Getting As Far Away From Pimm’s As Possible

words, photography, and illustration by Hayley Biddulph

I had just finished up accumulating a seventy-thousand dollar Hex debt, (also known as a double degree at the University of Sydney) and decided it was a good idea to purchase a two-year working visa for the U.K.

I would continue to model, make some money, probably join a run club and encourage people to be my friend, practice art like it was a religion, and maybe have some Pimm’s with my aunt and uncle over a small bowl of cocktail shrimp at the pub while it rained; might just be the perfect plan.

About two weeks before the perfect plan was to be put into action, I stabbed it in the back. In its place, I decided to spend nine consecutive months traveling. Everything in my life was working out smoothly—sensibly, on track. I got the degree, I finished an internship, I had worked really hard saving some pennies (you know, standing still in front of a camera). Now I wanted to put it all in a smoothie bowl and blitz it. See what happens.

I wanted an adventure that didn’t involve squeezing into two-sizes-too-small heels—don’t get me wrong, that can be an adventure in itself—but before I left to go have Pimm’s with my aunt and uncle over a small bowl of cocktail shrimp at the pub while it rained, I needed to climb to the top of as many mountains as I could, and get as far away from Pimm’s as possible. 

When you make a decision like that so abruptly, people may think you are impulsive. My agent simply said, ‘Enjoy: make sure to get inoculations for South America. Apply sunscreen.’ That’s how you know you have a good boss.

By month six, I found myself in the heart of Patagonia, very much uncomfortable, twenty meters from the ground, gripping onto a granite cliff. 

“How the fuck did I get here, and why in the world am I doing this, on purpose, and for fun?” 

Rock climbing requires a lot of patience, practicality, and being okay with heights. I have a very limited capacity for each of these things. 

Yet, after a multitude of bad words, positive-then-negative-then-positive-self-talk, and Patagonian wind changing the shape of my face, I mustered a strength within myself that reveals itself only during moments of survival. I put my faith in a tiny crack I had never seen before, and planted my toes there, carrying the weight of my body. The people on the ground became ants. The wind howled at my eardrums. I wiped the sweat that clung onto my forehead. 

Using the strength in my legs to lift myself up, I touched the cold metal chain at the top of the climb with my beaten up pointer finger. My fear of heights dissipated in that very moment. I let out an embarrassingly loud sound of elation, that ricocheted off every stray dog in El Chaltén below.

When I decided to buy a car with a rooftop tent to road-trip Patagonia for two months, I let go of a lot of things. I let go of toilets. I let go of my phone. I let go of expecting things to go to plan. I let go of coffee (a tragedy). I let go of my pillow (the wind literally blew it away). I let go of a REM cycle. I let go of all my distaste for hiking fashion (no offence). I let go of my skin care routine (not that I really stick to it anyway). I let go of looking into a mirror (good riddance), and I let go of showers. I let go of comfort. 

Don’t get me wrong, showering is probably one of my greatest joys in life (I have this weird thing where I need clean feet before I get into bed). But guess what? I let go of that too.

It got so dirt-bag that I found myself tucking into a second tuna can for lunch, after a second tire popped in the middle of the Argentinian desert. 

When we finished changing the tire, I ate peanut butter from the jar for dessert with the same unwashed tuna-stained spoon. I skulled some water, but it tasted like petrol. Then I realised the water I just filled up from the petrol station was literally mixed with petrol. 

I panned the scene: cracked cow skulls lay next to my bare feet, shining milky white in the sun, looking more put together than me. Turquoise lakes were dressed with flamingos, so perfect and pink. The Andes mountains watched our sprawled bodies move in slow motion, wincing while we begrudgingly fixed our car for the fiftieth time. The sad road-kill armadillo cracked in two, felt like a warning sign. Andean condors soared above us, too busy looking cool to lend a hand (or wing). 

We were at a fork in the road, and we didn’t have a signal. The classic question, “Which way?” felt better left unsaid. We were in a solid convoy of five: Sam, Gabe and Mimosa (best name I’ve ever come across), Darcy and I. 

Level-headed, top-tier humans with a large dose of “should be right” energy. I’d trust any one of these people with my life. I’d also trust any one of these people to give me a good hug if I needed one, and to rip into me if I said something really stupid.

“I don’t know guys,” I said assuringly to the group after a lifetime of deliberation, “I have a feeling we should go left.”

So we went left. And if someone thought we should go right, you know what? We would trust them. Every time. After all, it was the blind leading the blind, with stomachs full of tuna cans, peanut butter, a mild dose of petrol, and pure momentum. 

We were seeking gut-lurching, far-away-from-civilisation stuff - adventures in Patagonia that you can’t find at first glance; the ideas that sit on the top of your tongue, and you’re unsure whether to say them aloud. 

‘Should we hike seventy kilometres into a valley filled with pumas with no way of contacting the outside world and try to do it in two days?’ The answer is always…‘yes’.

It took us a motorcycle accident, a bogged car and a constant theme of slipping into river crossings to realise that Patagonia takes no prisoners. The wind is unapologetic, flattening our tent most nights, and the highway dust became our main source of oxygen. But we had lifelong friendships and two-minute noodles; ice axes and cheap empanadas; Cat Stevens and Monopoly Deal. We had mandatory push-up competitions and silly hiking conversations spoken in the language of delirium. Silly is good, so are mandatory push-up competitions.

There are so many things that happen when you embark on a journey that feels so far from your reality and comfort zone. You realise that you won’t necessarily be good at this, and that’s the scariest part—so you become brave, more patient, less transfixed on getting things ‘right.’

I’m still trying to work out how I had the courage to climb active volcanoes, hike across steep glaciers and set up a tent for two months straight in Patagonia, and maybe I’ll never really know.

Life is just a bunch of forks in the road, go left, go right, whatever feeling burns the strongest.

You can press pause and restart as many times as you want. This is your life after all. You accept that there’s always time for all the different versions of yourself to flourish. You start to feel your ‘identity’ (or whatever that means) dissipate into nothing.  

That was the best part. I just became more human.