I had a call out of the blue from an old mate during
Easter, who I haven’t spoken to in what seems to be a lifetime.
Sam and I met up at a local pub and talked about the shenanigans we got up to many years ago. It was a different World back then, with far more freedom than today.
He was the first wog I’d ever worked with. In the beginning, he drove me up the wall, but as time went by we became firm friends. That’s when I got introduced into the Italian culture.
There was a group of us who use to go bush, all male and what a time it was, with camaraderie I don’t see today.
Sam back then was a bit of dill, and would try anything. We were camped on the Lerderger River with his brother, and a few other work mates.
We woke up on the second day, had breakfast, and decided to go for a walk. After a while we came across a section of the river and decided to descend what was effectively a 100 Ft
cliff.
I had a fair bit of
rock climbing experience at that time, and cautioned Sam not to attempt it without some gear. He finished up going down using a 3m length of rope designed to hang your washing on.
The end result of that was rope burn, and a fall of about 90Ft down to a gravel patch on the river. There were four things that saved him. Firstly, he’s big boned, reasonable amount of fat, large blackberry cluster at the bottom, and a Army bum pack that protected his back.
By the time I reached him he was talking to the Fairies and not in a very good condition. I’ll never forget the three hours it took to push and pull a 14 stone fella back up that
cliff.
Back at
camp it became obvious that Sam wasn’t in a good condition, He’d sustained a rather bad head injury. Making matters worse, his brother was not a very delicate person, and continued to belt Sam across the head whilst using a potato sack needle to close the wound.
The rest of us went back to our drinking. Sam was placed in a tent to moan and groan for the next couple of days before we took him back
home to the missus.
What happened after that is another story.
Regards
Kim