Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Last weekend I took part in the corporate SA Challenge. 2 days and 2 nights worth of physical and mental challenge :) I was in an all girls team of 6 (only 4 people took part in each of 5 stages) and brandhouse entered a girls and boys team. As a team we took the time to leisurely drive to Goudini Spa stopping for lunch at a wine farm, where of course we talked tactics too!
Check involved being tagged with electronic dippers, having to adorn sack like blue outfits (one size fitting all) and organising a box of goodies including compasses, water bottles, head touches, pens, paper, first aid kit and most importantly spare inner tubes!
After dinner and the obligutory speeches our team captain received information on the first two stages - the first of which kicked off at 9pm in the spa grounds. Basically stage 1 was a treasure hunt, involving dashing about the spa picking up bonus points, answering puzzles and scratching out words on a 20 x 20 grid to reveal a phrase. Each stage and this stage was no different involved a 100m dash to take an envelope of a washing line, answer a mathematical problem in exchange for which you received a map indicating where the bonus and puzzle points were, as well as the puzzle desk to which you had to take the phrase once you had resolved it. I enjoyed dashing about, cracked the phrase "In Viena in 1600 the Australians invented the croissant" but really struggled with the 6 mathematical problems. As a team we picked up all the bonus points, cracked the phrase and completed the task very quickly, however we failed to answer any of the maths puzzles correctly :(
The following day (clear blue skies and rather warm), I was again the team of four. This time for some cycling. I was quite chuffed to be the member of the team to resolve the first puzzle from the washing line, and receive our map a long time before many other teams. Stage 2 involved cycling up and down rows of vines purchasing items e.g. oil, diamonds, wheat, electronics etc in exchange for money and purchase discs then bringing them back as quickly as possible to a trading pit where the cost of goods bought and sold were set every 90 minutes and you could sell items for more money. You had to move about in pairs and each team had one trading armband which had to be worn in the trading pit. The tricky thing about this stage was the thorns that reared their heads amongst the vines. Janine suffered a puncture after her first cycle and whilst fixing it lost a key component of her wheel. Two other members of our team (me included) suffered further punctures before the end of the 3 hours. The loss of the nut to Janine's wheel, meant we were one bike down, so being a better runner than cyclist I ran and Janine rode my bike - I felt like Forest Gump!!! Anyhow we made lots of money and solved one of three bonus puzzles so with 15 minutes left we began what proved a long and slow return to the finish line. Having lost its wheel we were unable to ride or push Janine's bike so ended up carrying it for approx. 2 kms - this proved very, very tough and we finally crossed the line 1 minute over time (incurring a small penalty).
The afternoon's activity required more brains than brawn, so I was dropped (!!!) and had the chance to rest and cheer the team on. The team had to make a water wheel which when water was poured over it (one bucket per team and a 100m dash to the dam for more) created momentum to drag a bottle of water between 2 and 6 meters across the ground. The girls seemed to spend a long time planning, then all of a sudden 8 planks with oars rose from the ground spinning from a narrow pole. Not too mush happened to the bottle of water on attempts one and two, however by attempt three the bottle was moving. Given the struggle and the weight of the bucket of water the girls chose to run to the finish after dragging the water bottle 2 metres and not the maximum 6.
By the beginning of Stage 4 the boys team were coming 20th out of 33 and we were just behind them in 21st stage.
Stage 4 and 5 both took place on the Saturday another gloriously hot day. The location of both stages was alongside a trout river, dam and mountains full of more vineyards! The first of the last two challenges involved rowing a canoe to various spots around the dam where you were given photographs to memorise. Once you had returned the photo to a separate spot you had to answer questions on the photo e.g. a plate of jelly babies, how many yellow jelly babies were there!!! I didn't take part in Stage 4 - we opted for two strong rowers and the two girls who hadn't taken part in Stage 2. The team did so well, getting more questions right than any other team and finshing middle of the pack in terms of time.
Again the two brandhouse teams were neck and neck as we entered the 5th and final stage. This stage involved running, cycling and many, many puzzles. Our first challenge was to run to 6 points around an acre of vineyards picking up puzzles from which we had to identify lines from Robert Burns poems!! Having cracked at least 4 / 6 codes we were given maps of our cycle route. There were 3 bonus points that you could collect on the cycle route so we shot off at high speed. The route took us up a gravel path, off-road and through vineyards and through streams and ultimately across a waist high river! Having learnt our lesson in stage 2, Annelise and me ran for our first bonus point leaving our bikes at the beginning of the short detour (genius, we passed many other teams either walking through sand or fixing punctures). By the second bonus point we were tiring so pushed on, by the third bonus point me and Sam both had punctures, which given our proximity to the end of the cycle decided to pump through. Finally, we had to lift, drag our bikes across a river. Once on the other side we had to leave our bikes get a boule into a hoop and then run with our other 2 members for 2 kms to the finish line. We did amazingly well finishing 13th and overall 20th :)
I really enjoyed the weekend and hope to do much more adventure racing between now and next year when the challenge moves to the Drakensburg mountains in East SA.
- comments