It is not often that that the Wednesday Walks test the mind as well as the lungs and limbs to the very limit. But Ian W´s walk managed just that; his sales pitch had said that “We will leave from the Foz at 9.00am (now that the clocks have changed).” And so it was that at 8.40am Tina, Hedley and I sat coffee-less outside the Foz and puzzled over the logic behind his proposition that because the clocks had ben put forward by one hour we had to start half-an-hour earlier than usual. Even when she had explained that in Einstein´s theories the ideas of absolute time and space were superseded by the notion of space-time in special relativity and by dynamically curved space-time in general relativity, we remained baffled. Clearly, so too had the Foz staff who had failed to open at 8.30am (in Ian W´s space-time, that is). But the Leader was relentless and allowed no time extension for morning coffees. And there was still Heliotropism to come! Read on.
Seekers after knowledge
Leader: Ian W.
Survivors of the previous week´s trek: Dina and Tina.
Others: Val, Hazel, Hedley, Rod, Chris, Antje, Paul, and JohnH.
Dogs: Tiggy and Maddie.
The Track
The Statistics:
Total distance: 15 km
Total Time: 4 hrs 30 min.
Moving time: 3 hrs 40 min
Overall Avg.: 3.3 km/hr
Moving Avg.: 4.1 km/hr
Total Ascent: 511 m.
Max Elevation: 325 m
The Leader´s Report: The Cistus Count
Chapter One – Complaints Corner
“Eleven mostly complaining souls and 2 dogs (not complaining) gathered
outside the Foz de Banho at shortly after 0900 hours. There was much
to complain about. First of all, the leader had moved the start time
forward by half an hour (or 1 1/2 hours in old time) which meant
getting up earlier than usual. To add insult to injury, the Foz did
not open until just before we set off and nobody was able to get a
coffee, there being only time for the ladies to spend a few pennies.
Nevertheless, there were still a few smiles in the obligatory pre-
start photo.”
The Starters
Chapter Two – The Softening-up Process
“ We moved quickly downhill, crossed the river and along
the river bank, assailed by the sweet aroma of pig sh##. the first
hill proved no problem with a number of walkers managing to walk and
talk at the same time. Along the ridge, down into the valley along a
new track for us to the first water crossing (in name only). Even Paul
didn't bother to line up for a photo of somebody falling into the
water.”
New Water Crossing
Chapter Three – Hilltorture and Horticulture
“We then commenced Killer Hill, which silenced everyone until we
ran into the cistus ladanifer, which was in full bloom all the way up
the hill. The game was to find a perfect 10, but as usual we failed.
Some noticed cistus albiflorus in their hunt -it has no blotches at
all- and mostly we found the standard 5 petals and blotches. However,
Paul and Antje discovered a near perfect 9 and had the satisfaction of
carrying the sticky exudate of fragrant resin with them for the rest
of the walk. None of us realised at the time that the cistus ladanifer
diverged from the cistaceae family during the Pleistocene Period 5
million years ago after the opening of the Straits of Gibraltar, and
has been decorating the hills of Southern Spain and Portugal ever
since.”
Hush, botanists at work
Near-perfect Nine
Spot the phoney Tilley
Chapter Four – Along the Ridges and Valleys
“At the top of the hill we had a panoramic view of Foia, Picota
and the south coast, but with poorer visibility than 2 weeks ago. We
walked along a ridge and then descended to a stream,which the dogs lay
in and some of us felt like joining them. We then trudged up a long
slow hill before having lunch at the top.
It was during this long perambulation that Hedley marvelled at how flowers are heliotropic and, after he had explained what that meant to the less well informed, we
wondered what the term for people seeking shade would be. Not anti-
heliotropic because we would have to seek shade opposite to the sun,
not just any old shade. Enough rambling.”
Lunch in the shade
Chapter Five – Val and Chris Go Missing
The Missed Rendezvous – Where are they?
“We had lunch on a side road and then,after a short flat bit, climbed a steep hill to the summit of the
walk, which John H´s Track describes as Green Hill, leaving Val and Chris
to find us when we came down. They were not to be seen, but shortly
afterwards we caught up with them to find that they had been rushing up
and down the track since we last saw them. We then hot footed it to
the Foz for a cold drink and a welcome rest.”
Here, Paul told one of his inimitable jokes (I mean, would any one really want to copy him?) and then launched into his Tilley Hat monologue – the Minor Mutiny will be relieved to learn that this time it lasted only 4 1/2 minutes – before he went on to rehearse his second Mastermind Specialist Topic, which is that of the comparative alchoholic strengths of British Midland and southern Portuguese beers. We wish him well in his endeavours in UK this month.
For those of us still puzzled by the failure of Val and Chris (two experienced walkers) to make the rendezvous at the bottom of Green Hill, the following extract may possibly serve to explain why they headed off in the completely opposite direction when they had actually seen us up on the hill top:
“Just as Einstein's own Relativity Theory led Einstein to reject time, so Feynman’s Sum over Histories theory led him to describe time simply as a direction in space. Feynman’s theory states that the probability of an event is determined by summing together all the possible histories of that event. For example, for a particle moving from point A to B we imagine the particle traveling every possible path, curved paths, oscillating paths, squiggly paths, even backward in time and forward in time paths. Each path has an amplitude, and when summed the vast majority of all these amplitudes add up to zero, and all that remains is the comparably few histories that abide by the laws and forces of nature. Sum over Histories indicates the direction of our ordinary clock time is simply a path in space which is more probable than the more exotic directions time might have taken otherwise.”
Time can indeed be confusing; not so Heliotropism, which is quite simply explained:
“Heliotropic flowers track the sun's motion across the sky from East to West. During the night, the flowers may assume a random orientation, while at dawn they turn again towards the East where the sun rises. The motion is performed by motor cells in a flexible segment just below the flower, called a pulvinus. The motor cells are specialized in pumping potassium ions into nearby tissues, changing their turgor pressure. The segment flexes because the motor cells at the shadow side elongate due to a turgor rise. Heliotropism is a response to blue light.”
I´m very glad of that last quotation because, while rambling on like this, I had been wondering how I could possibly reintroduce a favourite topic in these blogs, that of Bananas. Now the segue is easy because the reason that bananas are good for one is, of course, that they are high in potassium. This blog has been quite a fan of bananas in the past as that mythical creature, the attentive reader, will have noticed. It was sad, therefore, to have read in the news recently that, when a banana was offered to a player in the course of a recent Scotland v. Brazil soccer match, that player took umbrage and accused the Scottish fans of insulting him. Now it is true that, because of security personnel, razor-wire fences and protective moats surrounding present-day football pitches, it is very difficult for a fan actually to present a player with a bit of fruit with due punctilio. No, he has to toss it. But Scottish people do not toss little bits of fruit; they toss cabers. The young Brazilian player may be forgiven for not knowing that. But to me the oddest part of the whole farago was that the Scottish Football Association waded in claiming that the tosser could not possibly have been a Scottish Soccer Fan (SSF) because SSFs are world-renowned for their “impeccable behaviour”. The SSF may well be renowned, for example, for his good humour – good humour is actually a sine qua non for a SSF because, as the world knows, Scotland hasn´t won a seriously important football match since the world was young - but for impeccability of manner ! I think not.
Anyway, as our Leader for the day said, enough rambling. What to finish with? Well, since we in the AWW value the banana – we have for example adopted the Ingrid Bonte Scale of Endurance which is based on it – a gesture of support for the fruit as a symbol of goodwill and good health is called for. Luckily, we can call up this bit of music recommended by Yves which manages to combine nutrition (the fruit itself), culture (“Rigoletto” by Verdi) and linguistics (it´s in French)…enough to challenge the intellect, n´est-ce pas?
Juanita Banana
Sorry, I got confused in the middle there - what was all that about the Scottish tosser?
ReplyDeleteWell, Terry, it´s a bit like the dog that didn´t bark. You see, the tosser wasn´t Scottish.
ReplyDelete