Olympos Climbing: Day 4
Woke up feeling surprisingly OK, given the state I'd been in when I went to bed. It felt like the temperature I'd had the night before had burnt itself out overnight, leaving me feeling post-viral and achy, with no desire whatsoever to eat breakfast. The others gradually emerged and we came up with plans for our scheduled rest day while the two Toms cemented their notion of walking down to the beach to check out a new climbing area.
While we were talking, the hitchers arrived to pick up their hire equipment. After initially selecting a harness with so much slack in it, she was probably going to slip out, the woman went back and upgraded to a smaller one before returning to sit by the wood burner while the others fueled up for breakfast. Talking to her, it became clear that (a) they'd managed to blag their equipment out of the activity centre by claiming that they were climbing with the English group; and (b) they weren't quite as clueless as we'd feared and they'd done some, if not all that much, indoor climbing.
After breakfast, Newberry and Coras set out to explore while Gav told us that he was going to wait until midday when the sun would be off the wall behind the camp before doing anything. The idea was that the people who were up to it could do a spot of climbing and, because the crag was close to Kadir's, they'd never be more than five minutes away from a lavatory. An important consideration given the detailed information we'd been given on the state of AH's bowels — never have I been on a holiday where I've known quite so much about other peoples' bowel movements or where the Bristol Stool Scale formed such a key component of every converstation.
I went to the crag to do some belaying, but AB quickly decided it wasn't for him and we headed off the the beach instead. Along the way we bumped into the Toms and their hitch hikers — both of whom were surprisingly undamaged — before hitting the sea for a brief swim. Afterwards, I covered myself in sunblock and loafed around while A read. We saw the E and H in the distance, walking back to the road, but by the time we spotted them they were too far away to easily intercept, so we let them go.
On the way back to camp, we explored the ruins of the ancient Hellenic town of Olympos. This contained a number of fine, if slightly vandalised sarcophagi and routes through the scrub to some historic locations. By far the best was the path up to the castle — a bit of a struggle for someone who wasn't feeling well and hadn't eaten for 24 hours — which proved to have a spectacular view both of the bay and of the ruins and of the valley.
While we were talking, the hitchers arrived to pick up their hire equipment. After initially selecting a harness with so much slack in it, she was probably going to slip out, the woman went back and upgraded to a smaller one before returning to sit by the wood burner while the others fueled up for breakfast. Talking to her, it became clear that (a) they'd managed to blag their equipment out of the activity centre by claiming that they were climbing with the English group; and (b) they weren't quite as clueless as we'd feared and they'd done some, if not all that much, indoor climbing.
After breakfast, Newberry and Coras set out to explore while Gav told us that he was going to wait until midday when the sun would be off the wall behind the camp before doing anything. The idea was that the people who were up to it could do a spot of climbing and, because the crag was close to Kadir's, they'd never be more than five minutes away from a lavatory. An important consideration given the detailed information we'd been given on the state of AH's bowels — never have I been on a holiday where I've known quite so much about other peoples' bowel movements or where the Bristol Stool Scale formed such a key component of every converstation.
I went to the crag to do some belaying, but AB quickly decided it wasn't for him and we headed off the the beach instead. Along the way we bumped into the Toms and their hitch hikers — both of whom were surprisingly undamaged — before hitting the sea for a brief swim. Afterwards, I covered myself in sunblock and loafed around while A read. We saw the E and H in the distance, walking back to the road, but by the time we spotted them they were too far away to easily intercept, so we let them go.
On the way back to camp, we explored the ruins of the ancient Hellenic town of Olympos. This contained a number of fine, if slightly vandalised sarcophagi and routes through the scrub to some historic locations. By far the best was the path up to the castle — a bit of a struggle for someone who wasn't feeling well and hadn't eaten for 24 hours — which proved to have a spectacular view both of the bay and of the ruins and of the valley.