I wrote of my difficulties getting out of the airport onto Tonkin Highway. Above is the map. I invite you to try to figure out which way is the right way.

Here’s the map in the newspaper last week:

I challenge you to work out which is the correct path to take from this. I know now, but until I did this research, I could NOT tell from that.

Yesterday I got the microSD card out of my Navman GPS and found I’d recorded the whole trip. I found the section in question and reviewed my path. (Bloody marvellous technology! At the same time that I’m seeing what the camera saw in High Def video, the Google map is alongside the vision, showing my path on the map as the car moves along.) I wish I could post the video but the file is 722MB. Could be done, but I don’t have time.

So this is the path:

What I learned is that I was on the right road all along. I was just thrown by that crazy tight loop to get back onto Tonkin Hwy. I lost my sense of north-south when I went around there and couldn’t work out which way I was travelling. I was actually going OK, but thought I was going the wrong way. If I hadn’t taken an exit onto Gt Eastern Hwy at the top of the map here, I would have been fine.

I still think the road design is very poor and the signage is inadequate. I think any driver could be confused, and having to slow to 40Km/h on that tight left loop is crazy for a major intersection. Bad design. Seems to be the norm for WA – bad airport design, bad roads, bad signage.

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I’ve said before that I have a low opinion of the level of intelligence in WA. I find the letters to the editor in the West Australian newspaper are mostly idiotic. But one writer took us to new lows on Tuesday.

He thinks the weather forecasts put out by the Bureau of Meteorology are no good, and he used the cancellation of the Xmas Pageant due to the forecast of bad weather, when it turned out to be fine, as an example. OK, so a storm didn’t eventuate, but it was still cool and windy.

His solution? We should boycott the weather forecasts by switching the TV off at the end of the sports section and refusing to watch the TV weather.

Bloody hell. This guy should be turned into a weather reporting station in Antarctica for five years, I reckon.

Postscript: today’s letter section carries another four letters supporting the guy above’s view, that the weather forecasts are useless. Well, I’ve spoken to a friend and we agree, the forecasts are excellent. Sure, sometimes they’re wrong, but it’s the weather, innit?

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I watched episode 9 of Fargo last night on SBS. Holy smoke, what a gore-fest. It showed a massacre between police and crime gangs in Sioux Falls, N. Dakota in 1979. They reckon it’s a true story. Good ol’ USA. Guns are the answer to everything. When it finished I noticed my pulse was raised.

I say again, what a double standard. TV stations can show this extreme violence, admittedly with an MA 15+ rating, but there are strict limits on anything of a sexual nature being shown. It’s not as strict as 20 years or more ago, but there’s still subtle censorship and it’s much tighter than for gun violence and the like.

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I’ve caught Channel 7 in another case of showing the same episode of Big Bang Theory almost consecutively. It was two nights separated by one night, on different digital channels, but even so.

I must admit Seven and Nine are showing a wide range of episodes, more than I thought, but when they’re showing up to six episodes a night between them, and I’ve been watching the show for five years or more, repeat episodes crop up all the time, even if they’re spaced a couple of months apart. I’m writing down the episode names and it will soon become clear how many repeats are being shown and when. I won’t keep this up for much longer. It’s easy to do, but it is a time waster.

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I’ve also watched two episodes of Bangkok Airport on Nine, and what a showcase of the difference between Thais and Europeans.

The Thais are unfailingly polite, fun loving, friendly and absolutely free of swearing and rudeness (unless they’re doing it in their own language, but I don’t think so).

In contrast, the Europeans, Poms and Aussies, are slobs. Foul mouthed, bad mannered, temper tantrum throwing, low intelligence idiots. They get robbed, lose their passports, lose their luggage, run out of money and come to the airport with injuries and expect the Thai staff to solve their problems. Which they mainly do. But when, sometimes, they can’t help, they get scowls and bad tempered remarks.

I realise that we’re only seeing the low life people and that there are thousands of nice Europeans (like me), but I don’t believe there would be any badly behaved Thais as passengers at other world airports, throwing tantrums, swearing and treating airport staff badly.

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Lake Batur, Kintamani © PJ Croft 1985, 2015

I made another hotel booking in Bali yesterday, for a hotel on the crater rim at Kintamani. It would be somewhere in the left foreground in the shot above, I think. It’s just for two nights, hoping to get some dawn shots over the lake, maybe. I still have the two night booking in Ubud on the way back. I just need to organise transport to get there and back, now. A friend has given me contact details of a guy he uses. He’s incredibly enthusiastic about this Bali driver so I’d better use him or have a good excuse why I didn’t. Apparently his parents live in the Ubud area so he can make it a visiting thing while transporting me.

Crater Lake Storm © PJ Croft 1985, 2015

These two shots were only about half an hour apart.

Speaking of transport, I’ve found the Kura-Kura mini-bus service which I wasn’t aware of before. It not only covers the Kuta and Sanur sides, it also goes to Ubud. Not only that, its routes go right past my hotels. And, and, it has an Android app showing all the routes and timetables and telling how long until the next bus. How about that?

I’ve installed the app on both my phone and my Samsung tablet. I wasn’t too fussed about using this tablet, but I’m swinging around to using it. I think I’ll take it, with my laptop too. Crumbs, laptop, tablet and phone, all doing similar things. And, two full sized cameras, plus the cameras in the tablet and the phone. How crazy is this?

I initially thought I might take my GPS as it has maps for Bali, but Google maps really does all I need and it’s on my phone. So the GPS will stay home.

I took a drive out to the airport yesterday afternoon to check the new road into the place. It’s all changed recently and I don’t go there often.

Going in was dead easy, but I’m glad I checked because there’s a specific lane marked for rental car returns. Now I’m prepared.

I just drove into the carpark then straight out again, within the 10 minutes allowed for drop offs, so I didn’t have to pay anything.

But going out of the airport, heading for home again, I got completely bamboozled. I was in the left lane of a two lane section when I came on a split into two single lanes. The left lane was signposted Armadale and the right lane to Midland. I didn’t want to go south to Armadale so I hurriedly switched across to the Midland lane, thinking I was going to go via Roe Highway or whatever.

But my choice of lane started to veer left and went into a very tight 40Kmh 270deg turn! I couldn’t work out which way I was going and there was no choice, I just had to keep going. I was swearing and cursing because I’d lost my sense of direction. I didn’t know where I was going.

It soon became clear that I was headed for Great Eastern Highway, going east. I turned at some traffic lights, thinking I’d find a way to go north or west, but once on Gt East. Hwy you’re constrained by the railway line on the left. I just had to keep going, trying to find a way back to Roe Hwy. My GPS was no use as it was still trying to direct me back to the airport and it’s too risky to try to reprogram it while driving.

To cut a long story short, I reached Guildford before I was able to turn left over the river bridge and rejoin Roe Hwy. What a debacle. All because I was confused by that sudden split into two lanes back near the airport. They are utterly confusingly signposted.

I won’t be caught like that next time, and I may be being picked up when I come back from Bali so I won’t be driving, but it’s possible I might need to do the rental car thing in reverse. I mean book a car to be picked up at the airport on my arrival about 11pm and drive it home. Cost – $52. Cheaper than a taxi.

Holy smoke, the distance from here to the airport is 55Km and takes a full hour to drive. I’m a long, long way out. On the way home my GPS suddenly said, “You have been driving for two hours. Please consider stopping for a rest.” Two hours and I was still on Reid Highway.

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I don’t like blowing my horn at other cars but I had to yesterday. The right lane was stopped at the lights at Quinns while the left lane, my lane, was clear and green. There seemed to be some problem with a car at the lights in the right lane and the tail back drivers were getting frustrated.

So one of them tried to suddenly cross into the left lane just as I was coming up at about 60Kmh. I had to blow the horn and brake a bit. He stopped his move and it was OK. But the thing is, if he’d just moved out slowly, I would have let him cross in front of me, given way to let him out. But no, he had to move suddenly, which surprised me. Fool.

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Is this winter again, or what? Funny weather. Rain, rain, grey clouds. Good for the gardens and lawns.

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I was using spray on lawn fertiliser from 2 litre containers on Saturday and was about to start, with the hose snapped on, when I was distracted and put the full container, with the hose attached, down on the garden wall (about 300mm high). I forgot about it and didn’t notice it again until yesterday.

The wind must have knocked it over and I found it upside down on the lawn next to the garden wall. But when I picked it up, it was empty, and the lawn where it had been was completely black in a circle about 100mm across.

It seems that all the fertiliser had leaked out from the holes in the container cap, onto that spot of lawn, and burnt it black. All 2 litres of it. Wow, this’ll be interesting, because that area of soil will be saturated with this full strength fertiliser. It’ll be interesting to see what happens. I might get a big burst of growth in that spot.

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My blog seems to have picked up a couple of followers and one has obviously been doing an awful lot of reading, because he’s commented on a post from last Xmas. Thanks mate, and I hope you’re enjoying what I’ve written. Boy, I’ve written an awful lot – 1156 words in this post alone. I’ve been writing it for six years now. All my posts are quite long and I’ve done about 735 by now. When I use Blog Booker to make a book out of it, it’s thousands of pages. I wonder if anyone will ever read it after I’m dead and buried, like in 100 or 500 years’ time.

I’ve read a bit of Samuel Pepys’s diaries written between 1660 and 1670 and they’re fascinating. I’ve got a BBC set of CDs of the diaries being read with atmospheric sound effects, and it’s 11 discs! That’s more than 12 hours of material. I’ve only just made a start on them. I find it hard to concentrate and stay on the voices unfortunately. My mind wanders and I have to go back and replay sections.

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Bali next Sunday and I’d better start my packing. I need to take an awful lot besides just clothes these days. All my dozen medications, tablets, my insulin injectors and the means to keep them cold. Some bandages and Inodine patches (iodine) just in case. Pill containers, with enough spares for another week in case the ash cloud delays the return flight.

All the camera gear, but besides that, two chargers and power cords. My laptop with power brick and cords, and an HDMI cable to plug it into the hotel’s TV if I can.

My CPAP machine with all its hose, mask and power cable. A power board so as to avoid needing too many power plug adapters.

My tripod and head.

Phew, clothes and toiletries are the smaller part of packing these days.

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My Sony phone is not proving itself very reliable. Three times now it has locked up completely, such that I can’t even turn it off. I’ve had to take the back off and press that tiny reset contact while pressing the power button to make it restart. Luckily it comes up OK, but this is not good. Bad dog, Sony.

This is the caption accompanying this picture from The Guardian:

An illegal shipment of horns, antlers, dried sea horses and tortoise shells destined for China was confiscated by Indonesian police, who later burned it.

Destined for China. This is the common theme. The destruction of the world’s wildlife is largely due to CHINA. In particular, due to the desire of Chinese men to have better sex.

I do NOT like CHINA!

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Speaking of wildlife, on my walk around the lake this afternoon I saw an ibis quietly having a sleep (standing on one leg) on a rock right next to the footbridge.

Ibises. © PJ Croft 1985, 2015

This is the first time I’ve seen one in these lakes. Usually it’s only ducks and coots and seagulls. (The above picture is one from the 1980s at Lake Gwelup, shot on Kodachrome 25 with the camera on a tripod.)

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This is also the first time I’ve ever known the Channel 7 Xmas Pageant to be cancelled today, due to the weather. It’s raining, flashing and thundering and blowing quite hard as if it were winter. Yet it’s the start of one of our long hot summers.

As I say, I’ve never known the Pageant to be cancelled before in more than 20 years. I think it’s a first. Very disappointing for all the people involved, apart from the kids. (Postscript: yes, according to the paper, it was the 44th, and the first to be cancelled. As it turned out, the weather was OK at 7.30pm on Saturday night, but cold and windy so it wouldn’t have been pleasant.)

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I was having a quiet pint at the pub last night when a guy tapped me on the shoulder and thrust his phone in my face, showing me a picture.

It was this one. It was George R. R. Martin. Apparently I look like him. Oh come on. Who’s George R. R. Martin anyway? And why would a mature bloke have a picture of him on his phone?

Game of Thrones. Apparently he’s the writer/creator or something. I said I had no idea what Game of Thrones actually is. They couldn’t believe someone wouldn’t know about it. Well I don’t.

Anyway, it was a reasonably friendly conversation, but there was a lot of ribbing about hair, or lack of it. Two out of the three were shaven headed, but when I took my cap off, I was ribbed about my receding hairline. What?

Oh well, I gave up on that and returned to my paper. I got handshakes when I left, so I suppose I was OK, but I didn’t know how to take them as all their talk seemed to be private jokes.

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I’m writing this at 4am on another night of insomnia. I got to sleep very easily but awoke at 1am and that was it. I’ve just had some chamomile tea and I’ll try again now. Damn, I never used to have trouble sleeping. Getting older, apparently.

8am update: nope, never got back to sleep. Lucky I never have to go to work. Oh well, I’ll crash at some time during today.

I’m on my hobbyhorse about tilted horizons again. Above is one of the worst I’ve come across recently. The yellow line is the horizon. It’s 6.3deg. off. The alternate picture shows the corrected version. Sure, the beach looks sloping once the horizon is levelled, but that’s how it was. How could the photographer have let this out in public uncorrected?

Here’s another one, not so gross but it offends my eye. Water is level. Repeat, water is level, horizontal.

These are animated gif files, by the way. I’ve known this can be done but I hadn’t tried it up to now. It turns out there’s a free web site to do the job for you, http://gifmaker.me/ so I might do it more often from now on.

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Yesterday I went to the Joondalup Medicare office to make some claims. I came away empty handed, after nearly an hour,  shaking my head in frustration.

First, I had to stand in a queue of a dozen or so people while a woman with a tablet checks you in. That’s not new, but I find any standing quite painful (back muscles) and tiring. There’s absolutely nothing to lean on. It took between 5-10 mins just to reach Tablet Lady.

I showed my Medicare card and she directed me to take a seat and wait. Ten minutes later, a woman came and asked me to move closer to a small booth, seated, luckily.

Then she called another lady over to ask me about whether I had an iPhone or an Android phone. Huh? Well, it turns out that we’re expected to make claims on our phone these days. Or on our home PC, of course.

But to do this, I have to set up a myGov account and a phone “app”. I don’t want to bloody do this, but it seems we have no choice. There was only one woman actually behind the claims counter. (This is after I discovered a few weeks ago that the Whitfords City Medicare office has been closed down. Grrr. This is obviously a part of the never-ending strategy to cut staff and get rid of people.)

So we moved to another desk with a giant vertically mounted LCD screen and the young woman proceeded to show me how to set up this myGov account. This involved an ID authentication (driver’s licence, Centrelink card, Medicare card), then some form filling on screen, then the issuance of my User Number, and having to enter another eight digit authentication number sent to my phone, and choosing yet another new password. (I use a password management program and I’d estimate I have well over 50 user names and passwords, which I back up assiduously, I assure you. Plus another 80 or so software and website key numbers, licence codes, user names and passwords. Holy cow!).

Then the woman attempted to download the “app” to my phone. No go. I have data and wi-fi turned off, of course, because I don’t want anything more than phone functions on my phone. I don’t want to do anything more than make and receive calls. I don’t want all my emails appearing and loudly beeping at me on my phone!

So I turned wi-fi and data on in the Medicare office, but still no go. She couldn’t get this app to download. I said in frustration, “Just leave it, I’ll do it at home later.” So I ended up empty handed, unable to make my claims. I said, “Can’t I just go to the counter?” OK, so she showed me over.

I haven’t made a claim in about a year so I had a small bunch of invoices and receipts. But the woman went through them and said they are not filled out correctly, missing an item number and so on. Grrr. They’re all for the same specialist and we’ve had this problem before, and I thought we’d sorted it out more than a year ago, but it seems not.

So after all this faffing around, I walked away empty handed. This is a series of claims for many hundreds of dollars, so it’s not trivial. What a debacle. Bit fed up with this.

I have logged on to my new myGov account at home, but I can’t see any “app” to download. In any case, to make any claim on line, I have to either scan my invoices and send .jpg files, or take a photo of them on the phone and send those pictures. All this adds time and complexity that I don’t want. I suppose it saves me having to drive to a Medicare office, but Whitfords was on my way to Trigg, so that’s why I was OK doing that.

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I paid for the travel insurance this morning. I went through the existing medical conditions checks again and it worked out OK. I’m not having any current problems and I haven’t had any hospital treatments for more than a year, so they weren’t worried about me. Now I’m covered if Garuda goes bust or my luggage catches fire.

When I notified my bank on-line that I’m going to be away, they invited me to activate free travel insurance on my Visa card. OK, I’ll be in that.

This company declined medical cover, which is fair enough, but they cover me, at a basic level, for the other routine events. Of course, you generally can’t claim on two travel policies, but since I didn’t have to pay for this one, well, why not do it?

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It’s pretty amazing to read that Jetstar has been severely criticised for two incidents which had huge potential to cause major incidents recently.

In one case, a plane was in the air between Brisbane and Sydney when they discovered they had 16 more passengers on board than they had allowed for in their manifest. What?! This totalled 1,300Kg extra weight. That’s pretty significant.

In the other case, a plane taking off from Melbourne was found to be way out of balance, such that they struggled to get off the ground. Once in the air, they had to get passengers to move seats to re-balance the aircraft.

For goodness sake, this is Jetstar, the subsidiary of Qantas, not some cheap overseas cut price carrier. As the aviation writers say, it defies belief that any pilots could allow this to happen, let alone on a major Australian carrier flying within Australia.

I don’t know for sure, but I’ll bet my boots this is due to Jetstar’s employment of cut price, low wage overseas trained pilots. Or due to working their pilots on too long shifts, so that they are too fatigued. Even so, any pilot should be able to recognise if he’s too tired to fly. Anyway, there are always two pilots in the cockpit. How come the second pilot didn’t catch this? It’s a worry.

I’m always amazed at airlines constantly trying to use cut price pilots, or to cut wages to the bone and get rid of people any way they can. This kind of thing is the result. People are going to die while the high wage big boss managements in their plush offices count their bonuses accrued for cutting costs.

Let’s hear it for the unions. Meanwhile, stop trying to get the absolute cheapest airfares! I’m paying full fare this trip. It’s not much more expensive (about $60?) and I get 30Kg luggage allowance with two checked bags, a meal and free drinks. I’m not going to put up with being packed into flying cigar tubes, even Jetstar or Virgin. It’s a pity my money will be going overseas, but …

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I’ve reprogrammed my reticulation to reduce the watering times. The retic guy set it to 15 mins for both stations, but with the increased pressure and the fixed sprinklers, I don’t think I need anywhere near that much. I’ve reduced the front verge to 5 mins, and the backlawn and garden beds to 10 mins. This is twice a week. That makes me feel better.

Blue prahus, Sanur, Bali © PJ Croft 1986,2015

Below is a country summary from a travel photography viewpoint by a photographer I admire very much, Ming Thein. He’s a Malaysian guy who spends a lot of time in Melbourne.  http://blog.mingthein.com/

Bali, Indonesia
Photo friendliness – 10/10
Photo opportunities – 7/10
As with almost all places in Asia, Bali is very welcoming to tourists and puts up with their photography; the challenge is going to be getting from place to place because most of the interesting sites like Tanah Lot require a vehicle to get to, and there’s not much in between. The more touristy areas like Kuta in the south are basically divided up into the usual tropical tourists traps of eateries and pubs, or compounded resorts. None of these afford much to shoot, though some of the resorts do have interesting architecture.

Hmmm. Dunno that I agree with that, Ming. Ten out of ten for friendliness, yes, and putting up with our photography, well, anything if it will provide a money making opportunity. Nothing wrong with that.

But only 7/10 for opportunities? He obviously hasn’t spent much time there. The photo above was shot from the sand on Sanur Beach just by walking from my hotel to the end of the street.

Barong dancer, Kuta, Bali © PJ Croft 1986, 2015

This one was a performance in south Kuta not far from my hotel. We were bussed there from the hotel, but it was still a genuine performance.

Funeral, Kuta Beach © PJ Croft 1985, 2015

Again, this one was a walk down Kuta Beach from my hotel. We were informed of this funeral scheduled for a Saturday afternoon by the hotel people.

Besakih, Bali  © PJ Croft 1985, 2015

This one required a bit more organisation. It’s the Besakih Temple on the southern slopes of Gunung Agung. Just drive or ride to Klungkung and turn left. I’m pretty sure I rode my motorbike there, although I’d never attempt that now. There are any number of organised tours, though, so getting shots would be easy.

Looking to the coast from Besakih. © PJ Croft 1985, 2015 I have no idea who the guy in the blue sarong was.

So for all Ming Thein’s undoubted expertise and talent, I think Bali still offers massive photo opportunities. All those shots above were taken in 1985 and ’86 so it was relatively uncrowded then. I fear the hordes of tourists (me included, of course) make photography less easy now, but it can still be done.

Kuta Kite © PJ Croft 2010, 2015

Sanur chores © PJ Croft 2010, 2015

Kuta Kid © PJ Croft 2010, 2015

These are more recent shots. They’re quite different from Ming’s style, but I think they’re OK. I hope to do better this trip, although it’s getting harder to get around.

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I’ve just had a visit from the police. My doorbell sounded and I said, “Just a minute”, and a voice said, “It’s the police.” Oh yeah? I opened the door carefully as I’m always wary that some low-life could say that.

Anyway, he stuck his card out and said, “Is your name Victor?” Nup.

They were looking for a Burmese looking guy and they had this address for him. How long had I been here? Did I know the previous owners? (I do, and they’re not Burmese.) How long had they been here? A couple of years, I think.

So it was a wasted trip for them, but it’s easy for someone to give a false address. Happily, they didn’t put the hard word on me to buy tickets in the police raffle.

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I have to buy a new “head gear” for my CPAP mask. This is the neoprene rubber strap that holds the mask on your face.

The cost of these straps is $65! This is an utter rip-off. I cannot see how they could cost more than $5 to make. I bought my last one in September 2013 and unfortunately they get dirty and tatty after a couple of years’ use (well, after one year, really). I’ve paid Resmed many hundreds, even thousands of dollars over the years since I started CPAP in 2000. It’s all a rip-off. How is it that Resmed machines and accessories are sold for half the Australian price in the USA, when it’s an Australian company and they’re made in Australia? If you try to buy on-line from a USA supplier, they won’t supply to Australia. What a surprise. I can’t be sure but I’d say Resmed puts a prohibition on them – they won’t get any stock if they sell back to Australia. Rip-0ff!

I’m well overdue to buy a new machine (we can buy a new one every five years and get rebated from HBF). My machine was bought in 2008.

The result is that I’ll almost certainly buy another brand that I can buy at a big discount from a USA supplier. Probably the NZ brand, Fisher and Paykel.

You don’t believe in poltergeists, do you? Neither do I. Well, another very odd thing has happened and so far I can’t explain it.

Last night at about 8.15pm I was watching TV when suddenly there was a loud noise exactly like a bag of rubbish, with cans and glass, being thrown over the wall separating my house from next door. The noise lasted two or three seconds then ended with a loud, sharp CRACK like a stone hitting my window pane.

It made me sit up quick smart and look around, I can tell you. What on earth … ? I thought I was under attack. This 2m high wall is only about 4m from where I was sitting, but unless this rubbish bag had been thrown by my neighbour, I couldn’t work out where it could have come from.

I looked quickly at my windows from inside, expecting the glass might be broken, but they were intact. So I went to the laundry, switched on the outside light to the “drying court”, the space between my house and this wall and went out. I expected to see a bag of rubbish strewn over the paving, but no, nothing.

My light going on brought my neighbour, Barbara, out and she said she heard it too. Yet neither of us could see any thing amiss. (We have conversations over this wall where neither of us can see the other. We just talk through the wall 🙂 like in that TV show a few years ago where you only ever saw the top of the head of the neighbour over the fence. Or like Howard’s mum in Big Bang Theory, where you only ever hear her voice.)

I went out to the back lane where the bins were out for collection, thinking I might find one of them pushed over or something, but no, they were fine.

So I left it as a mystery last night, thinking I might find something this morning in daylight, maybe something thrown from the street, although it would have been a prodigious throw to have reached this drying court. Again, in full daylight, everything’s fine.

So, what on earth … ? What made this noise? It wasn’t just me — my neighbour heard it too. Applying Occam’s Razor, it must be a poltergeist. I’m haunted! That must explain the missing letter last week too. Uh oh.

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It was yet another almost sleepless night last night. I dropped off easily at about 11.45pm but awoke at 2.30am for a pee, but although I was very relaxed and could feel myself on the edge of sleep, I never got back to sleep again. It’s not as if I’m having obsessive, racetrack thoughts, I’m not. My mind wanders all over the place, into quite weird and amusing corners at times, but just as I think I might be on the edge, something pulls me back from the cliff each time.

The result is, with only 2½ hrs sleep last night, I’m woozy and groggy. I’m using valerian and another mild melatonin type sedative, but they ain’t enough. Yet, on other nights I sleep right through.

Problem.

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It was the final episode of SAS, Who Dares Wins last night on SBS. Crikey, out of about 30 guys who started the course, only two made it through to the end. The instructors were deliberately strict in dropping people out in the early stages, on a quota basis at times, but at the end, three guys out of the five remaining chucked it in right at the very end. If they could only have held on for another few hours, they could have finished proud. It was the interrogation that got them. It wasn’t all that physical, they weren’t bashed and beaten, it was just the pressure of having to hold stress positions for hours while completely hooded, then being subtly questioned with the intention of breaking their stories. Three out of the five did break.

Gee, I wish I was that type. Fit as bulls, incredible physical endurance, able to run and run in any weather and terrain. Fantastic camaraderie. Back in my high school days in the army cadets, just occasionally I briefly tasted that feeling of being in a fantastic group, even though that was literally kid stuff compared with the SAS. Then we went home to our soft beds until the next year.

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Canning Dam, WA, January 2011 © PJ Croft 2011, 2015. Pentax K-5

It’s the first day of summer, it reached about 30C and already, before the season has started, we’re being exhorted to save water. We’re way, way down in rain this year once again and climate change is in full swing. The shot above of Canning Dam (Western Australia) was taken in January 2011 and you can see how low the water level was then. We’ve had four more dry winters since then and there’s no sign of anything improving. We’ve lost 40% of the annual rainfall we used to have 40 years ago. I remember what it used to be like. This is serious, Stan. (I wish I could make these clickable to full size, but WordPress changed the software last week and now I can’t find any way to let you click on the image as we used to. Annoying.)

Mid-west salt lake, January 2011. You get a sense of scale from the tiny farm buildings at the centre left edge. © PJ Croft 2011, 2015. Pentax K-5

Dalwallinu, WA. Strange coincidence – I met a very nice lady from there at a reunion last year, but she’s gone back to Melbourne now. Sigh. Another one bites the dust. © PJ Croft 2011, 2015. Pentax K-5