Hey all,
Well, not to sound monotonous or anything, but today was particularly difficult – straight up all morning, then straight down all afternoon. It is supposed to take about 6 hours – and is about as many kilometres, which will give you some idea of the gradient. A lot of sections on flat sloping granite slabs with chains attached to them – in the wet this would would be very tricky indeed. Woke up this morning and nearly had a rest day, but then decided to push on and get this day done, have a rest tonight where there is not only a refuge but a ski lodge with hot showers and a restaurant and, with any luck, net access. My legs are pretty much done – they need a day I think for the muscles to build – the other problem I have got is that because the ACL in my right knee is stuffed, I unconsciously compensate for it by over-using the left – which is starting to hurt, and not in a good muscle-pain kind of way.
All of that said, today was not as non-stop relentless as yesterday – I was cactus towards the end, but managed my water a bit better and did not spend the last hour in a dehydrated state of panic.
Set up my camp at the refuge, booked in for a meal, then booked in for a room tomorrow night – plan to sleep in tomorrow morning, spend a couple of hours reading in the hammock, then transition to the hotel in the afternoon. Had a nice dinner with the Australian/Kiwi couple and the Spanish dude – they are off tomorrow – the Spanish guy seems to be holding up okay but the feet of the couple are really awful – I would be reluctant to walk across the room with blisters and raw meat on my toes like that.
One of the other reasons that today was a bit easier I think is that I spent the day walking with an Irish bloke – he just lost his job so is over here for a couple of weeks doing this walk, then back to the wife and looking for work – nice guy, and slowed up for me quite a bit because he is naturally quicker – makes life a lot easier when you are with someone – he took a bit of a tumble and was spouting blood on one leg, but it was not too bad once cleaned up, so long as he does not come out in bruises tomorrow.
Dinner – 5 courses for 18EU – was just fantastic. And I finally found the nice English couple, who had doubled stages – that is, what I did yesterday, they finished by about 1AM – then they did what I did today in the afternoon. Astonishing. Today they had a rest day in the hotel and for something to do, climbed the highest mountain on the island for kicks during their day off. Again, they are in their 60s.
Photos: Me, crossing a suspension bridge. The same bridge about 10 minutes later, from above. The Irish dude on a typical bit of track, looking happier than I was feeling. A couple of wild antelope/goat things – I forget their proper name. The view from near the top. Then one showing the track up to the actual top. You can't see them at this resolution, but there are two guys up there – I took this shot to give some sense of scale, but unfortunately the scale is so insane you can't actually see the people – if you zoom in you will see I have added a circle – the two little blotches in the middle of that are human beings.
Cheers, B.
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