Well another week has come and gone so time to update you on my weeks antics.
Work wise, as with most previous weeks, nothing much has been happening. I have spent a fair bit of time since being here doing more work on my masters thesis, getting in ready for publication and writing it up. Last week I finally finished my first draft!!! It has only been what, 8 months in the making. Well 8 months since I first submitted it for my masters anyway. So I sent it off to Alexey (my masters advisor) to proof read and am waiting for his corrections; I'm predicting there will be many! But still, the first hurdle has been jumped!
Work wise, as with most previous weeks, nothing much has been happening. I have spent a fair bit of time since being here doing more work on my masters thesis, getting in ready for publication and writing it up. Last week I finally finished my first draft!!! It has only been what, 8 months in the making. Well 8 months since I first submitted it for my masters anyway. So I sent it off to Alexey (my masters advisor) to proof read and am waiting for his corrections; I'm predicting there will be many! But still, the first hurdle has been jumped!
On another note, I also booked my trip to travel up the east coast to Fraser Island with Claire, Kerry and Sam! So you can be expecting lots of pictures from that trip!
Yesterday, Alejandro and I went back to Royal National Park. I know it was a Friday and I should have been at uni, but the weather forecast was much better for Friday (although it is really nice weather today) and I worked two days over the bank holiday weekend so that more than makes up for it...In my eyes anyway! This time, we planned on doing the "coast walk". This is a 26km walk which all websites suggest you take two days to complete. Having done ~24km last week, Alejandro decided that we could do it in one day. Website advise you only do this is you are a "fit and experienced walker"; I consider myself neither of those!
So we set off at 6.15 (after getting up at 5.30 - this was the second 5.30 start in a row as I had a conference call the preceding day!), caught a bus to central, a bus to Cronulla, and then a ferry to Bundeena, reaching Bundeena at 9.15, ready for the days walking to begin. Having done the first 5km last week, we paced through that section non-stop in order to save enough time to complete the rest before it got dark (since daylight saving, it is dark at 6pm!). After the first ~2/3 of the walk, we were making pretty good time but had about 3 hours left until dark, and the hardest third of the hike left. At this point though, I was absolutely shattered, my legs ached, my hips ached, my feet ached...the list goes on! This 2/3 mark was where they suggest you camp, recover, and rest for to complete the rest of the walk the next day. Well this was not an option for us, so off we went. This leg was very up and down, making it so much harder. As I was so shattered already, it was pretty slow going and I started to worry that we wouldn't make it to the end before night fall. At this point, we were deep in the depths of "palm forest", a pretty dense forest which apparently hosts pythons, so this was not a place I wanted to get trapped in if darkness did fall. We (well more I) plodded onwards, and eventually reached the edge of the forest, into much more open ground, and meaning it was only ~2km until the end. This gave me some motivation, and after 8 and a half hours walking, pretty much non-stop, we reached Otford, ready to catch the train back to Sydney. I don't think I have every been as tired as I was at the finish line; everything ached, I was grumpy, hungry and thirsty and just wanted to be at home. However, we achieved what is supposed to be only achieveable by the fit and experienced walkers giving me some sense of accomplishment! I will never being doing that type of distance again in one day though (at least not until we have longer days), I have learnt my lesson! Next trip....somewhere I don't have to walk for hours on end, perhaps Canberra!
As always, here are some pictures. After the 2/3 mark I took barely any photos; I lacked the energy and motivation to capture anything. Enjoy
Yesterday, Alejandro and I went back to Royal National Park. I know it was a Friday and I should have been at uni, but the weather forecast was much better for Friday (although it is really nice weather today) and I worked two days over the bank holiday weekend so that more than makes up for it...In my eyes anyway! This time, we planned on doing the "coast walk". This is a 26km walk which all websites suggest you take two days to complete. Having done ~24km last week, Alejandro decided that we could do it in one day. Website advise you only do this is you are a "fit and experienced walker"; I consider myself neither of those!
So we set off at 6.15 (after getting up at 5.30 - this was the second 5.30 start in a row as I had a conference call the preceding day!), caught a bus to central, a bus to Cronulla, and then a ferry to Bundeena, reaching Bundeena at 9.15, ready for the days walking to begin. Having done the first 5km last week, we paced through that section non-stop in order to save enough time to complete the rest before it got dark (since daylight saving, it is dark at 6pm!). After the first ~2/3 of the walk, we were making pretty good time but had about 3 hours left until dark, and the hardest third of the hike left. At this point though, I was absolutely shattered, my legs ached, my hips ached, my feet ached...the list goes on! This 2/3 mark was where they suggest you camp, recover, and rest for to complete the rest of the walk the next day. Well this was not an option for us, so off we went. This leg was very up and down, making it so much harder. As I was so shattered already, it was pretty slow going and I started to worry that we wouldn't make it to the end before night fall. At this point, we were deep in the depths of "palm forest", a pretty dense forest which apparently hosts pythons, so this was not a place I wanted to get trapped in if darkness did fall. We (well more I) plodded onwards, and eventually reached the edge of the forest, into much more open ground, and meaning it was only ~2km until the end. This gave me some motivation, and after 8 and a half hours walking, pretty much non-stop, we reached Otford, ready to catch the train back to Sydney. I don't think I have every been as tired as I was at the finish line; everything ached, I was grumpy, hungry and thirsty and just wanted to be at home. However, we achieved what is supposed to be only achieveable by the fit and experienced walkers giving me some sense of accomplishment! I will never being doing that type of distance again in one day though (at least not until we have longer days), I have learnt my lesson! Next trip....somewhere I don't have to walk for hours on end, perhaps Canberra!
As always, here are some pictures. After the 2/3 mark I took barely any photos; I lacked the energy and motivation to capture anything. Enjoy
The 26km walk to Bundeena!
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