Do You Have Any Rope?

I brought plenty of different things with me for my time here in South Africa, entirely too much stuff to be completely honest. The one I've used the most though and been repeatedly glad about having is far from the item I would have expected.

When I packed 20m of 4mm static wrap rope I thought it might come in handy a time or two, but it was mostly the backcountry Montana in me that put it in my bag I think. It has proved it's worth time and time again since leaving the states though. It made its first appearance shortly after landing in Johannesburg. As we started packing our luggage into the trailer of our kombi (15 passenger taxi van), it was becoming apparent that not everything was going to fit very nice and neatly. Without the assistance of the rope tying all the top layer of luggage to the trailer, I'm not sure all ten of the SA-YAGM's bags would have made it to our in-country orientation. At the time I felt fairly confident that this may well be the last time I could be justified in having brought this 20m worth of rope, but once again I was greatly mistaken.

Since then that same rope has been used to tow vehicles, assist in tree cutting operations, held down the hood of a car when the latch broke, been used as an indoor clothes line multiple times, and helped as a teaching tool for slack line with friends. I'm sure I'm forgetting something else that this simple length of rope has been used for, but in short, it's the last thing in my bag I expected to be most grateful to have brought!

Peace

*written March 5th