PERSPECTIVE IS A FUNNY THING. Events can look very different depending on where you’re standing as you view them, or when. Sometimes, one looks back at one’s life and ponders, “Did I really do that? What on earth was I thinking?”
This could apply equally to blissfully setting off to hitchhike to India with only a few dollars to your name or attempting to eat a 2kg steak as big as your head. Nowadays, whenever I hear Easter Island mentioned in a nature documentary or tourist brochure, my eyes glaze over, and I’m back in 2016, in the pre-dawn glow at Ahu Tahai, a ceremonial platform just outside Hanga Roa, Rapa Nui’s only town.
eyes of the glowed menacingly from inside its silhouette. The only sounds were the crashing of the Pacific Ocean on the jagged shoreline and the juddering of my nervous left leg against the soft earth. No one else had turned up, but then again, why would they? There’s only one sure way to win an ultra marathon, and it has nothing to do with strict training regimes, nutritional plans or being lucky on the day. The secret is to be the only entrant, and that usually means organising the event yourself! Though it
