Tuesday, December 6, 2011

The Gold at the End of the Rainbow




Authors note: The following events have not been exaggerated or embellished. Seriously.

Picture a grey morning, the sun has just risen above the sea, despite the cloud’s best efforts to mask it. Picture three men, three miles in to a proposed twelve mile hike, straining their eyes towards the horizon. Picture a lone ray of sunlight breaking through the clouds, illuminating the prize they’ve been seeking for weeks.

Nest check, 28/11/11 Messers Benjamin Barca, Thomas Edwards and myself (Zachary Halter) have just reached the mile 15 marker. Normally this is where nest check ends but we’ve decided to continue to mile 12, which is where the most jags have been seen the last few weeks. We’ve been scanning the horizon every half mile and again all we see are logs and driftwood. Then the sun comes out down by mile 15 and two logs that had looked black, suddenly are shown to be orange. After further inspection they also appear to be moving.

Though excited we know this is nothing definitive so we carry on down the beach. Just past 14 4/8 we checked the horizon again. After seeing nothing for about two minutes almost simultaneously Tom and I look down the beach and shout in shock. Just over 100m away are two jags. We immediately drop to the ground and when the jags are looking away we dash to an old turtle nest along the vegetation. We lie down and keep watching through the binoculars. When we get another opportunity we run up to another nest 15m further up the beach, this one directly behind a tree and some shrubs. To our disbelief the jags begin walking towards us. A few times it seemed they would stop and stare right at us, then continue walking our way. All three of us were laughing, sweating, just trying to hold the binoculars steady. After 10 minutes they were within 50 meters and our professionalism kicked in. We decided to try to ID these jags, which required us to go back to our bags and get our cameras. Tom and I got low to the ground and, hugging the tree line, ran back to our bags. We got the cameras and headed back. Unfortunately, we were spotted on our return trip, and the jags ran back into the forest, not to return again.

After a very necessary 15-minute cool down session, we went to the spot where the jags had started. There we took victory photos of ourselves, as well as their paw prints in the sand. Then, triumphant and victorious, we began our long walk back to base.

Picture a grey morning. Picture 3 men, taking their time on a long walk home, ear to ear smiles on their faces. See these men turn after 2 miles, wanting to see again the place that brought them such happiness. Picture again a lone ray of sunlight breaking through the clouds, illuminated that place that now is so dear to their hearts. Picture a rainbow forming above the ray of light, becoming maybe the first rainbow in history to accurately show a place where a treasure was found.

-Zach H, intern




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1 comments:

Dom G said...

Ninja-like - nice one fellas! Cameras next time though eh? :-)