What's next !! :-)

After all these adventure weekends I've been having you'll be wondering what was on last weekend's agenda.  Rock climbing?  Parachuting?  Walking over hot coals?  te he

Not quite.  Mike and I went to the Camperdown Cruise Rockabilly Festival.  What a load of fun it was too.  I loved seeing all the old cars, immaculately done up.  And the people that were walking around in full 50's garb of all ages, it was totally terrific.  Some say that this whole rockabilly thing is a way of life for some people, and I well believe it.

But a sedentary Saturday it was not.  I signed us up for an hour long Rockabilly Dance Lesson!  Wooo hooo.  I am in no doubt now why those ladies of the 50's had such tiny waists, there was a lot of hip action going on in the dancing.  Wow what a workout.  It was great fun, we laughed till we cried, we zigged when we should have zagged, we got our lefts mixed up with our rights, but finally ... FINALLY ... we were able to put all the segments learnt together for the whole dance that they taught us.  It was so much fun.

Strolling down the street admiring all the cars.  Yes, they really ARE Mike's sunglasses (he wasn't wearing them for dress ups), crazy man!

Some of the cars were just so pretty, who wouldn't love a pink and white two toned convertible?

Oh how I would buy this car for the seats alone.  Too cute.

Not to mention the swinging Elvis and fluffy dice!  :-)

I had a bit of a "red" thing going on.   Mike pulled me away quick smart when he saw me eyeing off the men's shoes for fear I would buy him a pair!!!

Another pretty pink car.  Clashed with my scarf but no matter!

Mike found a gal who wouldn't talk back!   Ha!

Lots of fun, a totally great day.  So next time you open the newspaper and read that there's a Rockabilly Festival coming to town, honestly, do yourself a favour and go.  It will definitely put a smile on your face and leave it there all day.

I may have been absent, but I haven't been a slacker

Sure, my lack of posts here and you may be thinking what on earth is she doing, just kicking back, relaxing, not doing much.

Not so. 

I TOOK ON A MOUNTAIN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That trek in the Otways the week before was a lead up to a mini milestone challenge a group of the 12wbt girls set and I was so in for the ride, for sure.  I'm ready to tackle anything at the moment, Mike is calling me an "event junkie" !!  I just love pushing my body to the limits right now, to the point of near exhaustion.  And each and every time my recovery time is getting quicker.  So that's a great thing.

And so it began.

Seven eager women met at Dunkeld last Sunday and onto the mountain we went.   Woah, up close they looked even bigger than I know them to be in my jaunts up to Halls Gap.  I don't mind telling you I was nervous.   The smile here on my face belied the fact my legs were already turning to jelly at the thought of the climb.  But I was full of bravado, all the while thinking I was older than probably all of these girls and Mike had put the thought into my head earlier on "know your limitations".  I know he believed I could do it, but I think he was worried that climbing a mountain was a bit beyond me.

Mr. Google says that Mount Abrupt has an elevation of 460 metres (and yet other websites say 815 metres, so who knows??), I think it's something to do with height/elevation/sea level.  The grade is listed as hard and it is marked as a strenuous climb.  I asked Casey (who arranged our gathering) as to why we chose Mount Abrupt over the other Mounts in the area and she told me "because it had the prettiest views"  Eeeeek.  And of course because if we're going to do a milestone challenge, we ought make it a good one.

One thing though that the 12WBT program has taught me is that I have no limitations.  I can do whatever I set my mind to do with determination and strength and sheer mindedness.  

So we set off and soon we were steadily rising and the heart rate was rising with it.  There were spots where the track was pretty good.  Hey this wasn't going to be so bad after all.  Right?

Then there were parts where the track, do I dare even call it a track? was a bit more strenuous.    It was a matter of pick a rock and step and hope it didn't wobble.

Then there were parts that the track was downright ridiculous!    It became a matter of hauling up a rock, grab onto a tree and hoist myself in parts and just pray I didn't tumble.  

There was a sense of feeling very miniscule against the mountain.  I love this photo of Alison and Delise waving to me.  I wonder at the time if they realised that there wasn't much under that overhang they were on!!!

And this just made me giggle, in a rocky clearing someone had decided it was a good place for a Stone Henge to take place.  Despite the wind I can't believe it balanced like that.  It teeter tottered in the wind, but didn't fall.  Crazy!

Alison turned around and took this photo of me a moment after I lost my balance and regained it again.  I must have been delirious, because I thought it was pretty darn funny that I could have rolly polly'ed all the way back down.

It's a funny climb Mount Abrupt, you have spectacular views of the neighbouring mounts, but not actually to the top of the one you are climbing.   I actually thought we were getting pretty close to the top, then round a bend and this view hits you.  HOW THE HECK AM I GOING TO GET UP THERE????  Those were the words that were ringing in my ears.  Are you freaking kidding me?!!?   THAT was the top?  I thought we were nearly there already!

But steady as she goes I kept plodding along, until this beautiful sight hit me.  WE WERE AT THE TOP!!!  We had made it.  So that neither of us were last, Alison and I who were bringing up the rear at that stage, stepped onto that final rock together.  Yahooooooo.  We were on top of the world.

And the view was magnificent.  The wind was strong, the air was cold, and I was elated.  I think I was flushed with achievement.  I wanted to jump up and down, but the wind was so strong I'd probably slip.  I soaked in the view all round, it was just beautiful. 

What a reward seeing how high we were up and that tiny snake of a road all the way down there where we had started from.  Words really can't describe the elation I was feeling.   I quickly took a photo with my phone camera and sent a message to Mike and Sonia (my bestie) ... "I DID IT!!!!".

I can't even describe how windy it was at the top, the photos really don't show it.  My feet enjoyed the view too!!  At this stage I was sitting down as the wind had gotten up and I swear the mountain was moving!!

One of the cameras were carefully placed on the ground and we got in for a group photo.  We were at the point at that stage that our fingers had started turning blue from the cold and it was time to head down.

Well heading down was a feat in itself.  It was a lot harder getting down than up.  Having to step and land on a rock and a few times my knees buckled from under me, once over balancing and my thigh hitting a tree trunk.  Ouch.   Must admit I did love my new walking boots, I am really going to make good use of them.

Beautiful wildflowers everywhere, tiny miniscule flowers, I only had my point & shoot camera, but made sure I took a few pics on the way down.

Oh and just to make this climb somewhat scary, these signs were placed in the perilous areas where the landslide of 2010 took place.  Trust me I didn't need to avoid stopping during heavy rain, I wouldn't have been up there in the first place!!  :-)

So for me, I went up and back (and a bit of time taking photos at the top) in 3 hours 16 minutes.  Not bad going.   What can I say, we girls became "Queen of the Mountain" last Sunday.   What a milestone.  

WE DID IT!!!

Our day in the Otways

Armed with new exercise friends and a plan to see four waterfalls in a day, I met up with Casey and Debbie at 8am and we set off on our mission.  You know, left to my own devices I probably wouldn't even bother, but with great like minded and new friends by my side, we are pushing ourselves to our limits and it is just amazing the things I have been achieving.

Well we didn't just see 4 waterfalls, we saw 4 and a bit (haha! you'll have to keep reading to see what I mean by that), covered about 20 KILOMETRES in walking for the whole day (yes you read that right!!), that's approx 12.5 miles for my overseas friends.  We really firmed up new friendships, laughed like I have never laughed before, pushed my body to it's limits and then pushed some more, seen some magical sights and had a wonderfully exhilarating day, which ended with me walking back in the door here at home at about 10.15pm.   Wow!  What a day.

First Stop Melba Falls ...

Absolutely beautiful scenery that we were walking through, huge tree ferns, and the air was so clear, there was also a fair bit of laughing going on. 

Our walking also involved a lot of the dreaded steps.

But soon enough we were rewarded with the view of the falls.

And the obligatory selfie we took at each stop.  We were looking pretty keen, pretty eager to keep going, the day was young!! 

Next stop - Little Aire Falls...

Onward we went, a lot more traipsing to get to these falls, with a muddy trail that Casey soon found out about when she went slipping!   But the falls were beautiful.

The day was warming up and we were still eager.  Yet another selfie.

Onward to Triplet Falls ...

This was a neat loop of another 2.5 kilometres, and as the name implies there's three parts to these falls, these are my best captures. 

And of course the selfie at Triplet!

I was feeling pretty great at this stage, holy heck, I was walking kilometres!  Looking a little bit hot and flustered, but I was keeping up with the girls as fast as these old knees would let me.

On to Hopetoun Falls ...

After a picnic lunch, which I might say tasted better than anything!!  I was starving!  and with Beauchamp Falls out of action due to unsafe trees, landslide conditions, we headed on to Hopetoun Falls, I thought this was one of the prettiest falls we'd seen. 

And again the selfie, I'm wondering now looking at it, were our smiles just kind of only half there at this stage.  Our smiles are not quite reaching our eyes, if you know what I mean.  I know I was feeling quite stonkered but willing to keep up with the girls.

So that was four waterfalls in a day.  But surely we could fit something else in.  We decided on popping into Maits Rest, which was a beautiful walk amongst the lush green rainforest type conditions.  It was a great relaxing walk after our hard climbs.  Talk about replenishing the souls, this place was magic!

That was it, we'd done it!  But the niggling feeling that we could go one more kept at us.  After popping into Cape Otway Lighthouse and finding out the exhorbitant price just to go and check out the lighthouse, we spotted a sign ... Rainbow Falls ... 5.5 km.   Should we round off the day with a final 5.5 km walk?  It did sound exotic, we imagined a huge waterfall with the sun hitting it just so that a rainbow would be formed.  The itch had to be scratched.

Rainbow falls to finish up ...

So we set off walking ... and walking ... and still walking.   This was a different type of walk, it was beachy, it was sandy, there were scrubby wind blown plants.  The path took us up along the cliff face with a magnificent view, but heck!  Where were the falls???

We had been walking for about an hour and a half, and ended up down the dunes into the beach below.

Still walking, we had come this far, by hook or by crook we were going to find these jolly falls.  Until we came to this.  

W.T.F ????   

Were these Rainbow Falls?  Are you kidding me?  About a foot high?

By this stage we were delirious, we took the obligatory selfie.  We were hot, we were bothered.  And to be honest crazed laughter was taking place.

And quite frankly we were thinking about the traipse back, not to mention the sand dune we were going to have to climb back up.  It was then we realised the 5.5 km to the "supposed" (cough cough) falls was not a round trip number.  We had walked 5.5 km there and now we had to talk 5.5 km back!!!!!!

I swear on that way back, our legs were going by autopilot.  We weren't talking, we were just concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other.  The disappointment for our last so called waterfall was huge.  I was actually numb from walking by now.  I don't know how Debbie was able to operate the accelerator on the drive home!

Heading home we were driving back down the Cape Otway Lighthouse Road around 7pm and came across the most magical sight.  We saw koalas EVERYWHERE.  We looked up into the trees and they were like fruit, perched on all the branches, climbing from branch to branch, up and down trees, wandering everywhere.   We stopped and got out and were amazed and quite thrilled.  After the disappointment of Rainbow Falls, this was magic.  This was the PERFECT end to the day.

It was only when this bad assed angry koala came stomping down the road toward us, with the most impressive grunt and growl, did we realise we still had enough energy in our legs to run when it rounded us up we flew around the other side of the car and got out of its way !!  

It soon got dark and we stopped in at Lavers Hill Pub on the way home wondering if we could get a coffee. I think the poor publican who was sitting outside took pity on us and told us to come next door, he turned the lights on and unlocked the general store and got the coffee machine going for us.   Ahhhh, a latte never tasted so good!  

All in all a terrific day, I can't thank Casey and Debbie enough for pushing me out of my comfort zone, getting me out and about, enjoying the fresh air, enjoying pushing my body, enjoying the beautiful vista of the Otways.  We smashed Sunday for sure!

And dare I say, only after we turned to our friend Mr. Google today, we realised they weren't Rainbow Falls after all !!  Hysterical.   We had to walk perhaps another 500 metres up the beach, you can see a small colouring in the base of the cliff in this photograph, well THAT was Rainbow Falls!

Un - freaking - believable !

My poor neglected blog

Shameful blogger, that's me.  Neglecting this blog while I'm getting on with life.  Go figure  :-)  

But there has been something quite noteworthy that has happened over the past while, which we are thrilled for both of them.  No date set as yet, but how exciting, I'm going to be a (step) mother of the bride!

Credits Designer Digitals.

So after my last mammoth achievement of the crater climb, and yes, it took probably just on a week to be able to walk without wincing, aye yay yay, the backs of my calves felt like they had tennis balls in them.  But here we are with another grand achievement next week, which I won't fill you in on yet, but lets just say the volcano is nothing compared to what we have planned.

However a couple of the girls thought we should work up to it, and so we are spending the day together tomorrow down at the Otways and seeking out four of the waterfalls and walking, trudging, hiking to them.  It is meant to fine up tomorrow, but after all the rain we've had recently, I just know it's going to be wet underfoot.

So ........ I went shopping this past week and bought these little beauties.   They feel amazing.  We have a gravel driveway and I can't even feel the gravel under my feet.

Not only do they feel good, but it's an even better feeling when you get a Gold Medal in Shopping!!!!  Ready for it ... they were down from $259 to $129.99 (if you bought them online), however I went into the store and got them for a cool $79.99.  But wait she cries, that's not all.   I had a $25 gift voucher from the store because Mike had recently bought a very expensive sleeping bag that warranted us receiving a voucher (note I say "US" and not "HE") !!  So that brought these little lovelies down to a neat $65.  Way to go, she wins the gold !  

Back tomorrow with photographs, hopefully.