Team 2.2 - knuckles

Day one in camp - The look of horror on Fraser Allan's face when he discovered his tent bag contained no pegs or poles made the rougher moments of the trek easier on the 14 challengers that remained. The breakdown that Katie went through when she found out that the "lettuce" she'd been preparing was in fact Chinese cabbage made it worth every every leech wound we had suffered - and we had suffered.

As if carrying 70 litre rucksacks on our backs and walking 57 kilometres wasn't enough, Fraser and Fraser felt the the need to rip the sleeves off their t-shirts and take on more weight than most could handle. A world challenge rated 5 out of 5 level trek for difficulty and the boys were still looking for a way to make the extensive walks even more taxing on their bodies. The amount of "jungle crossfit" that the rest of us have had to witness seemed to tire us more than Brodie and the boys but Finlay had to take a back seat after bumping 8ft down the almost vertical peak of the knuckles and landing on his coccyx.

I'm not sure what was worse, peters quips or Michaels shorts tear that manages to scar our guide Nishante for life. The sleep shouting - courtesy of Mairi Patterson was enough to wake us all - only 8 hours early for beakfast . Hannah Braidwood got a well earned rest after her concise budget keeping leading up to and during the trek. Evie's yelps after breaking her nails lead Brodie to believe a few legs were broken. Rhiannon's idea of a jungle toilet adventure took a turn for the worst when we got back to find about 17 leeches on each leg. Sources also say she rolled down the "hill" in the night to use Hannah Braidwood as a human matress. Mairi  Gilroy - (Gary Milroy) - had plenty to say to keep us all entertained on our way up to the top. Leading the way from day one she was one of the teams main motivators -"damn near innapropriately happy" - tom barker. The animal noises that came from Iain - team leader - confused the majority of us during the trek, man or monkey - Iain or iguana.

However, despite the leeches and the quite literal downfalls the trek through and over the Knuckles was thoroughly rewarding for all. The views from the guest house on the third night of the trek were breathtaking. Looking back over the mountains to see all we had achieved really made all the struggle worth while.

"This is what we came for!!" - Brodie Runcimen

Hannah bardett