Most incredible storm rolled in this arvo. Unbelievable. Notes below: 0835. Sunday. Really getting hammered at the moment. Last three nights have been very very tough. Last night was probably the hardest of the trip. Even harder than the other night when the mossie dome got obliterated. A survival expert mate calls it the death of a thousand cuts. It’s all the little things that combine together to form a much bigger whole. It’s rarely one thing that goes wrong. It’s multiple smaller things. So the challenge is now to arrest that deterioration and get comfortable again out here. Last night was really hard. Went to bed in a ball of sweat. Fly on of course because of the impending storm that always threatened sufficiently to make me keep the fly on. But it never really came. So about 0200 I got up, still in that same ball of sweat, to get some relief. And then five minutes later the raindrops started. Back out in a rush to get the fly back on, at which point the raindrops (big but not lots of) then stopped and remained like that for the rest of the night. So at about 0400 I got up again and pulled it off. But the relief was only minor, because by then the wind at dropped to zero and the humidity levels amped up another level. So the lack of sleep is wearing a bit at the moment but that just means I need to lift a level. Which, perversely perhaps, is a challenge I enjoy. To keep mentally strong and not let the fatigue start to take you down. To look past the fairly new gas struts under the bonnet that just failed and mean that the bonnet won’t now stay up of their own accord. To look past the phone that won’t charge unless I put it in the fridge first. To look past the headlights that haven’t been fixed properly after waiting ten hours over two Saturdays. To look past the IPhone that just shut down because it overheated. To manage around the GPS Battery that has pretty much cooked. To keep smashing the electrolytes and get some food into me. They’re the important things. To get stronger, not weaker, as the intensity out here lifts a bit. I’ve found a great creek bed now that I’ve shifted from my previous location. Big river gums. Plenty of shade. Not the baking heat that was the drill pad when I got up this morning. Not going to push my workload too hard this morning and early afternoon. Might go for a drive this arvo to check out another landmark location. I say that as the ants start to bite now. Gotta love it! 1630. Heavy rain falling. Most spectacular big black storm blew in this afternoon. Every bit as good as anything I’d seen at Cable Beach. Was amazing. So now copping the rain bit as it goes over and wondering whether there might be a surprise in time for sunset. Who knows. It might rain all night. The creek bed ended up getting pretty hot pretty quickly and so I decided to go for a drive around midday to check out another location that I’d had earmarked. Remote part of the range that I’d never been into previously. About 40 kilometres north west of my camp. Track ended up being pretty good, but the country opened out and so I ended up pulling rank 32 kilometres in. Saw some scrub cattle but that was about it. The decision to get out when I did might have been a good decision. This storm is punching out the thunder and lightning. It’s as if the country has said all of a sudden, “righto, time to get you some real photos. We know you’re serious now. And here’s all the opportunities you’ve been chasing, plus a few more.” I’m not used to taking images at 1530 in the afternoon but that black storm rolling in earlier over the range was incredible. Hope they turn out. Bit edgy here at the minute though as I’m a bit exposed to the lightning side of the equation. Can’t really move for fear of getting bogged. So most things I can think of have been disconnected. It’s been an interesting experience this time around. Previously, the most I’d ever waited was 17 days, and then it was almost an expectation I’d get an image. That came out of my experience waiting at Birdsville in 2009 when on the seventh day I got my image. It felt awesome. Vindication that I stuck it out and so it came. But this time, the longer the wait went, the more I came to the realisation that nothing in life is a given. There was a real possibility again that the opportunities this time around might not come. Patience and hard work help maximise the chance of an opportunity, but they don’t guarantee it. So all you can really do is work hard so that if an opportunity comes you can take advantage. So it’s been a journey this one. When the light eventually started to come these last few days there wasn’t any feeling of ecstasy or vindication. Am probably too exhausted to feel that. It’s become more like one of my survival walks. Get through each 40 minutes. Mow down a kilometre of country at a time. One foot in front of each other. Keep working towards the end. No mistakes. Focus on good decision-making.
Posted on: Sun, 25 Jan 2015 08:57:36 +0000
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