icefest wrote:Amazing job tortoise!I recall a couple years ago where you were convinced this would never happen!
Thanks, Icefest, and that's for sure!! A couple of weeks before the walk, I was still convinced it would never happen. But Maureen can be a persistent woman!
I guess she helped me progressively up the ante as I joined her for many of her last 17 Abels or so. Fortunately, she has slowed down, as a Senior Mountain Leaper, to the point where she can happily cope with my pace. That was going to be the crunch for me. I'm in between the Mountain Leapers (some of whom can be gracious enough to take me anyway
), and people I can comfortably keep up with who don't want to go where I want to go! But as this trip was largely to give opportunity for Maureen to get 3 of her last Abels, it was perfect. I also knew that I needed as much going for me as possible - hence the brilliant weather forecast was a key to me taking the plunge.
It was harder on the leader, as he soon discovered that when I took a turn in front through scrub, we went a LOT slower than when he did, even with rests. Thank you, Paul!!
Edit: And the thing I still chuckle about is that for various reasons, I was the only one to do all of the side trips! Even the day before, I had no intention of going to Tramontane, because I didn't 'need' it, and I didn't want to slow the others down. I only went because Maureen hadn't been feeling well, and I thought I'd go to be a moral support.