I $@&%ing hate proteas. On the weekend past we (Adriaan and I) had to fight through forests of the stuff in order to hike from Botma's kop to Pieke. But more on that later.
This weekend was truly one of pushing the envelope. After working in extra hours during the week, I needed to work only half a day on Friday. In other words, I had half a day to spend on an activity that I've come to love, namely climbing. The first order of business was buying chalk. The reason why I mention this very ordinary and usually uninteresting activity is because earlier in the week I had attempted to buy chalk at the climbing wall at Perfect Health. However, they informed me that the container that holds the shipment of chalk had been lost at the docks and consequently they had no chalk and won't be getting any for the foreseeable future. Man, I love this country of ours. Fortunately, the outdoor shop at the Helshoogte shopping center still had a supply of chalk, so no worries.
After eating lunch, Adriaan and I headed for the climbing wall at Perfect Health. Upon reaching said establishment, we decided to utilise their bouldering room for our warm up. Here we learned that Boland bouldering league had used the room to hold a competition. Routes were marked on the walls, ranging from easy (grading 3) to insane (grading 9). So, we being the intrepid climbers, tried to do the routes. What followed was very humbling. I, for one, could not do even the easiest of routes. However, the shocker was when Adriaan also failed to do the easiest route. In the end, I contended myself by swinging like an ape from the roof of the bouldering room.
Our “warm-up” done, we put on our climbing gear, and proceeded to tackle the various routes on the main climbing wall. On the main wall, the difficulty of the top-rope routes range from grading 12 through to grading 24. On the previous occasion that we had climbed there, I had been able to climb a 18 easily (apart from having to use my head to press myself against the wall for support). But the gradings after that became increasingly frustrating because I just did not have the strength to utilise some of the grips. This time I started with a 16 and worked my way up from there; the idea being to gauge my climbing and skill progress by attempting to do increasingly difficult routes. I am happy to report that all the hours spent on the Neelsie climbing wall, practicing strength and endurance, has paid off. I climbed the 18 without having to use my head and scaled the various 19 and 20 routes without too much trouble. Unfortunately my run of good fortune ended with me hanging from my fingertips from an overhang, my left foot somewhere near my ear and me groaning: ”Oh no!” In my defense, attempting the 21 route after 4 hours of climbing, with fingers that have lost at least two layers of skin, may have been a bit ambitious. After having thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, we headed to the second floor of the gym, where we had heard there was another bouldering wall. Here we found the routes marked 1 and 2 used for the bouldering league competition. Frustratingly, I could not even do the route marked 1, but after a couple of tries, Adriaan did manage it. All in all, I enjoyed the day immensely and was looking forward to the following day with great expectation. Little was I to know (queue ominous music).
Nah, nothing as dramatic as all that. Saturday just proved to be a very...intense day. We started our hike at 08:00 and planned to scale Botma's Kop; and from there follow the ridge-line to Pieke. We had a bit of luck when some people passed us in their bakkie, and offered us a ride to the top of the plantation roads. Alarmingly, it only saved us about 10 minutes in hiking time, but the energy conservation was welcomed with open arms. Getting to the top of Botma's Kop did not take long and soon we were on the path to Pieke. However, this was about as much good luck as we were going to get for the a while. Soon we ran out of path; and then came the baboons. Earlier we had met some hikers, who warned us of a baboon on the pathway (note the singular). Fortunately, the baboons did not present much of a problem, since they kept moving away from us as we hiked along the ridge. The fun part came when we reached the first peak after Botma's Kop. We decided that we would attempt to hike around the peak, while the baboons were still on it, thus bypassing the pesky critters. The snag came when we had to find a path through a ?forest? of proteas. I call it a forest because I can't think of anything else to call a collection of plants that stand well above your head. At one point I climbed onto a rock and when I looked back, Adriaan was nowhere to be seen. All that I could see was the frenzied shaking of protea heads as he forced his way through the sea of plants. I was reminded of one of those horror movies where the people are in a corn field and they can't see jack squat; and all we as the viewer see is the corn being pushed around by the people and whatever is hunting them. Except this was the SA version, with @#$%@ing proteas. We did finally manage to bypass the baboons and continue on the next peak.
The whole experience with the proteas had left its mark on us. To reach Pieke, we either had to climb over every bloody peak along the route, or force our way through thick protea forests along the slopes of said peaks. We chose the peaks. The only problem is that if you have to jump from rock to rock to reach the top op a peak; and then repeat the process when descending on the other side, it kinda takes its toll on you. At one peak, we found a meteorologic station, marked as the property of the Union of South Africa. That's old man. At the station, we found a road that linked up with the forestry roads in the plantation far beneath us. Our good luck did not last however, soon we were faced with the choice of descending to the plantation roads below (and potentially facing a massive climb later in order to reach Pieke) or trying to find a path leading past Square Tower Peak. We chose the bundu bashing option. Sometimes I do wonder about...never mind. As it turned out, finding a route past Square Tower is not really viable, especially if one runs out of ground. This necessitated some rock climbing moves up the cliff sides of the peak; meaning that in the end we had to climb another peak (that is 1500m above sea level) on our road to Pieke.
By this time, I was getting worried. It was well past midday, we had no path to follow, Pieke was a long way off, I could see no way to get off the mountain (there were sheer cliffs on both sides) and I was running out of water. On the upside, we had a great view. There was nothing for it, we had to continue. At one point Adriaan had to resort to the method of saying: ”Let's just reach that peak”, in order to keep us moving. Happily, our fortunes did change when we reached the foot of the final climb up to Pieke. We found a hiking trail leading down, and after a bit of searching also found the route up. But by this time neither of us was in the mood to try and climb further, so by mutual consent, we set our feet on the path leading down. Silently I vowed not to be cowed by those majestic peaks come next Saturday. The path coming down from Pieke follows one very steep ravine, but I really did not care, we were going home. On the route back, fortune smiled once more. We found a stream and were able to replenish our much depleted water reserves. The route back did not take too long, although zig-zagging through the pine plantations is not that fun when your legs are rubbery. And to add insult to injury, we came down from the mountain somewhere near the SCAS camping grounds in Jonkershoek. Which meant we had a 5-6km hike back. Fortunately, a passing couple offered us a lift and we gratefully accepted.
Reaching home I collapsed in the lazyboy and promptly fell asleep. For about an hour, then I had to prepare for the guests that were coming to braai at my place. In the end, the braai was top notch, but the best part was that no one really wanted to stay late. And with the rain beating down hard, I also did not have to get up at 04:00 the next morning to go and do a 80km cycle race.
Sunday presented its usual plethora of activities. Although I did skip my usual 4km run before Frisbee, seeing as my shins still hurt. During the climbing session I managed to complete one of the routes that I've been struggling with for the last week. The downside was that I over-extended the muscles of my right arm, so notch up another injury to climbing. Frisbee was even more intense than usual. We ended up playing three on three, on a smaller field. Add to this the fact that the grass was wet and you have a recipe for some serious fun. But most impressive of all was Riana. I finally managed to convince her to come and play with us, and all I can say is that girl has got game. Respect (IA2 style).
Sunday ended with me once more collapsing into the lazyboy and praying that I would be able to walk the next day. I think I am going to take a rest week. No running or climbing...until Friday. Besides, I am gonna have to be in tip top shape if I want to survive this coming Saturday.
