that I have talked about before. Spinifex and facial hair would have a lot in common (well not with my facial hair, the spnifex isn’t patchy). Girls love facial hair, makes a guy look more masculine, but when its there boyfriend that has it, they generally just complain about the itchyness. Same with spinifex, it looks great in a photo, but when you have to walk in it day in and day out, with it pricking you, it fast looses its appeal.
And probably the most annoying thing in the outback, Australians! hahaha, just having a go. Flies, my god, just look at the flies in the photos. At first they didn’t bother me, I thought it was mind over matter. But I have crumbled like a recovered alcoholic swallowing his mouthwash instead of spitting it. They are annoying, if you do not wear a fly net they have a tendancy to crawl into your eyes. And check out the photo i have of the cut on my leg, yes those 30 odd flies are drinking the blood from my cut like horses at a trough! Dam vermon, maybe they are hatching fly eggs and I’m going to start farting flies!
But really, I’m just complaining to be complaining, I love the outback, even those flying little flies, its a unique and beautiful place. I work in a sauna, and some people pay money to go to the sauna or pay extra to exercise in the hot with such gimmicks as “hot” yoga. All I know is that working in the outback is paradise compared to the finger freezing Canadain winters. But I will leave you with a little video to show you how the flies are and give you a little insight into the landscape of the beautiful Pilbara Outback.
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