Tuesday 28 February 2012

Anya and I volunteered to go collect seeds this morning. This involves a 2 ½ hour trek up to and past the second campsite, following a hand-drawn map (not to scale!) of where to go to collect any seeds or young plants. Along the way we were to spot previously labelled numbered signs and note any fruits and flowers there on a clipboard.

We set off late as Joel, the fashion photographer, did not come prepared with water, rain gear (except an umbrella for his camera equipment) or insect repellent as he had not been aware of how big the hike was. It meant that it was certainty we would be back late for lunch (working hours in the morning is from 8:30 to 12:00; lunch is at 12:30).

We were not able to keep to the timescale to reach 2nd campsite (this being the only other time in 6 weeks that Anya and I had ever been to 2nd campsite, with about 3 - 4 weeks' gap, and made it to second campsite by about 11-ish, which gave us very little time to scout around for seeds or plants. It didn't help that we hadn't spotted any numbered signs except for the one (numbered 16) that Joel tripped over: it was not upright and had fallen over. Even the clearing in which this sign was (labelled "big clearing" on map with "large tree", around which there should have been at least 3 or 4 numbered signs) was empty of any the expected signs.

We ended up turning back empty-handed (a record, perhaps?) and getting back for lunch around 1:20 pm. I ended up resting up the afternoon as I was a bit tired (not having slept well for a number of nights) as well has having stomach ache, which didn't really help my energy levels. Joel had to ditch his camera equipment on a convenient branch in the end: hiking to 2nd campsite isn't easy! On the way, we spotted two treecreepers (?),brown birds which moved up a tree by hopping up the main trunk. We also spotted a dark bird with a blue collar.

That night we had a massive thunderstorm at 3 am (see what I mean about not sleeping very well), with the rolling thunderclaps lasting several seconds and the rain sounding like a heavy waterfall, thunderous, in fact (forgive the pun!). I had to get up in the middle of the night and found that the water from the tap did not flow as it usually did and wondered if this would mean problems tomorrow. Not a good thing when we didn't have any power either, something that happens nearly every time there is heavy rainfall here….that, plus landslides, almost guaranteed.