Advanture Tour that have changed my life!

Got up very early in the morning, it is cold, and my body is aching….. What? Do we need to walk again? Yes, straight to the first ferry to Olympic Park, then straight hop on a bike and off we go. Yuval, studied the map of the Olympic park on the ferry, so we knew where to go, we found the Olympic stadium pretty quick, and to find Fatso the Wombat on one of the pole next to the stadium was easy too since one of the real race crew members was next to it to give us our next lead note. Nice place this park, it is so much fun riding here, and no stress since the rules were saying that we need to leave first since we finished last the day before.
Next destination a BMX track, what!!! I thought I might give it a go, but I saw someone from the other teams try to attempt it and we fell on the first go, so I figured since it is a one team member task Yuval should do it and not me. After Yuval’s first attempt he said it is very hard and tiring. On his second attempt he was half dead already, his third attempt ( the one that really counts- a real time trial) really took the best of it he was really exhausted, he finished the track within 60 second, rob and peter won this challenge, we came third. We got our next lead note which directed us to the Archery range, a short ride from the BMX time trial track. I missed the instruction on how to use the bow since I went to the rest room, and I was the nominated team member to do this challenge since Yuval was exhausted from the last challenge. Truly I was very good at this I even burst the balloon that was in the middle bull’s eye; however I burst it at the wrong time, which was after the point’s competition, so we came last in the points tally on this challenge. But it was fun, and I had a really good feeling about the whole day. We went on the bikes again and paddled to the train station parked the bikes and went on the train, after that we needed to catch a taxi to the Olympic white water rafting track- I didn’t see this coming!!!!!
Even at the beginning (although it was after long safety check, and very long and clear instructions) Yuval and I jumped into our canoe and lost control. How do you direct this thing? How do you go forward with it? How you not falling off? I don’t think white water rafting is our specialty. So, who will be the first team to go on the track? The teams have decided on paper, scissor, and stone tournament to make that decision, I lost so w had to get out there first. This is what people mean when they say ‘you have to jump into the cold water’ , we had to leave all our fears and worries on the dry surface and just do it, off we go. The instructors were really nice and they gave us a really good sense of security and “no worries” feeling. We’ve done well in the first part , I was at the front and I paddled really strong and hard, Yuval was at the back and he was screaming common!! Push it! Paddle, paddle! Harder! Faster! Even the instructor was impressed and then bam, we just toppled over. The water pulled us in, we tried to linger around some rocks and get close to the outside walls of the track but the stream was very powerful, eventually I notice that there is a rope behind me that I need to grab, I caught it but I could not move, the instructor looked at like he expect me to do something, but the water were so cold I couldn’t move. In this contest w came second or third I think. When finished we got our next challenge which is to get to Bondi Beach and build a sand pyramid. That was fun, but I think we have invested in it too much time and effort, since we were late to the bus that took us to the next point, we have arrived to the last pit stop for the day very late after the rest of the teams but the view from there was so special and cool, than they took us to the most famous fish and chips restaurant in Australia on Watson bay, and then back to the hotel, sleep time.

The beginning of the race was a bit weird, since we didn’t know what to expect and how competitive we suppose to be. So, we looked for the easiest and quickest way to the Opera House, we got their almost at the same time as everyone else did and we looked for the real race flag, next to it were our next lead notes.
Next task was to look for some kind of a chair, probably a historic Australian icon, since the first local that we’ve found knew exactly where it is, we run behind team Toyota that have tried to increase their pace all the time, I was breathless, I was struggling mentally to keep up the pace and control my body that looked like it is about to switch off.
Finally we have arrived, we understood that this is only the beginning, we got our next lead note, this time it was split task we could chose between two, each one with its pros and cons, we didn’t want to go to the state library so we went to the national gallery instead since we knew that the queen of Sheba is holding flowers in her hand even before we went into the gallery, since we know this painting but we went in to check it out anyway. We found her easily since the gallery employees were with us all the time and asked us to take off our backpacks, and not to run inside, we went out after a second looked for the real race crew member to tell him that the queen of Sheba is holding flowers in her hand to get our next lead note.
Next task pie easting contest, hammm I thought to myself, great timing it is lunch time and I am really hungry. We hitch hiked to the pie place, we had that feeling that we are doing really well since most teams are still at the gallery so it was really surprising to see them all at the pie place when we got there, and more surprising was to see them really wanting to eat this revolting thing. At first, I got really scarred it was huge and what is that green mash they put on top?! I was on my own, Yuval couldn’t do it, the lucky guy.
O.k. we bought 3 and we went aside for me to eat them, after the first bite I understood that it is not even tasty, what is that thing they put inside? One of the other team members thought it was funny to tell me it had horse shit inside, it didn’t help me with eating the damn thing, well this is a once in a life time experience, I never plan to it this kind of thing again even in my life. Yuval felt pity on me because I was about to vomit so he decided that we will go on the minimum points for this challenge. Our next task was to get to the Chinese gardens. We found a taxi and we were encouraging him to drive as fast as possible. At the gardens they’ve told us that they will let us leave on intervals so it was good time for us to plan how to get to the next place in the quickest way. Next destination was the green jade carriage at the Queen Victoria Building, it was very simple to find the building and when we got there we asked at the information desk for the exact location pf the carriage, we saw other teams looking for it so we went quietly from the other side, next to the carriage (which was very beautiful) stood a crew member from the real race with an orange vest, she gave us our next lead note. Next task is to find the shortest street in Sydney, we looked at the map we’ve got with the lead note and started to run, we run a lot, but I got tired so we looked for a taxi, the taxi driver was very kind and he open a book full with maps and found the street, we wanted to hop in and go there but he said to us that it is only 3 minutes walk from where we were. We went towards that street and suddenly we saw Shane the tour director standing there next to the real race flag. Finally, I thought to myself ‘its over” apparently it wasn’t we needed to find a hotel. We run to the next information centre but before we went in a lady from a next door shop showed us where to go. We have found a dark old pub, inside we’ve found the real race support crew and one team that got there a head of us, and there we needed to wait for the rest of the teams. I thought that it is over, I wanted to kill myself after all this running and backpack carrying, I am soooo not use to it, when all arrived we’ve been taken to the observatory, they explained to us there about the stars, showed us a 3D movie and we had a look through the big telescope, we saw through the telescope people climbing up the bridge, cool! Can we go to sleep now?
From there we’ve been taking to the harbor bridge climb, what?!!! Climbing?!!! I got scarred, really scarred; I didn’t want to do it. It looked too high and scary.
Everyone around me reassured me that it is safe and promised me to take really good care of me, some even said that this is a good opportunity to get over my fear, so I have decided to do it, no reason to spend more energy about it. After so many explanations, and gear we went up, I was terrified but then the my feeling changed since there is that sense of security there, every step I made the scenery was more beautiful, I made sure that this once in a life time experience will be well documented, so many pictures of me climbing on the bridge were taken.
We had a really cool guide, she was really funny, I think she was handling our group since she is very much camera oriented and the real race was filming on the bridge, she was a real celebrity.
The way down off the bridge was the scariest part, since it was dark and going off the ladders I was completely on my own. But I have done it!!!
After the bridge we went to a German restaurant ( since when German food is so special?) but it was very nice, it was underground and the German entertainment team was very funny. They had beer drinking competitions etc’. I almost fell asleep at the dinner table, when we went to the hotel room I thought to myself- wow! This room is so cool, so big and the bathroom the big bath I’m in heaven, but all I could care about is to sleep, I crushed on the bed, got up in the morning with a very sore body, oh now I know of few muscles groups that I never knew that they exist in my body.