Sep 7 Day 6 Refuge du Manganu-Refuge de Petra Piana 10km Ascent 980m descent 740m 7hrs My relief as I wake , noting the pain in my arm has pretty much abated, is shortly replaced with.an affliction of Tourettes.....Holy Crap, if hell is a neverending uphill path, I am on it at 6h30 on Sep 7 2014..its like a Mariah Carey harmony, never feckin ending..it brings a new level to up, I swear..steep and bouldery mixed with clambering over bare rock...mixed with steep and bouldery....I feel like Bear Grylls...well Bear Grylls or a goat, the only two living things I can think of who would be on this highway to hell by choice! Most of the boulders I am climbing over are bigger than me..it is like climbing over giant gobstoppers.....mmmmmm gobstoppers :) Ahem! anyway, I wave at a space shuttle and dodge to avoid a shooting star, as I continue up to the highest point on the GR20 route, the Bocca Alle Porte at 2225m (7,300 feet)..(6 x Empire State Building). It is worth it though, for the views over Lac de Capitellu and Lac du Melo and there are, once again, grins and mutual respect all round. When everybody else has gone, I take out your picture, like I often do on the route, when the views are spectacular, and I show you the panoramic, just in case you cannot see it from where you are. I want you to feel what I feel, to see what I see, the exhilaration, the beauty. I kiss your picture and pop it back safely in my pocket. Then I kiss your ring about my neck and look forward to a nice relaxing stroll to camp...FOOL! Turns out, the ascent was the easy bit! Next up we have the , oh look ee here, steep and rocky slopes of Punta a e Porte where I get to grapple with rocky slabs, boulders and awkward deep gullies and..woohoo break out the Rolos, lets all have a barrel of fun.......more chains.. after which it gets even rockier! .I have done so much scrambling and grappling , my hands have the softness of hooves..they are so rough I could exfoliate my body with them. I am so dusty and dirty I look like a coalminer. It crosses my mind to just roll all the way down to the refuge..if only..I still have to pass Bocca a Soglia 2025m and Bocca Renosu 2150m. Then, it is another gruelling, ricket inducing , boulder hopping descent, so painful, I do some of it backwards to give my knees a rest, for fear they will snap. (that could just be a first for the GR20,!) Eventually, I reach Petra Piana 1842m, and stroll into camp trying to look nonchalant, and debonair, .....I probably look more like Gollum...and can only hobble, a few minutes later, to my ice cold torture chamber, which momentarily freezes me solid and actually provides some temporary relief. I hurt in places I didnt even know I had places. My ass feels like it is hiding somewhere between my shoulderblades....when I hear that it is lentils for dinner, I want to cry, but I am so dehydrated, I cant spare a tear hahah I crawl into my tent to watch the sunset and get cosy in my sleeping bag, fully expecting a good nights sleep after the days trek and as it is the first grassy campsite. 80km down, 110 to go. Just as I am getting dozy, some fecker in a tent behind me starts an Al Pacino monologue..it goes on and on...I think about the guy who killed two people camping in Phoenix park and wonder was one of them doing an Al Pacino monologue too... . Wish you were here so we could make some sounds of our own :) that would shut him up pronto..I miss your naughty bits and the doo dahs and the wotsits with you :) G;night Shabba Ranks xx
Posted on: Mon, 22 Sep 2014 22:10:53 +0000
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